England v Ireland St Patricks Day 2012

nerd69

GerM wrote: »

To highlight the reluctance of our coaches to look at new props, Australia currently have 11 capped props playing Super Rugby in their country, all of whom are 30 or younger. Ireland have 4: Ross, Healy, Court and Horan. Three of them are the wrong side of 30 and will be gone in the next 3 or so years. Of the likely men to come into the set up, Jamie Hagan has never even started a Wolfhounds game as the coaches preferred to use them to give run outs to returning old players. Ronan Loughney is a bloke who is moving into his late twenties, covers both sides of the scrum and has a single bench appearance to his name for the Wolfhounds. Someone like him should have been identified and worked on several years ago. Ridiculously short term approach.

the issue is not capping props its developing them at a good enough level. theres no point in starting a player for the crack. also australia are a bad comparison bigger rugby playing base and as a country they seem to produce tremendous athletes anyway

irishbucsfan

nerd69 wrote: »

GerM wrote: »

To highlight the reluctance of our coaches to look at new props, Australia currently have 11 capped props playing Super Rugby in their country, all of whom are 30 or younger. Ireland have 4: Ross, Healy, Court and Horan. Three of them are the wrong side of 30 and will be gone in the next 3 or so years. Of the likely men to come into the set up, Jamie Hagan has never even started a Wolfhounds game as the coaches preferred to use them to give run outs to returning old players. Ronan Loughney is a bloke who is moving into his late twenties, covers both sides of the scrum and has a single bench appearance to his name for the Wolfhounds. Someone like him should have been identified and worked on several years ago. Ridiculously short term approach.

the issue is not capping props its developing them at a good enough level. theres no point in starting a player for the crack. also australia are a bad comparison bigger rugby playing base and as a country they seem to produce tremendous athletes anyway

Australia don't exactly have a massive rugby union playing base...

rrpc

irishbucsfan wrote: »

Australia don't exactly have a massive rugby union playing base...

+1

League is the big game in Oz. They get some converts from league, but props aren't in that mix.

GerM

GerM wrote: »

To highlight the reluctance of our coaches to look at new props, Australia currently have 11 capped props playing Super Rugby in their country, all of whom are 30 or younger. Ireland have 4: Ross, Healy, Court and Horan. Three of them are the wrong side of 30 and will be gone in the next 3 or so years. Of the likely men to come into the set up, Jamie Hagan has never even started a Wolfhounds game as the coaches preferred to use them to give run outs to returning old players. Ronan Loughney is a bloke who is moving into his late twenties, covers both sides of the scrum and has a single bench appearance to his name for the Wolfhounds. Someone like him should have been identified and worked on several years ago. Ridiculously short term approach.

there is no long term in irish rugby. Short sightedness is a talent that the IRFU actively look for in a coach

nerd69

irishbucsfan wrote: »

Australia don't exactly have a massive rugby union playing base...

fair point the issue is still developing props here we have healy ross court (whos a good lose head felt bad for him yesterday) and the leinester backups

irishbucsfan

nerd69 wrote: »

irishbucsfan wrote: »

Australia don't exactly have a massive rugby union playing base...

fair point the issue is still developing props here we have healy ross court (whos a good lose head felt bad for him yesterday) and the leinester backups

Jamie Hagan spent two years as connachts starter and never got near the national team. They caused the problem themselves.

Benny Cake

There are a few issues contributing to our lack of props.

1. Nobody wants their kids playing prop, its deemed a "dangerous" position & parents would rather see their little Johnny playing anywhere other than front row.

2. Schools and underage clubs play guys who should be props, in the backrow to make the best use of their skills. I know from a few guys who have spent time playing at the lower levels in New Zealand that guys are specifically targetted at schools level & encouraged to move from 6/7 to 1/3. You cant blame the school teams for playing a guy whos 6ft1 & 16 stone in the backrow as that is where you will get him on the ball most. However, in the long run, that player might be better served converting to prop if they have a desire to make it as a pro. Guys like Sean O'Brien, Denis Leamy are top players in their own right but maybe it would have served the greater good if they played front row from the age of 16 on... I can think of countless backrow forwards from my time playing schools that were among the best in the country at the time but clearly never had the height/pace to step up to the next level.

Until attitudes to front row players changes at grass roots level we will continue to struggle for props, while we drown in a sea of backrow forwards.

GerM

nerd69 wrote: »

the issue is not capping props its developing them at a good enough level. theres no point in starting a player for the crack. also australia are a bad comparison bigger rugby playing base and as a country they seem to produce tremendous athletes anyway

Australia don't have a bigger playing base. Rugby is a minority sport there and is vastly outweighed by Aussie Rules, league and cricket. Them producing tremendous athletes is not a coincidence.

It's not giving players a run for the laugh. It's integrating them into the national set up and providing options. Some of those for Australia weren't up to it but now they know and can focus on others. Loughney has done a decent job at tighthead this season despite being a loosehead, certainly no worse than what we saw yesterday. Not giving them a shot at Wolfhounds level is foolish. Realistically, we only have 3 international options in the front row playing in this country. It's a ridiculous state of affairs. Hagan not getting a start for the Wolfhounds last season due to Buckley getting a run was shambolic. Horan and Buckley both have a few starts at A level in the last couple of years. Wilkinson and Archer are the only new props that have been given a start for the Wolfhounds since Kidney's arrival.

La Ola

I live in Limerick but being from just outside Northampton am a massive Saints fan.I dont post here at all really but felt that yesterdays win was what i thought at the time a great win for the new young England team but on reflection probably was half that but half the fact that the developement of Irish players in certain positions is non existent.First and foremost I am a life long Rugby fan (long before HC) and feel a complete injustice is being done to Irish Rugby.I get to see as much rugby here as I can but it is so obvious that the grand scale of living off older players will destroy the contest that Irish rugby was always famous for.Take the hit of a couple of losing seasons with new faces to give them the opportunity and experience and that goes for provincial teams too.. I constantly here that the player base is not there.I do not believe that for one second. Its the pressure of the win that has caused this problem Leinster and Ulster are making an effort but the ruling body needs to take responsibility and action now not when most of the 'Top Flight' players are mid 30's promote the game invest in the clubs and look further abroad Ireland has branched out across the globe surely there is a good few players eligable and capable enough to pick up the shortfall at international level... cheers PeteG

rrpc

La Ola wrote: »

I live in Limerick but being from just outside Northampton am a massive Saints fan.I dont post here at all really but felt that yesterdays win was what i thought at the time a great win for the new young England team but on reflection probably was half that but half the fact that the developement of Irish players in certain positions is non existent.First and foremost I am a life long Rugby fan (long before HC) and feel a complete injustice is being done to Irish Rugby.I get to see as much rugby here as I can but it is so obvious that the grand scale of living off older players will destroy the contest that Irish rugby was always famous for.Take the hit of a couple of losing seasons with new faces to give them the opportunity and experience and that goes for provincial teams too.. I constantly here that the player base is not there.I do not believe that for one second. Its the pressure of the win that has caused this problem Leinster and Ulster are making an effort but the ruling body needs to take responsibility and action now not when most of the 'Top Flight' players are mid 30's promote the game invest in the clubs and look further abroad Ireland has branched out across the globe surely there is a good few players eligable and capable enough to pick up the shortfall at international level... cheers PeteG

Good post. I'd add that Munster appear to be belatedly bringing in fresh players and it's doing them no harm at all. It's just not reflected in the national squad which is where the lack of development is starting to hurt.

blinding

rrpc wrote: »

I thought Sean O'Brien had a pretty good game and made some yards in tight areas. Was in a very good position to make good yards were it not for an absolutely atrocious pass from TOL to above his head.

Selections and substitutions continue to flabber my gast. Regardless of the RTE muppets calling for it, I see no point in having O'Gara and Sexton on the park at the same time. O'Gara just gave up at the end, kicking the ball into touch. There's a strong stench of disillusionment from the team and really that can only stem from one place.

I would agree with you on O'Brien yesterday but I meant over the six nations season with regard to O 'Brien.

Tomás O'Leary needs a break from playing for Ireland and its questionably whether he can make it as an international scrumhalf.

I have the greatest respect for ROG but how much longer will he be good enough to play for Ireland.

Flincher

You could make that argument that if Kidney wasn't confident in Court being able to cover tighthead, then he should have named a tighthead on the bench instead of one of McCarthy or McFadden. Its not like he uses the bench anyway.

Problem being we don't have a second tighthead in the country. Buckley is probably next in line. I think he did ok against Corbisiero in the second half in Thomond last season, but I wouldn't have been overly confident had he come on.

Sonics2k

First of all, I'll admit that Ireland deserved that loss. It was sloppy gameplay and though England didn't play much better than Ireland in the first half, they pushed a lot harder in the second half.

Secondly. The first try given to England was an absolute disgrace and should not have been granted.
I was actually watching the match in a bar here in England, and though everyone cheered when England got the try, most of the people watching openly admitted it was not a try and should not have been given.

I truly believe that that was the point where Ireland just gave up and stopped playing, which is terrible form from professional players. But it was hugely demotivating for them.

Personally, I think the Referee made some incredibly dodgy calls that cost Ireland heavily. I really hope he gets called out on it, as there is no chance in hell he could of seen the ball go down from where he was standing.

In terms of performance. A very dull game from the Irish team. ROG was (as much as I hate to say it) completely under par for what we expect. Heaslip was dull and basically quite useless. I will admit that Sexton seemed to be the only one trying to actively win.

Overall. A very dull game, far to much of it was based on kicking and penalties. Completely not what I was hoping for in the game.

Tox56

Flincher wrote: »

You could make that argument that if Kidney wasn't confident in Court being able to cover tighthead, then he should have named a tighthead on the bench instead of one of McCarthy or McFadden. Its not like he uses the bench anyway.

Problem being we don't have a second tighthead in the country. Buckley is probably next in line. I think he did ok against Corbisiero in the second half in Thomond last season, but I wouldn't have been overly confident had he come on.

I would rather have put Earls in at Tighthead.

Buckley has been minced in the scrum every time I have seen him play for Sale this season.

TOTO BERKS

why don't they do channel 1 in the scrum, get the ball out the back asap for heaslip to pick immediately and then problem in scrum is not an issue.
perhaps one issue is the hooker doesn't heel thesedays because scrum-half feeds the ball in to one-side??
Seems logical to feed it straight back to be picked before the scrum gets a head of stream up.
At least this would solve problem on our ball.

rrpc

TOTO BERKS wrote: »

why don't they do channel 1 in the scrum, get the ball out the back asap for heaslip to pick immediately and then problem in scrum is not an issue.
perhaps one issue is the hooker doesn't heel thesedays because scrum-half feeds the ball in to one-side??
Seems logical to feed it straight back to be picked before the scrum gets a head of stream up.
At least this would solve problem on our ball.

England were getting a push on before the ball went in most of the time. Should have been pinged for it, but weren't and we turned over ball because of it.

Ardillaun

CIARAN_BOYLE wrote: »

In faireness 2 high quality props is not enough in the HEC these days. While Healy started most games for Leisnter VDM made a massive difference when he came on.

Stan Wright was injured for the year, if he wasn't there and someone else went down injured instead Leinster would have been in major trouble last season.

Props are by far the most important foreign players in Ireland. That alone should tell us how serious the situation is.

Ardillaun

rrpc wrote: »

It was also canny coaching that identified the strength of the Saints scrum and nullified it at half time.

This is what the Ireland squad needed more than anything and it just wasn't there for them.

That was the most dramatic reversal of scrummaging fortunes I can remember. The coaching team deserves credit but Tonga'uiha seemed spent by forty minutes and Leinster's scrum looked even stronger after Healy went off.

TOTO BERKS

rrpc wrote: »

England were getting a push on before the ball went in most of the time. Should have been pinged for it, but weren't and we turned over ball because of it.

I agree this was a nightmare; the refs just don't have a clue about the scrum.
They just want the scrum-half to put it in quickly so to get the thing done with.
So that leads to some teams getting the push on as soon as they engage. And if the scrum-half delays putting it in he gets pinged!
The scrum needs to be settled properly before scrum-half puts ball in to avoid the engage-push in one movement.
It was clear England were doing that all day.

tolosenc

http://www.rte.ie/sport/rugby/sixnations/2012/0317/kidneyd_sixnations.html

Deccie: "I wasn't surprised by what happened at the scrum because Mike Ross got a crick on his neck at the first scrum and managed to play for half an hour after that."

Or in other words: "A player got injured, it was having a detrimental effect, so I decided to leave him in."

Clueless.

Cpt_Blackbeard

tolosenc wrote: »

http://www.rte.ie/sport/rugby/sixnations/2012/0317/kidneyd_sixnations.html

Deccie: "I wasn't surprised by what happened at the scrum because Mike Ross got a crick on his neck at the first scrum and managed to play for half an hour after that."

Or in other words: "A player got injured, it was having a detrimental effect, so I decided to leave him in."

Clueless.

Because bringing on Court helped matters? He has built an international career on being able to cover both sides of the Scrum. Bit of a chancer IMO.

tolosenc

Cpt_Blackbeard wrote: »

Because bringing on Court helped matters? He has built an international career on being able to cover both sides of the Scrum. Bit of a chancer IMO.

Well, I may be wrong, but it might just be Kidney's job to look out for player welfare. Playing a prop with a neck injury is borderline negligent.

The only chancer here is Deccie, who has built an international career out of EOS's team winning the Grand Slam years ago.

windsurfer99ie

Sonics2k wrote: »

First of all, I'll admit that Ireland deserved that loss. It was sloppy gameplay and though England didn't play much better than Ireland in the first half, they pushed a lot harder in the second half.

Secondly. The first try given to England was an absolute disgrace and should not have been granted.
I was actually watching the match in a bar here in England, and though everyone cheered when England got the try, most of the people watching openly admitted it was not a try and should not have been given.

I truly believe that that was the point where Ireland just gave up and stopped playing, which is terrible form from professional players. But it was hugely demotivating for them.

Personally, I think the Referee made some incredibly dodgy calls that cost Ireland heavily. I really hope he gets called out on it, as there is no chance in hell he could of seen the ball go down from where he was standing.

In terms of performance. A very dull game from the Irish team. ROG was (as much as I hate to say it) completely under par for what we expect. Heaslip was dull and basically quite useless. I will admit that Sexton seemed to be the only one trying to actively win.

Overall. A very dull game, far to much of it was based on kicking and penalties. Completely not what I was hoping for in the game.

Ha ! Sour grapes or what ? Your team are rubbish and they got hammered !

phog

Gutted after yesterdays performance, hard to know how we'd have coped if Ross hadn't gone off but without him I goose was cooked.

Did any player 1 - 23 leave the field without some error, I've seldom if ever seen so many silly errors in a game, some may have been because we were working from a creaking scrum but we just looked like we'd prefer to be somewhere else.

I thought when Ryan won that penalty just before halftime we might keep neck and neck with England but unfortunately it was never to be.

I pity Tommy Bowe, he's heading back to Wales the Champions after a terrible defeat and very little rugby to look forward to, at least the majority of the rest of the squad has H/Cup as well as a chance of the Pro12.

CatFromHue

phog wrote: »

I thought when Ryan won that penalty just before halftime we might keep neck and neck with England but unfortunately it was never to be.

I too thought in the second half we could get the finger out but that was not to be. Then when ROG and TOL came on I lost hope of us winning to be honest. While the scrum was a mess and we were comprehensively beaten in it the rest of our game wasn't great.

It's hard to disagree with Trimble when he said "It seemed like we were caving in and it's very difficult to hear yourself say this, but it felt like we gave in. That feeling hurts."

It doesn't give me any pleasure to say but TOL had a stinker and you could see the players heads dropping because of it. I think the management is losing the dressing room to be honest.

http://www.espnscrum.com/six-nations-2012/rugby/story/161396.html

Reading the stats from the game is not pretty reading either; 62 tackles made 8 missed, 13 penalties against, and 21 turnovers conceded to sum up a few.

phog

Actually, consdering the game Reddan was having I was happy to see TOL coming on but unfortunatly, he wasn't any better.

CatFromHue

No Reddan wasn't having a great game but TOL's mistakes very very bad.

thebaz

if Court is our number 3 prop , who is no. 4 ?

I think everyone, including Deccie, agree Ross is critical/irreplaceable to the irish team , yet he was very slow to use him early days

phog

CatFromHue wrote: »

No Reddan wasn't having a great game but TOL's mistakes very very bad.

Is that Reddan wasn't having a bad game?

irishbucsfan

TOL was awful. It was really embarrassing for the lad. Reddan wasn't great but he at least did some things well.

The second ROG and TOL came on our chances of winning disappeared. It was a ludicrous substitution. We were getting hammered in the set piece, we needed to keep ball in hand... So we brought on TOL and ROG!? Laughable. The game just became an excercise in damage limitation at that point.