RWC 2015 Warm ups

philthrill69

Apologies if there's a thread about this already but does anyone think that Ireland's RWC warm up games against Scotland, Wales, Wales and England so close to the world cup are a bit of a risk more than warm up.
Joe will have those teams to size up his squad against in the 6 nations so with the way our national team is so injury prone at the moment are these games necessary and would it have served us better to play a few teams like Georgia, Samoa, Tonga, Fiji?

Riskymove

philthrill69 wrote: »

Apologies if there's a thread about this already but does anyone think that Ireland's RWC warm up games against Scotland, Wales, Wales and England so close to the world cup are a bit of a risk more than warm up.
Joe will have those teams to size up his squad against in the 6 nations so with the way our national team is so injury prone at the moment are these games necessary and would it have served us better to play a few teams like Georgia, Samoa, Tonga, Fiji?

Georgia, Samoa and Tonga would be twice as physical and likely to end in injuries than the team we are playing

LeinsterDub

philthrill69 wrote: »

Georgia, Samoa, Tonga

Maybe if it was an A team world cup. We put 50 points on Georgia a few weeks ago with a B team

Podge_irl

Why would players be less likely to get injured against Samoa, Fiji or Tonga?

thomond2006

The Pacific Island teams are the last teams Ireland should play!

philthrill69

Podge_irl wrote: »

Why would players be less likely to get injured against Samoa, Fiji or Tonga?

The injuries were kind of a side point,
obviously the pacific island teams are some of the most physical in the world but my other point was that Joe will have his chance to pit his side against northern hemisphere teams in the 6 nations and wouldn't it be more beneficial to see how the same team would fair out against the Samoan, Fijian style of rugby to fully prepare us for all types of opponents in the WC?

Podge_irl

For one, Samoa and Fiji likely won't want to travel to Europe. All teams involved in warm up matches will want to stay as close to home as possible.

Secondly, I'm fully confident Ireland would beat Samoa and Fiji were it to come down to it in the World Cup and their styles really aren't that similar to the Big 3 so it wouldn't benefit there.

The Lost Sheep

philthrill69 wrote: »

Apologies if there's a thread about this already but does anyone think that Ireland's RWC warm up games against Scotland, Wales, Wales and England so close to the world cup are a bit of a risk more than warm up.
Joe will have those teams to size up his squad against in the 6 nations so with the way our national team is so injury prone at the moment are these games necessary and would it have served us better to play a few teams like Georgia, Samoa, Tonga, Fiji?

As others already have said risk of injury is greater if you play the islander sides especially. A better spread rather than just a mini 6 nations would be great
As we have to play Romania and Canada in our group perhaps in the warm ups we could have looked to play Georgia and US but we didn't

LeinsterDub wrote: »

Maybe if it was an A team world cup. We put 50 points on Georgia a few weeks ago with a B team

That was not the full Georgian side either they were missing several of their main players.

philthrill69 wrote: »

The injuries were kind of a side point,
obviously the pacific island teams are some of the most physical in the world but my other point was that Joe will have his chance to pit his side against northern hemisphere teams in the 6 nations and wouldn't it be more beneficial to see how the same team would fair out against the Samoan, Fijian style of rugby to fully prepare us for all types of opponents in the WC?

We more than likely wont play a Pacific Islander team In the world cup unless we win our group and Tonga finish runner up in pool C ahead of Argentina and behind NZ.

Podge_irl wrote: »

For one, Samoa and Fiji likely won't want to travel to Europe. All teams involved in warm up matches will want to stay as close to home as possible.

Secondly, I'm fully confident Ireland would beat Samoa and Fiji were it to come down to it in the World Cup and their styles really aren't that similar to the Big 3 so it wouldn't benefit there.

I would guess Samoa/Fiji etc will be playing most of their warm up games in Europe. They wont get games v NZ etc in NZ and no sides will travel to the islands so they'll be playing games in Europe prior to the world cup

Podge_irl

The Lost Sheep wrote: »

I would guess Samoa/Fiji etc will be playing most of their warm up games in Europe. They wont get games v NZ etc in NZ and no sides will travel to the islands so they'll be playing games in Europe prior to the world cup

Really? Maybe, no idea what they did before, but it strikes me as far from ideal. They either have a lot of travel to get back home and then out again or a hugely long stay in Europe.

errlloyd

Everyone needs to face the fact right now that we will lose players in these warm ups. So will the teams we face. I think at this stage serious enough rugby injuries are average about 1 every 2 games, so I think we're likely to drop two players.

That said, South Hemisphere teams have the championship, and other Northern teams will be warming up too. The players will tell you they want to play. I think they're a necessary evil.

The Lost Sheep

Podge_irl wrote: »

Really? Maybe, no idea what they did before, but it strikes me as far from ideal. They either have a lot of travel to get back home and then out again or a hugely long stay in Europe.

Yeah. That's what's happened before. Samoa, Tonga, Portugal and Georgia played a lot of games in France, England against Premiership and top 14 sides before the 2007 world cup so something similar this time id expect.

macslash

That just reminded me..slightly OT but South Africa played Connacht before that WC too in the sportsground! I was at it..lovely evening..be great if something similar happened again!

Tim Robbins

macslash wrote: »

That just reminded me..slightly OT but South Africa played Connacht before that WC too in the sportsground! I was at it..lovely evening..be great if something similar happened again!

Yeah, you'd wonder if the Irish team played three Oz teams and then a test in Oz would it not make more sense.

ArmaniJeanss

Worth pointing out that these games aren't just warmups, but would be regarded by the unions as replacements for the revenue they miss out on by not having any Autumn Internationals in an RWC year.

So the point of the exercise from the union pov isn't necessarily to play those teams which would best prepare for the potential range of opponents at the world cup.

The Lost Sheep

Tim Robbins wrote: »

Yeah, you'd wonder if the Irish team played three Oz teams and then a test in Oz would it not make more sense.

Why and how would that make sense? Why would Ireland go to Oz? Which sides would you look to play?