General Rugby Discussion II

awec

Neil3030 wrote: »

You could. But I'd say players who make it to the top 10 of all time caps for their country are likely getting played whenever fit.

Yes, but it's a misleading stat, right? Ireland has always rested players so they can play international games.

Look at BOD, highest test capped player in your list, but only 186 caps for Leinster.

Jason Leonard, English highest capped player played 309 games in the AP.

Jason Leonard club + test caps = 423
BOD = 319

Over 100 games fewer. Both players played for 15 years.

The Lost Sheep

awec wrote: »

BOD and POC also started to play their pro career pre-Pro12.

In the initial days of pro rugby the number of provincial games was much smaller. I think the first year of the celtic league the winning team would have played like 9 games.

They also played at a time when the league was treated as glorified filler in between european matches.

Modern players will blow BOD and POCs cap count out of the water. Henderson is another one off the top of my head, 86 Ulster caps at 25. Luke McGrath, should he become a regular international, already has a really high number of Leinster caps if I remember right.

O Connell had about 2 seasons pre pro12 set up with one league. Yeah first seasons of celtic league were pools before the welsh set up the regions but yeah players coming through now will go well beyond ROG/POC provincial caps

molloyjh

Let's not forget too that at the start of season a couple of English players publicly stated that they play too much. And that the French domestic season is actually a month longer than ours or Englands.

It's going to be all but impossible to get a definitive study on this stuff though as things have changed fairly substantially over the last several years in numerous ways. Trying to get a comparative sample large enough where it's all being measured consistently isn't easy, if it can even be done at all. We might not know for a fact for years really.

awec

awec wrote: »

Yes, but it's a misleading stat, right? Ireland has always rested players so they can play international games.

Look at BOD, highest test capped player in your list, but only 186 caps for Leinster.

Jason Leonard, English highest capped player played 309 games in the AP.

Jason Leonard club + test caps = 423
BOD = 319

Over 100 games fewer. Both players played for 15 years.

In fact, Leonard is probably a bad comparison given when he played.

If we take Johnny Wilkinson.

323 club games + 91 caps = 414.

Still played almost a hundred more games than BOD, and his career lines up pretty well in terms of timeline, even though Wilkinson had a longer career by a few years.

Neil3030

awec wrote: »

Yes, but it's a misleading stat, right? Ireland has always rested players so they can play international games.

Look at BOD, highest test capped player in your list, but only 186 caps for Leinster.

Jason Leonard, English highest capped player played 309 games in the AP.

Jason Leonard club + test caps = 423
BOD = 319

Over 100 games fewer. Both players played for 15 years.

Depends what your main concern is - it's fairly self evident that playing less club games will lead to fewer club caps by the end of a player's career. But the key concern (I'm sure for the IRFU anyway) is whether fewer club games will lengthen your international career. The figures I posted support the idea that it might.

prawnsambo

awec wrote: »

In fact, Leonard is probably a bad comparison given when he played.

If we take Johnny Wilkinson.

323 club games + 91 caps = 414.

Still played almost a hundred more games than BOD, and his career lines up pretty well in terms of timeline, even though Wilkinson had a longer career by a few years.

Wilkinson spent a lot of his Newcastle career out injured. Look at his caps for the 12 or so seasons with them compared to the five he spent with Toulon: 182 against 141.

awec

prawnsambo wrote: »

Wilkinson spent a lot of his Newcastle career out injured. Look at his caps for the 12 or so seasons with them compared to the five he spent with Toulon: 182 against 141.

And yet still had a longer career than BOD both in terms of time and games played.

awec

Neil3030 wrote: »

Depends what your main concern is - it's fairly self evident that playing less club games will lead to fewer club caps by the end of a player's career. But the key concern (I'm sure for the IRFU anyway) is whether fewer club games will lengthen your international career. The figures I posted support the idea that it might.

Well I wasn't limited to test career, just overall career.

Obviously if players are prevented from playing for their club on a semi-regular basis in order to rest to play for their country they'll play more for their country than players who play for their club as often as possible.

BOD played 42 more test games than Wilkinson, but at the expense of playing 137 less club games over his career. They both retired at the same age.

Neil3030

awec wrote: »

And yet still had a longer career than BOD both in terms of time and games played.

But 40 fewer international caps!

Neil3030

awec wrote: »

Well I wasn't limited to test career, just overall career.

Obviously if players are prevented from playing for their club on a semi-regular basis in order to rest to play for their country they'll play more for their country than players who play for their club as often as possible.

BOD played 42 more test games than Wilkinson, but at the expense of playing 137 less club games over his career.

There's other confounds here - how much more punishment does a centre take, vs a 10. How much more punishment does an International test involve, relative to a club match. How much does the atrophy of speed affect players' ability to continue playing. Etc. etc.

The jury is still out for me, just to be clear.

Burkie1203

Sam warburton has had knee surgery while rehabing his neck injury. Is out for season

molloyjh

Neil3030 wrote: »

There's other confounds here - how much more punishment does a centre take, vs a 10. How much more punishment does an International test involve, relative to a club match. How much does the atrophy of speed affect players' ability to continue playing. Etc. etc.

The jury is still out for me, just to be clear.

Plus factor in that each individual will be subtly (or not so subtly) different themselves so you're never truly comparing like with like.

Then of course you have to factor in the number of available games at stages in players careers. Drico started playing rugby before there was ever a Celtic League. So his club games reduce there straight away. When the league started first there were only 6 regular season games. It didn't match the AP for number of teams until the Italians joined in 2010. The French league had 16 teams during that time too.

There have been way too many variables to measure this properly. And the impacts of playing more vs playing less in later life will vary over time too given the increased level of physicality over time. Does that make it relatively better to finish with less game time now compared to 10 years ago or does the gap decrease due to the heavier hits?

prawnsambo

awec wrote: »

And yet still had a longer career than BOD both in terms of time and games played.

Yeah, I know. Just wondering if all the protracted injury absences early in his career helped. He was averaging twice the number of games per season with Toulon as he was with Newcastle.

razorblunt

Warburton must be like the bionic man at this stage.
He won't be able to walk up the back step by the time he's 50!

irishbucsfan

I reckon Warburton must be due for a free operation on his NHS loyalty card at this rate.

Neil3030

So when did this Kolpak rule come in? 2015 Heino final, for e.g., Toulon had Mitchell, Gitau, Williams, Hayman, Lobbe....

The Lost Sheep

Neil3030 wrote: »

So when did this Kolpak rule come in? 2015 Heino final, for e.g., Toulon had Mitchell, Gitau, Williams, Hayman, Lobbe....

Kolpak has been in for quite some time. Came about in 2002 or 2003 but if you have 36 months consecutive residence in country you're playing you dont count towards numbers for kolpak

thomond2006

Neil3030 wrote: »

So when did this Kolpak rule come in? 2015 Heino final, for e.g., Toulon had Mitchell, Gitau, Williams, Hayman, Lobbe....

Lobbe, Hayman and Giteau would have been naturalised by then.

Asus X540L

Probably discussed already but will Brexit present any problems for the Irish rugby team?

It does represent the United Kingdom after all

Burkie1203

SRU looking to take over an Aviva premiership side. Worcester are apparently the target so they have a third side.

prawnsambo

Burkie1203 wrote: »

SRU looking to take over an Aviva premiership side. Worcester are apparently the target so they have a third side.

Linky?

Burkie1203

prawnsambo wrote: »

Linky?

Saw few retweets on twitter

prawnsambo

Burkie1203 wrote: »

Saw few retweets on twitter

Can you link them? Who are they retweeting?

irishbucsfan

Mark Palmer hasn’t said it so I don’t believe It yet. I follow him for my Scottish Rugby insights

baas baa

Bit of a random question but can anyone tell me who was the last top class French no.10?

FellasFellas

baas baa wrote: »

Bit of a random question but can anyone tell me who was the last top class French no.10?

Michelak at his best was god like. At his worst, there are a few U18 players who would be better but he was top class for a while. They've gone through so many; Tales, Plisson, Lopez, Trinh-Duc, Skrela, Beauxis, Merceron, Traille played a bit of 10, and then all their 9's have also played a bit of 10 as well. It's mad how many they have gone through.

Bazzo

FellasFellas wrote: »

Michelak at his best was god like. At his worst, there are a few U18 players who would be better but he was top class for a while. They've gone through so many; Tales, Plisson, Lopez, Trinh-Duc, Skrela, Beauxis, Merceron, Traille played a bit of 10, and then all their 9's have also played a bit of 10 as well. It's mad how many they have gone through.

Yeah, Trinh-Duc and Michalak on their day I'd say.

prawnsambo

baas baa wrote: »

Bit of a random question but can anyone tell me who was the last top class French no.10?

For me it was Thomas Castaignede. More of a playmaker really, but he had a stellar career with Toulouse and had a (relatively) high number of caps for France. His brother Stephane was a scrum half and they played together for France a good few times.

Speedy little fecker too:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=39Avg5CavZ8

baas baa

FellasFellas wrote: »

Michelak at his best was god like. At his worst, there are a few U18 players who would be better but he was top class for a while. They've gone through so many; Tales, Plisson, Lopez, Trinh-Duc, Skrela, Beauxis, Merceron, Traille played a bit of 10, and then all their 9's have also played a bit of 10 as well. It's mad how many they have gone through.

I'm not sure you'd mention any of them in the same breadth as Wilkinson, Sexton, Rog, Jones, etc. It's mad how little top quality they've had in the position. I know they put less emphasis on the outhalf but still. How can it be such a bogey position for so long.

CatFromHue

michalek was way too flaky to be considered top class, he was bad much more than good