Ireland Team Talk XII: Farrell's First Fifteen

Must love hardship

TRC10 wrote: »

Burns has been excellent for Ulster for the last 2 seasons and outperformed R.Byrne for ireland in the Autumn. I'd say hes easily overtaken Byrne and hell almost certainly start some games in the 6 nations.

I wouldn't even say he out performed the georgian out half he stuttered against in only start he got.

Benched v Wales and played 40 minutes when we failed to score a try.

Hasn't steered his team to a win in the H Cup in 12 months. We must have different views on excellence.

aloooof

Must love hardship wrote: »

Hasn't steered his team to a win in the H Cup in 12 months. We must have different views on excellence.

12 months. Also 2 games.


The reality is Burns probably edged Ross Byrne for his performances in the Autumn Nations cup. I expect him to be on the bench against Wales, but we'll see.

UAEguy2020

sydthebeat wrote: »

ah here, after this im out... but just go back and re-read the post which you originally quoted and try to understand what it means.



you are actually making the same bloody point

How much do I need to dumb it down before it hits you in the face?

I know what it means, it looks great on paper but that’s just it. In practice it’s like saying Ireland should pick players based on the Celtic Cup performances or players from ProD2 or the Championship...or even the Top 10 in Italy. Just because it’s professional doesn’t mean it’s a viable option for test rugby. It’s a nice pathway to Super Rugby but that’s about as far as it goes.

UAEguy2020

Must love hardship wrote: »

I wouldn't even say he out performed the georgian out half he stuttered against in only start he got.

Benched v Wales and played 40 minutes when we failed to score a try.

Hasn't steered his team to a win in the H Cup in 12 months. We must have different views on excellence.

And I suppose it’s all one players fault? Nothing to do with the 14 other players on the field?

We scored that great pick and go try all because of Sexton right?

Dubinusa

The team is transitioning. Farrell has tried new players and a different plan/approach. That said, there's only a couple of years until the world cup. We probably won't finish any better than 3rd in this 6nations. So, why not bring in EOS and let him get valuable experience? It's pointless picking both Healy and Kilcoyne, imo. The likes of Standrr and Ruddock will be 33 years old by the next world cup. I can't see them being good enough by then. Hence, why not give Coombes a shot? I do think Burns is the back up to Sexton. I've no argument with that, he will be picked until Ben Healy or HB outperform him. Or if Carberry ever gets back up to speed. With this covid pandemic, I doubt there will be summer tours this year, which curtains any development for new lads coming up. I think the 6nations is a chance to establish a couple of lads and it's now a wasted opportunity imo.

Must love hardship

aloooof wrote: »

12 months. Also 2 games.

3 Games. You forget the Toulouse 1/4 final.

Ross has started 5 of leinsters last 6 H Cup games and won all 5 that he started.
Not too shabby

aloooof

Must love hardship wrote: »

3 Games. You forget the Toulouse 1/4 final.

Ross has started 5 of leinsters last 6 H Cup games and won all 5 that he started.
Not too shabby

Ross Byrne didn't win all 5 that he started. Leinster won all 5 that he started.

The point being, comparing players' individual records is practically worthless.

UAEguy2020

Dubinusa wrote: »

The team is transitioning. Farrell has tried new players and a different plan/approach. That said, there's only a couple of years until the world cup. We probably won't finish any better than 3rd in this 6nations. So, why not bring in EOS and let him get valuable experience? It's pointless picking both Healy and Kilcoyne, imo. The likes of Standrr and Ruddock will be 33 years old by the next world cup. I can't see them being good enough by then. Hence, why not give Coombes a shot? I do think Burns is the back up to Sexton. I've no argument with that, he will be picked until Ben Healy or HB outperform him. Or if Carberry ever gets back up to speed. With this covid pandemic, I doubt there will be summer tours this year, which curtains any development for new lads coming up. I think the 6nations is a chance to establish a couple of lads and it's now a wasted opportunity imo.

If we are settling for 3rd before a ball is kicked we might aswell not bring in anyone as with a lack of ambition our new players won’t thrive. We have France and England at home two teams we atleast on the scoreboard came within 12 and 8 points of despite playing poorly on the road, if we are throwing in the towel on those games already at home than we can forget about the RWC in 2023.

We need momentum, this talk of sacrificing games to give young players experience is counterproductive. We need to win games and create an environment where the players will produce their best, they won’t if we throw the towel in before a ball is kicked. That’s what helped players like Stockdale and Ryan to name 2 players when they came into the Irish team, they came into a good competitive environment and that pushed them further quicker. Just throwing lambs to the slaughter and seeing if they sink or swim is the worst thing you can do.

The key for this 6N is continue to build a culture and once that’s done we can start calibrating it with younger players which can help push us the better heights.

UAEguy2020

aloooof wrote: »

Ross Byrne didn't win all 5 that he started. Leinster won all 5 that he started.

The point being, comparing players' individual records is practically worthless.

It’s the most Irish thing ever, when something goes wrong just blame whoever was at 10 except if it’s Sexton.

Must love hardship

aloooof wrote: »

Ross Byrne didn't win all 5 that he started. Leinster won all 5 that he started.

The point being, comparing players' individual records is practically worthless.

We'll agree to disagree but I dont see an international test level starter when I see burns play. They only game he's started in the last year that his team has won above pro 14 level was Georgia. If he is starting multiple game for us in the 6 nations we're in serious trouble...

aloooof

UAEguy2020 wrote: »

It’s the most Irish thing ever, when something goes wrong just blame whoever was at 10 except if it’s Sexton.

I don't think Ross Byrne was entirely to blame against England. I also don't think he had a particularly good game.

And it's possible to think both of those things while also thinking that Burns is probably ahead of him at the moment, but not discounting him in future.

I really don't see the big deal.

UAEguy2020

aloooof wrote: »

I don't think Ross Byrne was entirely to blame against England. I also don't think he had a particularly good game.

And it's possible to think both of those things while also thinking that Burns is probably ahead of him at the moment, but not discounting him in future.

I really don't see the big deal.

He didn’t but at the end of the day what do you expect in such a rudderless side? Sexton was arguably much worse in February, gifting England 7 points and some embarrassing misses. I watched it thinking “wow, imagine if Ross Byrne did this what would the reaction be?”

The poisonous atmosphere that’s created for our young 10s how would you expect any of them to thrive? This is exactly what I mean by throwing someone to the wolves, people expect him to step onto the field and suddenly be Jesus himself and don’t consider giving him any time to develop or settle into the team which is why I stress how important it is to develop a culture in the squad. Yes you can still throw young players in but far more often than not it will take them time to settle into test rugby. It’s no coincidence that in 2017/2018 most players we threw in looked up to it (even Byrne in his brief appearances looked good, I even thought he was better than Carbery at times) whereas 2019/2020 most look like a dear in the headlights.

dub_skav

If only there were a lower tier competition where a larger number of 10s get a string of games in a row with less pressure, where you can then give each of them an opportunity at the higher level when they're ready.

Something like the Mitre 10 would give Harry Byrne, Ross Byrne, Hawkshaw and even Frawley opportunities to all be playing 10 simultaneously at a level below Leinster.

aloooof

UAEguy2020 wrote: »

He didn’t but at the end of the day what do you expect in such a rudderless side? Sexton was arguably much worse in February, gifting England 7 points and some embarrassing misses. I watched it thinking “wow, imagine if Ross Byrne did this what would the reaction be?”

The poisonous atmosphere that’s created for our young 10s how would you expect any of them to thrive? This is exactly what I mean by throwing someone to the wolves, people expect him to step onto the field and suddenly be Jesus himself and don’t consider giving him any time to develop or settle into the team which is why I stress how important it is to develop a culture in the squad. Yes you can still throw young players in but far more often than not it will take them time to settle into test rugby. It’s no coincidence that in 2017/2018 most players we threw in looked up to it (even Byrne in his brief appearances looked good, I even thought he was better than Carbery at times) whereas 2019/2020 most look like a dear in the headlights.

Most have said Burns is probably marginally ahead with RB just behind. That's not a poisonous atmosphere or throwing him to the wolves. It's also not expecting him to be Jesus by expecting him to take it a bit flatter. You're way over-blowing this, imo.

Dubinusa

UAEguy2020 wrote: »

If we are settling for 3rd before a ball is kicked we might aswell not bring in anyone as with a lack of ambition our new players won’t thrive. We have France and England at home two teams we atleast on the scoreboard came within 12 and 8 points of despite playing poorly on the road, if we are throwing in the towel on those games already at home than we can forget about the RWC in 2023.

We need momentum, this talk of sacrificing games to give young players experience is counterproductive. We need to win games and create an environment where the players will produce their best, they won’t if we throw the towel in before a ball is kicked. That’s what helped players like Stockdale and Ryan to name 2 players when they came into the Irish team, they came into a good competitive environment and that pushed them further quicker. Just throwing lambs to the slaughter and seeing if they sink or swim is the worst thing you can do.

The key for this 6N is continue to build a culture and once that’s done we can start calibrating it with younger players which can help push us the better heights.

Who said anyone is settling for 3rd place. My opinion is that we will be 3rd. We could win it of course, depending on lot of things, injuries, refereeing etc, but it's unlikely.
That's why I would like to see Coombes etc included. We know what the experienced lads bring. Recently, not much.

UAEguy2020

Dubinusa wrote: »

Who said anyone is settling for 3rd place. My opinion is that we will be 3rd. We could win it of course, depending on lot of things, injuries, refereeing etc, but it's unlikely.
That's why I would like to see Coombes etc included. We know what the experienced lads bring. Recently, not much.

If we can win it we need to go all out to win it, we have yet to establish a culture and we won’t do that until we start winning games consistently and keep the moral high. Just throwing young players in now is like stamping on the accelerator in the car without putting the key in the ignition, it will get us nowhere. We have England and France at home, and particularly France who have significant absentees for the game in Dublin, we simply have to target the title, while 2nd would also be seen as progress. If we atleast make progress we can start seeing the progress of our culture being built and only then will the youngsters come in and thrive and only then will we see the benefit of it.

Right now we have enough good youngsters like Larmour, Keenan, Casey, Doris, Ryan, Porter, O’Toole, Kelleher even someone like Ringrose who still hasn’t reached his peak. Right now focus focus on these guys who are part of the set up and create a good environment involving these guys and then in the next window we can bring in guys like Baird, Coombes,Byrne, Hume etc and all of a sudden from seemingly nowhere we will have the look of a young progressive squad.


For now let’s not put the weight on the shoulders of the previous players mentioned and let them develop into the players they are going to be, do that and the results will take care of themselves and once that starts happening we can start being in the second batch of young players and by bringing them into a positive environment created by the first batch you will probably see more progress at a faster rate.

Yeah_Right

Would you guys rather a) win the 6 Nations while performing badly and losing a game or 2 OR b) finish 2nd or 3rd but see some real progress including a win over England and some youngsters getting quality minutes?

TBH, I'm not sure which I would pick.

TRC10

Must love hardship wrote: »

I wouldn't even say he out performed the georgian out half he stuttered against in only start he got.

Benched v Wales and played 40 minutes when we failed to score a try.

Hasn't steered his team to a win in the H Cup in 12 months. We must have different views on excellence.

That's just nonsense. We actually played quite well in the first half v Georgia but nobody seems to remember that, and Burns was excellent in that half, scored a try and controlled the game really well. Funnily enough, it was when he went off when things started to go to ****.

12 months seems like a long time to not have won a H cup game but what if I told you it was 3 games (2 against Toulouse). But you use whatever numbers suit your narrative.

"Benched v Wales" yeah he was on the bench for his debut, so nice work there. Again phrasing it to suit your agenda.

I noticed you also failed to mention that he came on and set up a try against the best team in the world. But I'll give you the benefit of the doubt and presume you just forgot about that.

sydthebeat

Yeah_Right wrote: »

Would you guys rather a) win the 6 Nations while performing badly and losing a game or 2 OR b) finish 2nd or 3rd but see some real progress including a win over England and some youngsters getting quality minutes?

TBH, I'm not sure which I would pick.

Give me number 1 please.

Because in order to do 1. we will most likely have to do 2. anyway

Paul Smeenus

Yeah_Right wrote: »

Would you guys rather a) win the 6 Nations while performing badly and losing a game or 2 OR b) finish 2nd or 3rd but see some real progress including a win over England and some youngsters getting quality minutes?

TBH, I'm not sure which I would pick.

Given the current financial hardships that we are staring at, a).

Obviously, usually it would be b).

But we have no idea when we'll get crowds in again, we have no idea whether the Rainbow Cup will happen, players' and staff contracts are being squeezed badly. The time to experiment was in the autumn, when no prize money was at stake.

There's over a million euro difference in prize money between 1st and 3rd.

P.Walnuts

UAEguy2020 wrote: »

He didn’t but at the end of the day what do you expect in such a rudderless side? Sexton was arguably much worse in February, gifting England 7 points and some embarrassing misses. I watched it thinking “wow, imagine if Ross Byrne did this what would the reaction be?”

The poisonous atmosphere that’s created for our young 10s how would you expect any of them to thrive? This is exactly what I mean by throwing someone to the wolves, people expect him to step onto the field and suddenly be Jesus himself and don’t consider giving him any time to develop or settle into the team which is why I stress how important it is to develop a culture in the squad. Yes you can still throw young players in but far more often than not it will take them time to settle into test rugby. It’s no coincidence that in 2017/2018 most players we threw in looked up to it (even Byrne in his brief appearances looked good, I even thought he was better than Carbery at times) whereas 2019/2020 most look like a dear in the headlights.

How do you know a) There is a poisonous atmosphere and b) that you Mr. Keyboard Man know what kind of culture is best for the squad?

Christ almighty

ionadnapokot

Yeah_Right wrote: »

Would you guys rather a) win the 6 Nations while performing badly and losing a game or 2 OR b) finish 2nd or 3rd but see some real progress including a win over England and some youngsters getting quality minutes?

TBH, I'm not sure which I would pick.

Great Q's

a)

I would say Ireland have as much chance of winning it with Healy, Murray, Sexton, Earls side as an O’Sullivan, Marmion/Blade/Casey, Carty, Daly side.

As in zero chance!

So maybe thats a b)?

shootermacg

We've been beaten by mistakes in most games. You could rectify that by not playing inconsistent players. It's tough enough to win an international without guys on your team doing it.

Stockdale and Larmour out!

Dual wheels

Must love hardship wrote: »

Ross is only 25 with 10 or 11 caps. A couple of the starts have come against a dominant England team where dan Carter would have struggled behind a back peddling pack.

Open to correction but I dont think Johnny started a 6 nations match until he was nearly 25 in 2010.
I think Ross deserves another look. He has preformed very well at times at H Cup level while Johnny has been injured. Also is a reliable kicker.

Burns im not confident about. A year older than Ross byrne he's not the regular kicker for his club.

Healy and or h byrne are probably a year away. Both should get plenty of pro14 game time during the 6 nations and maybe joey might be back in the mix.

Finally someone speaking some sense

Dual wheels

aloooof wrote: »

Most have said Burns is probably marginally ahead with RB just behind. That's not a poisonous atmosphere or throwing him to the wolves. It's also not expecting him to be Jesus by expecting him to take it a bit flatter. You're way over-blowing this, imo.

He’s not over blowing it at all, everyone thinks there’s nobody like the great Johnny but the great Johnny has been very average in an Ireland shirt for s while now and is past his best, if any of the other 10s played as badly as Sexton has they would be buried into the ground
These other 10s need to be encouraged, Ross Byrne isn’t at Leinster for nothing you know

Paul Smeenus

UAEguy2020 wrote: »

For example in the first 6N match when O’Toole comes off the bench an organic rugby culture (NZL) would allow him to settle into test rugby. We on the other hand will expect him to be as good as Porter or Furlong right off the bat otherwise he isn’t test standard and should be sent back to Ulster. Talk about the number of professional players while has some truth to it in terms of advantages completely ignores the main point because a good rugby culture will get every last drop out of their system and won’t find itself making excuses for mediocrity, if you are happy with mediocrity than it’s okay keep the excuses coming but if you want to be successful put the head down and focus on the controllable. You didn’t see us making these excuses in 2017/2018 and look where that got us that period.

Just quoting this here because there are misgivings that Eddie Jones operates in exactly the same manner, discarding those that don't find their feet immediately. I suppose sheer player numbers could explain why England have continued to perform to a good level regardless.

https://www.theguardian.com/sport/2021/jan/26/hiring-firing-eddie-jones-cost-english-rugby

molloyjh

Hyperbole. Hyperbole everywhere.

UAEguy2020

Yeah_Right wrote: »

Would you guys rather a) win the 6 Nations while performing badly and losing a game or 2 OR b) finish 2nd or 3rd but see some real progress including a win over England and some youngsters getting quality minutes?

TBH, I'm not sure which I would pick.

A ofcourse. We won’t make progress if we finished 2nd or 3rd because we did that last year with a much harder fixture list. If we finished let say 2nd and won 4 games from 5 that would be considered progress but not as good as winning the 6N so A.

UAEguy2020

P.Walnuts wrote: »

How do you know a) There is a poisonous atmosphere and b) that you Mr. Keyboard Man know what kind of culture is best for the squad?

Christ almighty

Just look at the reaction any time Byrne makes a mistake, you’d swear he killed someone.

Stop crying.

UAEguy2020

Paul Smeenus wrote: »

Just quoting this here because there are misgivings that Eddie Jones operates in exactly the same manner, discarding those that don't find their feet immediately. I suppose sheer player numbers could explain why England have continued to perform to a good level regardless.

https://www.theguardian.com/sport/2021/jan/26/hiring-firing-eddie-jones-cost-english-rugby

And there’s the point, someone like England can afford to just throw players in and out for fun. One route that works for England won’t necessarily work for other countries.

What countries with a smaller population need to do to be successful is get every last drop out of our resources, NZL for instance do it better than anyone. We did it brilliantly in 2017/2018 but now the way we go about it is totally wrong it’s laughable. Players who are uncapped that turn into super stars right from the off are few and far between, most will need afew games to get in the swing of things... something lost on people in Ireland, when O’Toole comes on against Wales we will expect him to be as good as Furlong right away or else he’s not test quality, likewise with Casey we’ll expect him to match an inform Murray, Byrne with Sexton etc, no eyes whatsoever to future, it’s like you must be a star right away or else you aren’t up to it, many Irish fans need to return to the real world and quite fast actually.