General Rugby Discussion

irishbucsfan · 06-08-2016 2:31am

Christian Lealifano has been diagnosed with Leukeamia

https://www.brumbies.com.au/2016/08/statement-regarding-christian-lealiifano/

Following a brief illness, investigations have indicated that Christian Lealiifano has been diagnosed with Leukaemia and is currently in hospital for further management.

Brumbies interim Chief Executive, Phil Thomson, said it was too early at this stage to comment much further.

“At the moment it’s just a matter of ensuring Christian receives the best care and support he can at this time,” Thomson said.

“He is one of the most respected players within this group and this news has come as a huge shock to all of our players, coaches and staff.

“Everyone knows that Christian is an amazing young man, an important member of this team and of the Canberra community.

“Our thoughts and prayers are with Christian and his family at this time.

“We ask that the Lealiifano family’s privacy is respected and no more comments will be made at this time.”

The Brumbies primary concern is for Christian’s health and any further updates on his progress will come via the club and with his personal approval.

swiwi_ · 06-08-2016 6:21am

Thoughts go out to CL and his family. Have to say it's put a dampener for me on Super Rugby final day. Hopefully chronic myeloid leukaemia and he'll be grand. Anything else and he's got a fight on his hands. One of my more favourite Australian players.

sydthebeat · 06-08-2016 8:24am

CatFromHue wrote: »

they're not top level international players though.

Youre initial point was about Irish teams signing "unknown or fringe" players from the SH.

My pointy is that just because they are unknown doesn't mean they are fringe players.

There's quite a few Irish fans who would only recognise 5 or 6 players from each SH test teams.

The point was already made that nacewa was so highly rated by NZ they looked for a special dispensation for him.

molloyjh · 06-08-2016 9:59am

irishbucsfan wrote: »

Christian Lealifano has been diagnosed with Leukaemia

https://www.brumbies.com.au/2016/08/statement-regarding-christian-lealiifano/

Yikes. He's young though and should get top notch care so hopefully the treatment will work well for him.

CatFromHue · 06-08-2016 2:13pm

sydthebeat wrote: »

Youre initial point was about Irish teams signing "unknown or fringe" players from the SH.

My pointy is that just because they are unknown doesn't mean they are fringe players.

There's quite a few Irish fans who would only recognise 5 or 6 players from each SH test teams.

The point was already made that nacewa was so highly rated by NZ they looked for a special dispensation for him.

Nacewa was unknown up here before he came
Mafi was on the fringe of a Super Rugby team and never got a game for them.

Think of all the SH players the Irish teams have signed and the majority of them no one up here knew too much about.

irishbucsfan · 06-08-2016 2:17pm

CatFromHue wrote: »

Nacewa was unknown up here before he came
Mafi was on the fringe of a Super Rugby team and never got a game for them.

Think of all the SH players the Irish teams have signed and the majority of them no one up here knew too much about.

But whether or not casual rugby fans know a player us good dosent actually impact their value and the demand for them. That's why Nacewa was actually quite expensive for Leinster to acquire. Despite the fact that in those days the Premiership was tiny in comparison to where it is now so there was far less competition for players.

CatFromHue · 06-08-2016 2:30pm

My original point was that Irish teams have never really signed the big name marque players so seeing big name marque players going to France or England nowadays isn't anything new.

My example being after the 07 RWC were Howlett went to Munster but Haymans, Mauger, Kelleher, McAllistair, Jack, Masoe, and Evans all went to England or France.

irishbucsfan · 06-08-2016 2:36pm

CatFromHue wrote: »

My original point was that Irish teams have never really signed the big name marque players so seeing big name marque players going to France or England nowadays isn't anything new.

My example being after the 07 RWC were Howlett went to Munster but Haymans, Mauger, Kelleher, McAllistair, Jack, Masoe, and Evans all went to England or France.

Actually seeing big name marquee players going to England in particular at the rate they are going today very much is a new thing. I still think we're capable of attracting a high calibre of player, the likes of Aki.

CatFromHue · 06-08-2016 2:41pm

I'm not saying the guys we recruit aren't good players but who's the odd one out from Dan Carter, Colin Slade, Conrad Smith, Ma'a Nonu and Bundee Aki?

Felix Jones is God · 06-08-2016 2:48pm

CatFromHue wrote: »

I'm not saying the guys we recruit aren't good players but who's the odd one out from Dan Carter, Colin Slade, Conrad Smith, Ma'a Nonu and Bundee Aki?

Easy....only Dan Carter has been coached by the great ROG!

irishbucsfan · 06-08-2016 3:10pm

CatFromHue wrote: »

I'm not saying the guys we recruit aren't good players but who's the odd one out from Dan Carter, Colin Slade, Conrad Smith, Ma'a Nonu and Bundee Aki?

But you said that the likes of these players going to England and France is not a new thing, where starting All Blacks moving to England at this rate in 2008? Or even France to the same extent? Not really, it's very much a new thing. Our abliity to recruit is around the same but our competitiveness (which is different) is far less than it was back when the revenues of the provinces was closer to the revenues of the clubs.

sydthebeat · 06-08-2016 3:17pm

CatFromHue wrote: »

My original point was that Irish teams have never really signed the big name marque players so seeing big name marque players going to France or England nowadays isn't anything new.

My example being after the 07 RWC were Howlett went to Munster but Haymans, Mauger, Kelleher, McAllistair, Jack, Masoe, and Evans all went to England or France.

World cup running Jdv wasn't exactly an unknown either.

Contepomi was a 5 year international, but the reason he played with leinster was different I suppose.

Ireland, at that time, didn't seem to have any trouble recruiting top level non Irish players

CatFromHue · 06-08-2016 6:20pm

irishbucsfan wrote: »

But you said that the likes of these players going to England and France is not a new thing, where starting All Blacks moving to England at this rate in 2008? Or even France to the same extent? Not really, it's very much a new thing. Our abliity to recruit is around the same but our competitiveness (which is different) is far less than it was back when the revenues of the provinces was closer to the revenues of the clubs.

My example being after the 07 RWC were Howlett went to Munster but Haymans, Mauger, Kelleher, McAllistair, Jack, Masoe, and Evans all went to England or France.

1 to Ire
5 to Eng
2 to Fra

CatFromHue · 06-08-2016 6:22pm

sydthebeat wrote: »

World cup running Jdv wasn't exactly an unknown either.

Contepomi was a 5 year international, but the reason he played with leinster was different I suppose.

Ireland, at that time, didn't seem to have any trouble recruiting top level non Irish players

Contepomi was recruited from England, not the SH.

Yup JdV was a big name.

The majority, not all, of the big name players from the SH tend to go to England or France. JdV coming here doesn't change that, Charles Piatau coming here doesn't change that, the majority of big names are still going to Eng or Fra

sydthebeat · 06-08-2016 6:34pm

CatFromHue wrote: »

Contepomi was recruited from England, not the SH.

Yup JdV was a big name.

The majority, not all, of the big name players from the SH tend to go to England or France. JdV coming here doesn't change that, Charles Piatau coming here doesn't change that, the majority of big names are still going to Eng or Fra

Absolutely 100% agree

I though the argument though was that ireland, at our best period in professional rugby, were, in the majority, only recruiting unknown and fringe southern hemisphere players.

Which isn't correct

Clearlier · 06-08-2016 10:15pm

CatFromHue wrote: »

Contepomi was recruited from England, not the SH.

Yup JdV was a big name.

The majority, not all, of the big name players from the SH tend to go to England or France. JdV coming here doesn't change that, Charles Piatau coming here doesn't change that, the majority of big names are still going to Eng or Fra

Ollie le Roux was another fairly big name to play for Leinster. I wonder if he's the heaviest player ever to play for Leinster? He had a big impact on the pitch too.

You've got to remember too that in comparing Ireland to France and England you're comparing 4 clubs (and until very recently only really 3) to 12 in England and 14 in France. Put in that context 1 player from the 8 new zealanders you mentioned earlier in the thread is about par with English clubs punching above their weight and French ones below.

CatFromHue · 06-08-2016 10:27pm

Yeah Ollie was a big player but he'd been finished with the Boks by about 5 years when he joined us

irishbucsfan · 06-08-2016 10:40pm

CatFromHue wrote: »

Yeah Ollie was a big player but he'd been finished with the Boks by about 5 years when he joined us

CJ and Rocky were both closer to their international days though

CatFromHue · 06-08-2016 11:09pm

yup but not so much Stan Wright, Richardt Strauss, Ben Gissing, Cameron Jowitt, Aaron Dundon, Christian Warner, Matt Berquist, Nathan Spooner and I'm sure there's more too

former total · 06-08-2016 11:35pm

We used to sign players of the same or higher calibre than the English or French teams. Definitely.

But then the English and French started signing better players in their prime (and not just older guys winding down), while we implemented a policy explicitly not to do so.

But back in 2008-2010, we were signing better imports than our rivals.

Yeah_Right · 07-08-2016 1:32pm

Vern Cotter had the Scottish rugby team kill rabbits with their bare hands at a pre-RWC training camp.

http://nzh.tw/11689016

irishbucsfan · 07-08-2016 1:59pm

Yeah_Right wrote: »

Vern Cotter had the Scottish rugby team kill rabbits with their bare hands at a pre-RWC training camp.

http://nzh.tw/11689016

This is totally bizarre and could be bad news for Vern

However is anyone surprised that it was Richie Gray who was the one guy who supposedly asked not to take part... Normal locks actually acquire most of their dinners in this fashion

jacothelad · 07-08-2016 2:04pm

Yeah_Right wrote: »

Vern Cotter had the Scottish rugby team kill rabbits with their bare hands at a pre-RWC training camp.

http://nzh.tw/11689016

Personally I think that is despicable and if true, he should be sacked. What is the point of it for a start except to bring pain, anguish and death to timid, captive creatures in order to somehow boost Cotter's ego. What a horrible, disgusting thing to even consider never mind carry out.

Yeah_Right · 07-08-2016 2:23pm

jacothelad wrote: »

Personally I think that is despicable and if true, he should be sacked. What is the point of it for a start except to bring pain, anguish and death to timid, captive creatures in order to somehow boost Cotter's ego. What a horrible, disgusting thing to even consider never mind carry out.

Yeah it's a strange one. I think (hope) Jim Hamilton was exaggerating otherwise Cotter could be in trouble. If he'd organised for them to go rabbit hunting with shot guns and said they had to shoot their dinner then I would have said its a bit weird but ok. Beating the rabbits to death... WTF!!

In NZ, rabbits are considered to be pests that should be killed. If you're driving and you see a rabbit (or possum) on the road, you run it over.

thomond2006 · 08-08-2016 9:34am

This wait is dragging on.

b.gud · 08-08-2016 10:54am

From Reddit a graph of the 6 nations results since 2000

Quin_Dub · 08-08-2016 11:03am

b.gud wrote: »

From Reddit a graph of the 6 nations results since 2000

Some interesting nuggets there..

Only Ireland and England have never gotten the 6N's wooden spoon and Wales are incredibly inconsistent.

10 finishes in the bottom 3 (compared to Irelands 2) along with 4 outright wins , including 3 Grand-slams.

They have been better in the last few years though..

The Pheasant2 · 08-08-2016 11:08am

Does anyone know is Demented mole even writing anymore? He hasn't released an article in over 6 months...only 2 in total this year. It's a shame because his articles are excellent

razorblunt · 08-08-2016 11:27am

There's mixed views on that Cotter story, a lot of folk are saying it never happened and it was Hamilton taking the píss.
If it is true then it is absolutely disgusting, but given that they appeared to be "tame" then I'd imagine Big Jim was on the wind up.

molloyjh · 08-08-2016 1:59pm

razorblunt wrote: »

There's mixed views on that Cotter story, a lot of folk are saying it never happened and it was Hamilton taking the píss.
If it is true then it is absolutely disgusting, but given that they appeared to be "tame" then I'd imagine Big Jim was on the wind up.

From what I can gather it did happen, just not in the way Hamilton described it. They went on some sort of survival training exercise with Marines and a couple of them learned how to kill a rabbit for food. Not as bad as it was made out but at the same time I'm not sure what the point was. If it's team bonding you want play some paint ball.

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