Munster Team Talk Thread - Beirne After Reading

It's pretty hard to see something you know will be great knocked by know-nothings over and over again before it's even announced.

I think you're conflating things here tho; just because someone discusses potential issues or hurdles with a proposition doesn't mean they're actively against it.

The majority posting here are Munster fans. I'd wager if the economics of it work, and it turns into something positive for Munster, most here would be delighted.

Wow. Thanks Mr. Snowden.

To be fair, that's a great response. :)

Edit: sorry just whizzed through the thread am I to understand Harvey has been advocating support for games at Parc Ui Caoimh and dullards and negatrons have been shooting him down?

No.

There is certainly a pretty dismissive, borderline hostile attitude to any discussion regarding increasing the number of games in Cork, especially any mention of games in PUC, from certain posters. Given the player profile, demographics and economics of the team and province at large, I personally don't see the Munster decision to go all in (or 95% in) on Limerick as sustainable in the long term. People are too focused on the short term economics of single games and are ignoring the larger picture of freezing out the biggest market in the province. Posters taking the attendance figures for Thomond and copy and pasting them to the much larger, far less served, market in Cork, is kind of typical of the points being missed.

Quite awhile ago now, but the All Blacks game in 08 was a Tuesday at 7:30pm, so I'd expect it to be similar alright.

Discussing the practicalities against it (and there are a few) isn't dismissive or hostile, tho.

Posters taking the attendance figures for Thomond and copy and pasting them to the much larger, far less served, market in Cork, is kind of typical of the points being missed.

The most significant hurdle to me seems to be the economics of it. To the point Cork may attract bigger attendances, they'd have to be materially larger than the capacity of Thomond to at least mitigate the cost of renting PuC. I just don't see that happening for anything other than a knock-out Euro game.

And even then, the Aviva may be available; for all the hand-wringing before the Toulouse game about Thomond not being available, Munster and MRSC got that day spot on in the circumstances, from a supporters perspective with regards buses, ticket pricing etc.

I see your point that you don't want to disillusion the Cork fanbase, but presumably coming out of Covid, short-term economics are going to be of even higher importance than usual.

But ultimately, if they can get the economics to work, it'll happen. I just don't see it happening all that frequently.

Think it was more a comment on it being a school night for kids say especially anyone with kids travelling for it.

TP only needs to sell 26k tickets.

PUC needs to sell 45k.

The timing of the game is an important part of it.

100% ya. It was Cork people who took the decisions. I think at the time they were the easy decisions to make, Cork City Council were a nightmare and there was enough nostalgia and mythology around Thomond that there was very little complaints from Cork.

I would question if they were aware of the long term picture at the time though. The demographic numbers are quite stark. When the decision to redevelop Thomond was made in 2006 the population of Cork was 481k, at the census last year it was 581k. Limerick was at 184k in 2006 and was at 205k last year. Cork grew by 21% and Limerick by 11% since the decision was made. If these trends were to continue, Cork will be at 700k by 2035 and Limerick will be at 225k that same year.

I think those numbers will get harder and harder to ignore over the next 15 to 20 years and Munster will have to revert back to a split model to exploit the commercial opportunities and to negate the low probability but major impact downside risks like a Cork club going it alone professionally (presumably in England). I know that suggestion will be laughed at now but if the public in Cork was to turn sour on the lack of attention from Munster and something like the Grovemore deal for Cork City (which was rumoured to include a 12-15k stadium development for Turners Cross) it would become a lot less laughable.

I will concede that this is a really low priority, borderline non issue amongst the Cork rugby public now. It’s bubbled slightly once or twice, I think the Donal Lenihan interview to second captains in 2016 was the peak of “discontent” but to ignore the risk would be a major mistake, in my opinion.