Genuinely interested in your take on all this syd?
Nobody’s disputing what’s happened over the last 10 years. People are disputing what’s happened and over the last 3, where your position seems to be Munster still don’t back their academy.
People are focusing on 9 because Munster will be missing their 3 starting 9s next season.
If that scenario, where Munster also have backed young players, AND have the lowest number of NIQ players isn’t a good candidate for an NIQ signing, can you tell me what would be?
Yeah, let's obsess over the one position where there is a good track record of producing international quality players, and blindly ignore the fact the last player who came through the Munster academy to get to 20 Ireland caps is 31-year-old Niall Scannell.
Regale us with tales there Phog of all the Munster produced centres in the past 25+ years.
I was checking back to see who Leinster had in their squad for the 2015 RWC when they sent two SHs to the RWC, they had just brought in JGP, a project player to replace two non Leinster produced SHs that were representing Ireland along with Conor Murray.
You couldn't make this stuff up, the outrage from a few posters to a suggestion that Munster might look elsewhere for injury cover for Paddy Patterson while we would be missing Murray and Casey as they are more than likely heading the RWC.
Round ball reference there !
Tut Tut mr moderator ;)
You’ve spelled it wrong, syd. It’s Davy Keogh.
It’s literally not just this season tho.
Look at the list of players that have been promoted over the last 3 years.
John McKee says hello
this season of all seasons.
Maybe that's part of the disagreement.
Like, this season is grand but it's a sample size of one.
We won't really know what the current/recent academy output is really like for another couple of years, and we still need to see if it can be maintained and reproduced year after year.
Even if we grant FTD all the caveats (no SA A game, include Leinster SA tour etc), the Munster cohort of players being discussed still have a higher number of average minutes played this season.
There’s a reason he’s the only poster arguing this side of the coin.
It’s an absurd stance to take this season of all seasons.
True! It's a pity as the young lads gave a good account of themselves.
Missing the obvious point that while a lot of players are involved with Ireland that leaves gaps needing to be filled by necessity by Academy players.
Comparing apples with oranges.
How many academy players will be involved in the CC and URC knockouts? None I’d guess.
Leinster get credit for cutting a guy who became a world class player after he left?
This is a good time to bail. That’s not a good example of Leinster development. You pick terrible examples.
No, we don't.
We agree if we accept your argument that somehow the development minutes in those games don't count, when of course they do.
Leinster manage to give more development minutes to players while simultaneously being the bulk supplier to the national team, winning 90%+ of their games and constantly competing for trophies. Given Leinster are competing on both fronts and stuffed with internationals, it ought to be harder to break into the Leinster team. The Leinster squad is predominantly produced by the Leinster academy (as, incidentally is 12% of the Munster squad, including your best player).
Spin that however you like in a way that you think is favourable to Munster, but I think I've said all there is to say on this topic.
So the only reason Leinster have more minutes for academy players and recent academy graduates this season is because of “substantial” minutes in 2 games of no consequence to Leinster, where they fielded a 3rd/4th choice squad?
We finally agree, FTD. 👍
Anyone who watches any rugby should know that Leinster have more minutes available in games where either they don’t absolutely need to win or where the surrounding quality of their players will still let them win. That is so obvious to anyone except people who intend to make a very specific argument that relies on ignoring that.
I don't have the numbers to hand; but I imagine they're substantial since Leinster had 9 Academy players playing against the Lions and 12 against Bulls, not to mention recent graduates. If you want them, go and get them, but before you go posting them next time, please make sure they're correct. 😉
But the reason why Leinster could do this and Munster couldn’t is relevant.
Not entirely. As I've shown, Leinster's use of current academy players and recent graduates happens in games all through the year. 21 of 25 games featured academy players - it's in those games all through the year where they earn the right to send a younger squad to SA. In 8 games Leinster used 4 Academy players or more; so this narrative that they just compile numbers during the SA tour isn't the case.
Deflections! This is hilarious.
The three paragons of leinster development all seem to have been on the Munster plan all along lol.
Long may this continue lol. This thread is fantastic.
How are minutes played by players in those games less significant than any other?
The minutes aren’t less significant.
I notice you didn’t answer the question?
You never know! Injuries could scupper anyone off to the world cup.
This is the kind of nonsense a few of you have tried to perpetuate here: the SA 'tour' was two league games. Two competitive games, with points at stake, one of which Leinster won.
Those are still development minutes for those players in the Leinster senior team, surrounded by experienced pros. If anything, the Bulls game and the hiding they took down there was probably one of the most important development games for Leinster in years. It showed a load of young players who've only really known success what it's like at a higher level.
Leinster have used current academy players in 21 games this season - meaning there have been only 4 games where an academy player wasn't utilised. The only players in the Leinster academy who didn't get any minutes this season are the long term injured Rory McGuire, current U20 Diarmuid Mangan (injured for the trip to SA), Sean O'Brien (leaving at the end of the season) and Andrew Smith (leaving at end of season).
Yep, about as useful and insightful as all of your contributions on this thread so far, lol.
The most defensive Munster fan on this site is an Ulster fan, who'd have thought it.
Wait, weren’t you going to explain how much your examples played in year one and two?
Flailing lol.
I’ll entertain this…
How many of those 434 minutes came in the SA tour out of interest?
What you should say is you'll skew numbers in whatever way you think is necessary to best support your argument.
You're equating the caps Leinster gave out in actual league games in South Africa (one of which they won btw) to the caps Munster gave in their glorified friendly with South Africa A.
I'm not proposing to include the Chile game, it was a non-competitive game, like the SA A game. You did include SA A in your original numbers, but fail to mention it.
You'll include the last three years of graduates, but surely additionally including the caps given to current Academy players (seeing as we're assessing stats this year) is equally logical?
You keep saying "and around and around we go" or things to that effect, but then you keep posting stuff too, so there is two of us in it in that regard.
No, the best sign of Leinster's elite development versus the other provinces is probably the fact that 50% of the 32 players who made up the Grand Slam winning squad this year were products of the Leinster Academy (versus 15.6% Munster, 12.5% Ulster, 6.3% Connacht and the balance, 15.6% Overseas).
It's probably the fact that Leinster have the highest share of their squad developed from within their own academy (84% - 36 of 43 players) at a time when that squad is a perennial European contender and has topped the URC for well over half a decade - contrast this to Munster where 67% of the squad is academy produced (29 of 43 players), Connacht 46% (21 of 46 players) and Ulster 61% (30 of 49 players).
In fact, in the other provinces, apart from overseas players, the next biggest contributors in every scenario is the Leinster Academy: Munster (5 players - 12% - Carbery, Conway, Patterson, Beirne, Loughman), Connacht (9 players - 20% - Aungier, Dooley, Dowling, Thornbury, J Murphy, Daly, Farrell, Hawkshaw, A Byrne) and Ulster (4 players - 8% - Madigan, Cooney, J Murphy, Moore).
“recent academic graduates”.
You’ll say academy, Chile etc.
I’ll say SA A, and Leinster’s SA tour etc.
And around and around we go.
But, they don't have more minutes. Not when you exclude the SA A friendly game:
Munster: 159 total caps, 69 starts, 6,592 minutes
Leinster: 149 total caps, 86 starts, 7,026 minutes
Leinster actually have considerably more minutes (434) than Munster in this regard.
It turns out the only part that was actually true was the more sub appearances.
Its not. They also have more minutes.
Munster have comparable players promoted, minutes and starts for recent academic graduates as Leinster, whatever way you slice it.
You’re painting this as somehow Munster not backing their players.
It’s bullsh*t.
Yeah, look you're getting a bit upset in tone now because of your big reveal statement earlier:
So in the last 3 seasons Munster have promoted more players, who have more starts, more subs appearances and more minutes this season, and comparable average mins vs Leinster.
Frankly, it’s utter bullsh*t
You're right about this part though, I literally don't care anymore.
Denis Leamy effectively came out today and said something along the lines of what I said a few days ago that prompted this whole thing, namely that:
Denis Leamy said developing homegrown talent from within Munster should be the top priority.
...the province’s recruitment focus should focus on reinforcing the pipeline of exciting talent coming the academy
“We’ve got to grow our academy, we’ve got to get our own, we’ve got to get Munster-born players through"
“We see day to day the excellence. I worked with the Leinster academy for two years, a really, really strong production line, world class. I see very similar workings going on, on a daily basis and it gives me great hope that we can start to produce the Munster-born boy and get him into the jersey for 50, 100, 150 caps."
“That is ultimately what we want to do. We want to get indigenous players playing in a Munster jersey.”
Not so controversial when he says it though.
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