Rugby world cup post mortem

We were beat last night by very small margins. It had nothing to do with our other past defeats in the World Cup. Non. Zilch. 4 fecking points after going down 13 níl.

We've talent coming through at underage. Retirements make opportunitys. Let's enjoy the journey.

I hope NZ go on to win it

People talking about a Six Nations GS feeling 'hollow' are just talking too soon.

Come the Six Nations we will be back in the land of hope and speculation.

A GS will feel just like they always feel.

If we didn't pick ourselves up and go again the soccer team supporters would never even get out of bed. They do, again and again and the rugby supporters will be no different.

I know nothing about rugby and all I watched of this RWC was the last 20 minutes of the game last night.

And one thing that I am noticing in this thread is that it's very like what we Mayo people say after an All Ireland final loss.

The consolation that it's small margins, which is true, but what I also notice is the idea that what happened in previous years has no bearing on what just happened.

I'll argue that it does.

What happened last night?

Ireland lost the game narrowly and the overall reaction was that NZ were just better, and Ireland were unlucky, and that they had a great tournament besides and there is always next time.

So because Ireland have always fallen at this hurdle, falling at it again is not that big a deal, the ground work for the disappointment has already been done by previous teams through the years

These guys are no different than the same guys in 1991.

So players come into the game knowing that losing now is nothing new, or special, or that they won't go down in history for losing now.

And I think that is in the players heads, somewhere.

Now look at it from the NZ point of view.

If they lost that match they would go down in history as the first NZ side to get knocked out at this stage, that would weight heavy on the players.

So what went before does have an effect, when a player is on that field looking for that something inside him to put in the extra effort but struggling to find it, somewhere inside him is also the knowledge that not finding it and losing now will not single him or the team out in the big picture of Irish RWC performances.

New Zealand lost in quarters in 2007 so would have been same as then. I see where you are coming from. of course what went before will play a role. natural but how do we change it? Thats the million dollar question....

Thats a bit OTT. Wouldnt say worst loss in history irish sport but yeah very disappointing.

So for next WC we will lose the following:

Earls, Sexton, Healy, Kilcoyne, Bealham, Herring, Beirne?(35), Furlong?(34), Lowe, McCloskey, Henshaw, Aki, Gibson Park, Murray, POM, Conan, JVDF

That a lot of players to replace over the next few years. The front row is going to see huge change

He shouldn’t be. He doesn’t and hasn’t had the confidence to take shots at goal and goes to the sideline by default partly to cover up that deficiency. He should have been subbed last night and arguably should have been replaced year ago. He’s not and never has been that good to be irreplaceable. He also got away with going to France for a year when guys like Zeno were banished. It’s good that he has retired at last and it should have happened years ago.

Definitely lots to work on but important they don’t become too reliant on certain individuals.

Yep well the team will be in transition. Younger talent needs to be brought through. We're going to lose games for as long as it takes to bring through a new group of players. It's the same in all team sport though. Players retire.

Clear out of who and replace them with who?

What else would you change.

At least 4 years ago. Please stop. thats just ridiculous and cant be backed up with anything close to reality.

he was that good and the others development was stunted by their own ability as much/more than JS

A golden opportunity lost. Get past NZ and the semi final was a gift at this level.

In 4 years time England will be back. NZ will be better, Wales should improve and Scotland are improving too. Australia won't be a mess either. It will be so much harder to win.

We'll not enter the next world Cup as No. 1 and favourites.

The annoying thing is that it just wasn't blind faith - Ireland truly had a good chance of being world champions.

However, they really were not at the races during this tournament and got lucky against SA whose kicking was dreadful.

Not a chance, Schmidt had his homework done at the breakdown & rucks. they had a game plan to go through phases & starve Ireland’s ball.

Every New Zealand player had a minimum 9/10 performance & was probably the best they have played in year’s. They were so much fresher also,nearly a month to prepare.

And we still nearly got there in the end. heroic from those men in green, compared to that utter shower of wasters that played in the Aviva on Friday night.

Now ye lad can have a pop at me as I am a blow in and don't post around here very often, if at all on boards anymore.

But I think Ireland most especially Farrell and his backroom team got things wrong in this world cup.

This is not a great All Blacks team and this was Ireland's best ever team, World No.1 on 17 game winning streak.

We were always told it was because we had lack of depth and that when we lost front line players the other guys weren't good enough as reason for losing 1/4 finals and yes it was true to a huge degree in certain WC where we lost key players in tough matches beforehand.

But who was missing for last night?

Ryan, although he wasn't doing great anyway, and Hansen probably shouldn't have been even on the pitch.

We are supposed to have strength in depth so please explain why it was almost a full 1st team against Romania.

Romania FFS.

You don't get SA, NZ or France doing that.

The team against Romania were:

15 Hugo Keenan, 14 Keith Earls, 13 Garry Ringrose, 12 Bundee Aki, 11 James Lowe, 10 Johnny Sexton (c), 9 Jamison Gibson-Park; 1 Andrew Porter, 2 Rob Herring, 3 Tadhg Furlong, 4 Joe McCarthy, 5 James Ryan, 6 Tadhg Beirne, 7 Peter O'Mahony, 8 Caelan Doris.

Earls, Herring and McCarthy were the only 2nd string.

Yeah play Sexton because he is just back, but FFS it was Romania.

Then against Tonga we had a few changes simply because guys were back from injuries.

15 Hugo Keenan, 14 Hansen, 13 Garry Ringrose, 12 Bundee Aki, 11 James Lowe, 10 Johnny Sexton (c), 9 C. Murray, 1 Andrew Porter, 2 R. Kelleher, 3 Tadhg Furlong, 4 Tadhg Beirne, 5 James Ryan, 6 Peter O'Mahony, 7 J. Van Der Flier, 8 Caelan Doris.

Not enough rotation.

Last night a lot of guys just looked tired and well below par.

The summation has to be that Ireland don't know how to play in tournaments.

Some will say ah great we got within 4 points of All Blacks and beat the Boks so we did well.

That is settling.

We scraped past the Boks who if they had a half decent kicker would have beaten us.

The lineout was a mess and it was not resolved or even a real plan B go to in place for the All Blacks.

Yeah yeah people could argue that the gap wasn't there, the ref wasn't doing his job, etc, but there was still a fair bit of non functioning.

Then as for the game itself last night, Hanson was played when he looked doubtful, Sexton was left on the pitch when a change might have brought something different.

Maybe he was left on for sentiment, but sentiment has no place in professional sport.

Just ask O'Gara.

Maybe ranking points in 6 nations and autumn internationals should be sacrificed in order to built better strength in depth?

Being World's no.1 means nothing it you can't get anywhere in a WC.

Stop listening to Shane Byrne.