When was he dropped for poor form?
Any of Cooney, Blade, Devine (injured), Casey are functionally better than Murray has been. Farrell could also have taken Doak instead with a view to developing him the same way Prendergast was selected. Murray has been done since 2019, and it's insane he's still getting picked.
POM has had one genuinely excellent season in the last 5 seasons or so, GS and the series win in NZ. He's been ordinary at best outside of that. He offers nothing that isn't being done better by other, younger players now. Earls was brought for his leadership and ethos, but he wasn't starting any important games and certainly not made captain.
A couple of season back, it was big news, he wasn't playing and was given the senior pro off the bench role. Then with his form got back into the team.
Murray was class in the games at start of the Grand Slam winning season with JGP out.
He did nothing that other SHs couldn't do, who could also play at a higher tempo which Murray is generally incapable of.
I'm not a Cooney fan, but Blade and Casey are both travelling. This seems like a pretty minor complaint in the grand scheme of things. Murray has had a number of good games since 2019, that is ridiculously over the top. I'd start him any day of the week in an international over Blade at the moment.
POM's supposed one genuinely excellent season was pretty recent and he is the captain… I am more than willing to have a discussion on that point as I don't think he is good enough to maintain his starting role, but you have to acknowledge that there is a massive dearth of leadership behind him. Doris is next up and frankly I wouldn't trust him just yet.
I think you underestimate the chances of SHs completely screwing things up.
Murray plays a lower tempo than I would like, but he generally makes good decisions and still has a good pass and still has a good kicking game.
Never?
Yes never. That RTÉ screwed that up is not a counter-factual, it is just RTÉ screwing it up and applying soccer terminology to their rugby coverage.
No, you're overthinking it.
Casey starts ahead of Murray because he's the better player. The only thing Murray has is experience but Casey is better and that's why he starts for Munster.
But it shows that this talk that Ireland is reliant of JGP is rubbish just like it was with Sexton,
Blade and Casey are going. Cooney is not as good as Murray and is almost as old, there’s no argument to bring him.
So, no one?
Disagree entirely on that. Cooney does everything Murray does, and better. He's not in the team because of personality issues imo, not because he's deficient. He's better than Casey to boot.
Tbf JGP has screwed up plenty. You could lay a large part of the QF loss on his shoulders, as well Leinster's loss last year. I don't think you should select a player based on the idea they'll make less mistakes, I'd rather take the guy who's more likely to do something positive.
Putting aside debates over their abilities, POM, Murray and Healy should have been moved on from based on their age alone. I don't believe we're that lacking in leadership that the potential benefits from these players is worth taking them over younger guys.
It is a balancing act, which is why someone like Paul Marshall never got anywhere. JGP predominantly makes the right choice even if he sometimes makes the wrong one. Also I just don't rate Cooney or Blade whatsoever and whatever about Cooney (who is old anyway) I have no idea what positives Blade is going to bring. But if we are moving past people on age alone than you are already discounting Cooney so we can ignore him. It is a silly position to be bothered about, we have very few realistic options and our best player is out.
Leadership impacts the entire squad. I would rather it wasn't an issue but it quite clearly is. We are 100% lacking in leadership though, Leinster's on-field decision making (where most of the next tier of leaders are) is distinctly poor.
There are three different screenshots, only one from RTE
Stop digging
Don't know where the others are from, don't care. The same logic applies.
You are overwhelmingly in the minority here consistently insisting on calling them "friendlies" instead of what they are, which is test matches. This is like telling people playing test cricket that they are actually playing friendlies - it's absurd. Obviously some matter more than others, but we take chances when we tour Japan or Argentina.
I don’t think Cooney is on the same level at all, but it’s pointless dropping a 35 year old and replacing him with a 34 year old who doesn’t even bring test level experience to the table and as you say, is a very difficult character to manage.
Oh, they're international test matches, I never claimed otherwise but they're also just friendlies.
Look, if it keeps people happy we could just refer to them as SIs (Summer Internationals) and AIs (Autumn Internationals) but winning or losing any of those games is far less important than winning/losing a pool game in the 6Ns or the RWC which is where this argument started
We're not playing a RWC or a 6N match at the same time though, so it doesn't matter.
It is a test series against the World Champions, in which we are bringing a squad where 10 of them have less than 10 caps. I think this is more or less a perfect balance to hit to bring in new players and try and win an important test series. If we were touring elsewhere the squad would be different.
We have already beaten the World Champions, in a RWC pool game, with what will probably be a very similar team to what we can field. We'll be delighted if we win but what happens if we lose?
Trying a more experimental team is almost a win win for us, if we win it will great for that team and the squad in general, if we lose, we still have the experienced players to call on and given gametime to players with little international experience.
Rating Blade, Cooney, and a (admittedly promising looking) kid who has played 160 minutes of senior rugby ahead of Murray is one of the most hilarious things I've read on this forum. Blade was actively handicapping Connacht this year and at the end of last year - he's only there because JGP dropped out. Cooney can't defend nearly as well as Murray (probably not a great idea to have a poor tackler against the Saffas if possible), is just as old from a developmental POV, and wouldn't be rated nearly as highly as he is if he wasn't a goal kicker.
The idea that Murray has been finished since the World Cup BEFORE LAST but just so happens to keep getting selected is also hysterically funny.
The personality issues doesn’t really wash with me, Cooney was selected for Ireland in squads and in the team a number of times when he had the same personality.
It was only after he got dropped he came up with the sexton story himself. He also done an interview after the 2019 WC squad, said he had nothing in his game to improve and couldn’t understand why not been picked
No mention of personality issues
those are 2 examples of personality issues.
I'd love if either World Rugby or the teams themselves imposed a total cap rule for at least one of the games. Or if Ireland and SA agreed that at least 5 players had to have under 10 caps.
Sa will have atleast 5 players with under 10 caps
Yeah and he had a go at the current coaching team after his last dropping too. He doesn’t do himself any favours, to put it mildly.
He also tried to declare for Scotland for the RWC, they politely declined.
Whatever he is, was or could have been, it’s all academic now, he’s done.
think he means players in the starting XV
You do realise that some of us watched and played Rugby before we had sponsorship and wall to wall TV coverage. You are utterly incorrect.
I'm not sure why the post i quoted disappeared but it's in relation to Phóg and his 'Friendlies' garbage.
Roos,evdm,maybe fassi,ben Jason maybe, but will hopefully soon find out more
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