Ireland Team Talk XII: Farrell's First Fifteen

Go back to the GS games in 09

V wales Heaslip, Bod, Darcy , Fitz and Kearney were the Leinster representation In the 22. Munster had 11 players.

It's 15 Leinster versus 4 Munster on Saturday so it's not the same but it's not too far off it. And if you go by population the numbers actually reflect roughly pro rata by that metric.

Some Munster fans seem irked by Gavin Coombes omission but I don't see why. Doris is a world class operator, Conan is a better player than Coombes. So we rotate this week and put Coombes in for one game. That achieves very little in the grand scheme of things because Doris is not going to be left out when fit.

The current Domination of the 23 by Leinster players is by and large down to other provinces not producing players of that calibre. Munster have been producing players lately, very good in URC, good in Europe but that'd where the problem lies. European form, a big step up above URC is a telling factor here.

i usually go out to the pub watch6N matches and meetup with my dad and brothers, and now my Adult sons . None of us have any real interest in doing so this year . It’s a tradition every year that we cherish as my Da is getting on in years and his health isn’t the best lately

I went out to watch the Scotland match in my local in limerick and the owner switched two of the three TV’s over to the hurling at half time , and there wasn’t any objections in the bar.

Speaking to others around limerick in the past few weeks, the disenchantment with the Irish rugby team and #teamofus is very real. The reason why, rightly or wrongly are plain to see.

Go to the rugby pubs on saturday in Limerick and you will have busy bar during the game but also notice a fair amount of detachment in the build up and particularly after the game.

Ive never seen such a focus on the relevance as to what province you play for or where you were born as being meaningful when supporting the Irish rugby team. The waft of arrogance isn’t what we Irish were about . The OTB piece and daily Indo clickbait only reinforce the view.

I will be going out to the pub to support ireland on saturday hope we beat the welsh, who are in a dark place that anyone following the Irish rugby team longer than the last 10 years knows only too well.

But that detachment comes from within. When Munster fielded a team in the not too distant past with multiple south african/kiwis etc and a few other imports from leinster did Munster fans have the same detachment from the team ??

In November just gone Munster fielded a team with 5 of the 7 starting backs were signings. Do Munster fans feel a detachment from that team??

It's very selective detachment IMO.

we were absolutely not happy about alot of that though

Which precisely?

the Dublin media

None of the OTB guys in that piece are from Dublin. Literally not one.

This says more about the people in the bar than anything else.

I know this will come across as holier than thou but I was going to the Leinster Bath game, and was genuinely struck by the level of cheers from Leinster fans watching Munster start to come back against Northampton (in both Smyth’s on Haddington rd and Ryan’s Beggars Bush). That was my first game in Ireland after living abroad the past few years where my only experience of Irish rugby fans was online. The in person experience was a pleasant surprise, but mostly a shock because I really didn’t expect it.

That was provincial rugby, never mind the National side. Anyone who can’t support Irish lads representing their country just because they don’t come from x or y, needs to take a good long look at themselves.

I don't want this to come across as provincial sniping but I think the bandwagon fans thing is a fair point, in that Munster's support swelled (obviously) with the fairytale team of the 2000s. Lots of non or casual rugby fans loved the image painted of ther rural underdog team sticking it to everyone, in particular how they always beat Leinster in big games. It was a big 2 fingers to 'the big smoke'. many to be fair have stuck around as Munster fans but it leads to the (again very minimal) attitude where there's a bitterness.

Hey ho high fives his rugby bros, pounds his chest and shouts "HUNNH!" in the true non-nonsense Alpha male rugby stylee

Fair enough, then the IFRU should really be targeting the grammar schools and funding the playing of rugby in them. Especially those of a Catholic ethos to spread the game into a non-traditional cohort.

I apologise for my ignorance and hope no offence was caused.