Irish Rugby peaked in 2023 and is now in steady decline. A Very Barron decade ahead

Barron?

Has anyone got an NIQ spot spare for him?

What Mental fragility?

An insistence on kicking to the corner with a malfunctioning lineout and our almost unique ability to be consistently held up over the line cost the game.

Which best "by far" players are you referring to?

He'd be handy for a line out play or 3 I suppose 👀

Diarmuid Barron I believe

If it dampens down the over the top and nauseating hype that rugby gets in the media I won't be too disappointed.

Such as the longest goodbye in history for 3 players retiring. Nearly more headlines than the actual match.

Our 20s have been pretty good but some of those players are hitting 27 now and the youngest will be 21 or so and they're either well in the irish system by now or have left it, not like they're all coming through

I think we'll be there or thereabouts in the next few years but possibly hanging on to France and England coat tails.....don't see any of the other 3 passing us.

I do know we need approx 10 new players in match day 23 come world cup time and some of our very top performers at the moment will be the ones needing replacing.

Sean Prendergast put 3 points over the bar from the halfway line on Saturday. There are not a lot of players [in the world] who could do that and he is only 21.

This year Ireland won 4 out of 5 games, and you think we are in steady decline?

I just looked at the OPs post history.

Are-ireland-and-leinster-the-biggest-chokers-in-world-rugby ? - July 2024

Would you agree that "Golden age" of Irish rugby is over? - June 2024

I'm not going to say "Only in Ireland", because I dont follow sports threads in other countries. Maybe there are other lunatics in other countries who love to celebrate when the national team does not win at something and then declare their time is over.

I'm not going to say anything more on the subject, but will simply add the OP to my ignore list. There's a word for posts like these but it escapes me right now.

I don't have any great interest in Rugby but given the coverage it gets here, can't help but consume a lot of the coverage and discussion.

I struggle to understand, how a professional sport can allow it's team manager take a year off to manage another team. Why could he not have combined both roles. Or why don't they hire someone not currently employed?

Given the player pool Ireland are pulling from, they are punching well above their weight. The biggest threat to Irish Rugby is that only 2/3 private schools are contributing to our player population.

It will always be very hard for smaller nations like Ireland to consistently produce quality underage players year after year.

The important thing to remember though is that there will be a few players coming through that will make it regardless. Our 2017-2018 team isn't regarded highly. Finished 3rd in the u20 Six Nations having won only twice. And finished last in their World Championship group, lost to Scotland in the playoffs and barely beat Japan in the next match to decide who came last in the entire tournament.

That Ireland team had Caelan Doris and Dan Sheehan in it. Both of whom are now regarded by some as the best in the world for their position. This years Ireland side was missing half it's starting pack. Three of those lads are regarded as huge prospects for Leinster. There's a good chance they'll go on to have gone careers also. Our U20 set up is fine.

Small player pool? Only if you exclude over half our backline.

The retirees is an interesting one. I doubt there are super clear stats but I do wonder what percentage of six nations / rugby championship squads across each country retire in a year - i.e. how many 35/36/37 year olds are still in internation squads the year they retire. Anecdotally it does feel like we hold onto ours longer than the average.

There should have been a steady evolution of the team after the World Cup. Instead, we tried to squeeze every last result out of the same 25 odd players and ran them into the ground. Now we’re left with an old squad, needing a major refresh, when it should have been a gradual process. Other than at 10 (which was enforced with Sexton retiring) and McCarthy at lock, it’s the exact same 23 that played at the World Cup, a year and a half on.

Is this a standard cyclical peak & drop off for a rugby team losing older players to expected retirement or something more serious?

Seeing (or not seeing.. ) what's coming down the line to replace these guys I would say in a very non-panicked state … It looks like we won't be bouncing back too soon. But its ok to observe a team that has obviously peaked a while back. It seems to upset some people to call it out. For, me i'm not saying we've peaked … now we're fecked forever... Obviously not. Naturally players get old and step out of the game and new players get their chance. The question is Ireland showing a good linear conveyor belt of talent replacing talent? I'm not so sure.

On the subject of teams peaking and dropping off look at England after they won the 2003 RWC? Their form went off a bit of a cliff if I recall and they didn't win
another 6 Nations for years. Admittedly they did see a huge number of players retire after they won the WC within a relatively short space of time. Yet they still managed to get their
act together for the world cups.. mostly!

Trying to put some sort of positive spin on this our performance in this 6 nations very much paints a picture of a team
in progress A team very much at the start of a long rebuilding process. Buckle up its going to get bumpy for a while I'd say.