Connacht Team Talk Thread VI - Some like it TOH

Think this will be a disaster

He has failed in his his last 2 head coach roles

What did he win with Leinster

This stinks off a job for Farrell's mate to keep the IRFU click happy

He achieved loads with leinster. Look at how so many players coaches pundits and fans talk of his time with leinster. It wasn't a bad time with him involved. Don't know how this can be seen as a disaster

Me too. The main thing I remember about his time at leinster was how the team talked about him and the approach he took to personal/professional development. It sounds like dry management stuff and when a poor manager does it, it's little more than a tick box exercise. But it seemed much more than that with Lancaster.

If he can keep connacht's attack exciting and tighten up the defence AND develop the players individually, Connacht will be both brilliant to watch and very dangerous. Really hope he smashes it

Christ, if I was a Connacht fan I'd be delighted to be getting him and willing to give him a chance

Pretty much every rugby/soccer coach fails. The nature of the beast essentially.

Lancaster is exactly what connacht need IMO. Connacht look a team that's poorly coached and lacking in a clear plan. They do so much right but the bits they get wrong hurt them enormously and uts usually basic stuff that kills connacht. I suspect Lancaster will fine tune the balance between expansive and pragmatic rugby and connacht will finish top 8 next season.

He won a European cup and 4 leagues at Leinster. R92 are a basket case of a club so I wouldn't judge him on that too much.

Are you Nostradamus?

That's a great signing, would have loved him at Munster. Lots to be excited about next season for Connacht!

four pro 14s and a champions cup.

If I had to find a negative in this, and i know I don't but still, it would be that maybe some of the issues from racing might be the same in Connacht.

Racing are an odd team. probably the most french french team in terms of the old stereotype; "you never know which <Racing> team will turn up" etc. They go from world beaters to nothing pretty quickly.

Connacht have a bit of that in their history too. The issue hasn't been the ceiling for Connacht, it's the floor. Some days they've just been nowhere, and then the pull out a cup final performance and look great.

I suppose what I'm getting at is that there's a chance this is exactly the problem that Lancaster can't solve.

All of that said, he did great things at Leinster. They were faltering when Leo took over and he really came in and steadied the ship. It's hard to think of a better option that was a reasonable possibility. I'm looking forward to next season now, even though any big success is probably likely to take another year after that.

I was looking lazily… Good call…

You may be right Mr. Tickle but I would prefer to address the issue of floor performances with an experienced coach than take a chance on an up and coming one. I like that Lancaster has experience of both success and failure at a high level. Before the appointment if asked I would have said we required a solid, mature, experienced career coach who would have the resilience to take the rough with the smooth and the smarts to improve us on our worst days. It doesn't guarantee success but it at least moves the focus to the players and the squad performance instead of the inexperienced coaching team.

There won't be many places to hide for this squad now. We have decent players- Lions, Internationals and players who aspire to those levels. Connacht and the IRFU are now backing them with the highest levels of coaching experience and we as fans should expect to see the minimum standard of performance improve. Not expecting us to win anything next year but top 8 should be within our ability imo.

On a side issue, this appointment will improve our recruitment possibilities. Players who turned their nosdes up at Connacht may now think differently.

Yep, I agree with all of that.

I was really just trying to understand what some of the doubters might be looking at specifically. I think a season of solid home results with a couple of scalps on the road, finish higher than at least one other province, and get knockout rugby in both tournaments would be a good showing next year and I don't think it's unreasonable.

edit: It probably doesn't hurt the chances of one of Leinster's 10's moving west if Lancaster has a relationship with them.