It isn’t no, like you said it’s more of the performance.
The issue is unless we win in Twickenham the 6N will automatically be looked upon negatively after that performance versus France.
If we lose by +20 in Twickenham than the IRFU will need to move on some coaches by the end of the championship.
I don't see us getting rid of Farrell before the RWC and as I've previously said, they have appointed from within the last few times. Who is the obvious head coach that they can jump to if they get rid of Farrell. I don't see a standout one.
They won’t move on Farrell but I could see the IRFU moving on some assistants.
Keep Farrell. Ditch O'Connell and Goodman. Both are just not good enough.
What does that improve?
A change of voices, fresh ideas, a change of philosophy
I guess the concern is that we now know that a large contributor to Farrell's early struggles was the implementation of an ambitious and incredibly detailed attacking shape. From what I can remember even when we were struggling under Farrell the messages from the camp were overwhelmingly positive and it was clear the players trusted the process.
It's very hard to see what we're working on now, or what innovation is just around the corner. I'm sure our kicking game will improve, but we've a long way to go to even catch up to our rivals in that aspect.
I look at our team currently and I think of Borthwick's quote when he took over England:
"When I looked at the team in the autumn, when I measured the team and got all the data for the team, we weren't good at anything. It was as frank as that."
one of the issues w Leo’s extended run at Leinster is that he’s not a serious candidate for the Irish job.
In terms of playing style the first contestable in the French game saw two of their players jump together and tap the ball back. A small thing but it put a marker down that they came to dominate in the air which they did very convincingly. Ireland didn’t seem to have a particular set of tactics to deal with the aerial game, other than send it up and hope for the best. Given that this has been a fundamental shift in how the game is played since the WC you’d wonder why there are no obvious strategies in place to dominate.
Farrell will see out his tenure.
Hopefully Felix Jones will be available at that stage. I think he has what it takes to make the leap to a Head Coach position.
Plus, it'll be nice to have a Leinster man in the role
😉
To be fair, the voices in the Irish camp still appear to be positive, the issue atm is we are one year closer to the RWC than we were the last time we had this struggle so it could be a case where if things are still going to **** the IRFU might be forced into making a decision.
The head coach either dictated or agreed that the plan for the second half was to kick long. Will changing a coach and leaving Farrell change that
Italy's scrum and lineout was excellent yesterday, albeit against a poor Scotland side. We'll need another strong performace from Loughman, Clarkson and the locks. If they dominate the set piece it'll be a tough day out for us.
The IRFU don’t care about the World Cup. It’s just an expense to them. That won’t be what influences their decision. What will make them pull the trigger on Farrell is if we finish in the bottom half of the 6N and/or ticket sales for the Aviva drop.
They struggled to sell out the Japan game in November, so we’re already seeing this to an extent. Games like Italy and Wales will be a very hard sell at €100+ a ticket if they keep serving up performances like Thursday night and SA in November
Our Problems didn't begin last Thursday. This has been going on a year or more.
And AF wasn't around for the 6n last year. So yeah, few voices, fresh ideas, some changes in coaching is probably needed.
… Attack and set-piece, line-out specifically.
… given they're the coaches responsible for those areas.
Wild concept, I know.
Set piece was close to perfect last week and as we heard from Fogarty the attack was kick long. I'm of the opinion that Andy was aware of that and agreed with it so changing Goodman might not change how Farrell wants to play
This is an on-going problem, not specific to one game - one game doesn't prove anything either direction. I don't think anyone can claim (with a genuine or straight face) that our set piece or attack is going well in general.
This isn't a knee-jerk reaction.
I'm not claiming anything, also, I've never looked for a coach to be sacked but I honestly think changing Goodman for someone different will only change our attack if Andy wants it to change
I think there is a strong possibility Italy win, but i think home advantage will get us over the line, but not confident saying that. If the game was in Rome I would be very very sure we loose it.
I agree. I’d get it very hard to believe that Farrell has no input or say over the coaching being undertaken by all his coaches. Surely he’s the one dictating to them what game plan he wants them to follow.
I thought Farrell was the attach coach off of phase play & Goodman was brought in to coach the attack of set piece play.
A bit like Nienaber at Leinster getting the blame for a multitude of things, it gives the other coaches a free pass.
Any downturn in our attack play isn't solely down to Goodman, Farrell has always been an integral part of the attack coaching duties since becoming head coach
There's a degree to which that is true. Farrell takes the overall responsibility for everything, he's the main man. That's fine.
We've had other coaches on those positions and have done very well. The change isn't Farrell, it's Goodman and O'Connell. Not that there aren't other factors at play, but at the moment their particular remits are lacking, and I trust Farrell to fix it, but I don't trust either of them in the same sense, because I don't think they were up to it in the first place. Farrell, however, is.
If Farrell's selection policy is to be consistent suirely Crowley has to start against Italy
It is not going to happen. Sam is the man and will be for some time.
The lineout was great against France.
He won't be there that long. I don't think he'll be Leinster starter for that long. There has to be someone better coming through and the most likely place for that to happen is Leinster.
I agree with all this.
I remember saying this before the summer of 2021 that I have a lot of fate in Andy Farrell but what he needs to do is decide weather Mike Catt, who had doubts about him at the time, is up to it or weather we need additional coaches or weather Catt needed replacing.
If he doesn’t act then Farrell will start becoming a problem.
To give him his dues POC seems to have steadied the lineout so I am less keen on moving him on then I was before…Goodman on the other hand needs to seriously start earning his corn soon otherwise he can take a hike.
Hard to tell with the lineout because a lot of our ball seema to come at 2? Could be wrong, just feels like we are playing it safe.
I would qualify that statement by reminding people that for most of the game France rarely contested the lineout when the did challenge near the end we didn't look too comfortable at that stage Kelleher was on. The Italians looked to have a pretty effective lineout on Saturday.
