Leinster Team Talk Thread (Love you Furlong time)

I disagree. I think they'll have to do exactly what they always do and what every team always does. Set goals, set ways to achieve those goals.

To take it a bit further, does Scott Penny need special motivation, looking at an aging VDF in the 7 jersey keeping him out of the squad? Penny pushing pushes VDF. same with Deegan, Cooney, Tector, Osbourne. Jack Boyle and Paddy McCarthy are pushing each other and Porter for the starting and bench place. Furlong and Clarkson pushing each other.

I'd say ita exactly the same as every other year. This melancholy will pass.

The most damning indictment of the coaching ticket for me is that a lot of these players produced some much better rugby in the 6 Nations and likely will for Ireland again in the summer, under a different coaching ticket.

Both sides of the ball are largely a confused mess. Our defence is going backwards by any statistical (or eye test) analysis.

Our attack looks stuttering and unclear, with players badly aligned and poor execution of basic skills.

We have huge levels of talent in our squad, and an academy that does a great job in continuing to produce talented players, but we have largely wasted a golden generation of players, and to me, it is madness to go into yet another season without changing anything.

Will be brought into the Irish Management in a heartbeat

Jobs for the boys - Don't forget that

Big parallels with how France have given us similarly big beatings the last 2 times we’ve played them where multiple scores were conceded quickly and we huffed and puffed to score ourselves after the game got away.

Three different coaches have been unable to compete with them with a large group of the same players which would indicate that it’s not purely a coaching issue. Time to stop looking through the names of the team sheet with 2023 eyes. Still a lot of fine players but with a lot of rugby in their legs.

Robertson coming in place of Nienaber would be a dream announcement. Looking at the bigger picture the outside backs coming through would be a concern. And 9/10 will be a concern. Top teams have top halfbacks. That’s not just a concern for Leinster..

Depends how you frame it yes a failure to not win again in a Final. Not a failure when you consider Leinster have been in the top 2 teams in europe for a decade.

Yeah But the attitude in thus forum was that it was a very close call between Henshaw and Osborne. Henshaw had a decent season and Osborne didn't perform as well in the centre as he did at full back.

Fair to say it didn't work out well, but it wasn't a crazy decision when he made it.

Similar with Mcgrath on the bench. A month ago the concensus was that Mcgrath has played pretty well and Gunne hasn't played well enough to displace him.

The wild swings between playing the best team today and planning for the future create a pretty inconsistent narrative. It's Captain Hindsight stuff mostly.

He had 6 very good years with the Crusaders so has been coaching very well up until recently. Things didn't work out well at the Abs and he was pushed out, a bit prematurely in my opinion. I'd still have him at Leinster in a heartbeat.

Reality is French rugby is now top of the tree because they have so many teams playing at a high level, huge finances, huge crowds and massive tv contract. The URC is not at the raves in comparison to top14. Maybe we need to look at joining with the Premiership and having 2 leagues with relegation. France has won the last 5 and is constantly moving to a higher level. We need more top level competition to compete with them. Playing Zebre and the Dragons is no help at raising the bar.

I did a loose calculation of Leinster's wage bill there, with the following assumptions:

12 Central Contracted players, earning from €350k-€650k (average €445k) - total: €5.35m

3 NIQs, earning €200k-€450k: - total €900k

19 Core Squad players, earning from €125k - €400k (average €184k) - total: €3.5m

13 younger / development players, earning from €60k-€85k (average: €77k): Total: €1.01m

That gives a total for the full playing squad of c. €10.76m, pretty much in line with the French cap (before they get the benefit of the international player credits (and other credits), but it's also allocating the full cost of the CCs onto Leinster, which doesn't seem to be a fair way to do it.

For this to be the case - the average salary across Leinster's 47 man playing squad would be €228k. The average in the PREM is estimated to range from €180k-€211k, and the average salary in the Top14 is €259k.

You can argue about the wage bill, but it's the standards and squad depth. Have you any positive suggestions as to how we can compete over the nest 5 years when French rugby is getting stronger and stronger ??

With the dust settled and a bit more time thinking about Saturday's match, we were beaten by a far better team this time. I think the anger at losing is due to the previous final losses and not this one itself. If we had won one of those previous 4 finals that were all very winnable, we could probably take this year on the chin a bit more.

I would agree with the sentiment that Nienaber's style was always an odd fit for Leinster and changing so dramatically was likely an overreaction based on the two La Rochelle finals. That 2023 final in particular hurts more than any given how well the team played all season up until then (and for the first 30 mins too!)

Winning the URC needs to be the priority now and it will be a good test of the coaches as to whether they can get the team back in gear for that.