Leinster Team Talk Thread (Love you Furlong time)

Many of the schools you mention that I'm familiar with have had rugby programs for more than 100 years. By your figures Leinster get 80% of their players from this source. Not sure what the point you are trying to make is, but the point you are making is that the schools literally provide Leinster with the vast majority of their players, which is not the case for the other provinces. These schools have had integral rugby programs for so long that the ebbs and flows of their senior contributions goes in cycles of decades. Newbridge win the SC every 40 or 50 years, yet the school has produced a dozen or more test players over the years. The closest club, Naas, has produced 4 over the same period, and 3 of them went to Newbridge. The SCT/JCT is a mythical ambition for many of these schools, but those competitions are an insane incubator of rugby talent in the round.

So to summarise, more investment needs to be provided in the other provinces to improve the development of club/school level rugby players because they don't have the same levels of culture/competition that the Leinster clubs/schools have.

Seems fair, that is the argument being made isn't it?

That is the million dollar question. Do we rely on the fact that the current Ireland captain's father had the culture and the means to send him to Blackrock and continue with that status quo?

Or do we make an effort to discover those without either. They surely exist, so how do we find them without establishing the means (that means money) to do so?

We absolutely should try to discover all the talent that we can. But the other million dollar question is, how?

No one from IRFU has bothered to tell us how this money will improve “player pathways”, or indeed what “player pathways” even are. No one on this board has been able to hazard a guess either.

If you read their press release closely, the IRFU hasn’t actually committed to a single extra cent for player development.

It’s a noble aim but how we’re actually getting there is a black box of mystery.

Everyone goes to school, that is the difference between it and clubs.

Sorry, no, “garrison games” isn’t on. Absolutely unacceptable

Well clearly I'm not using it in a derogatory sense, which I'm sure you know. It can't be denied where the advent of the prevalence of a rugby culture comes from can it? It didn't develop on it's own.

Tommy O'Brien picked up the Player of the Year Award at the Leinster Awards last night, while Paddy McCarthy took the Young Player Award.

As widely rumoured, Leinster have confirmed a number of players leaving the Academy too:

Paidi Farrell, Billy Corrigan, Mahon Ronan, Henry McErlean & Liam Molony.

It's in line with the speculation. I'm not surprised at Molony, he has been permanently injured virtually for 3 years. McErlean equally, while very talented, had sub-optimal size and struggled to stay healthy.

Ronan & Farrrell are being cut after just 1 Year. Both are probably a bit shorter than the archetype for their positions, but thought Mahon Ronan was excellent in the last Leinster A game v Ulster, and wouldn't be surprised to see him pop up in someone else's academy.

Corrigan's cut kind of surprises me, always thought he had very good athleticism for that kind of hybrid lock/blindside and played well anytime I've seen him play.

Still haven't gotten any response on these two fairly direct queries to @awec and @aloooof:

I’m more than happy to answer these IF

1. it was done somewhere more appropriate that isn’t the Leinster thread
2. You answer some of my previous questions to you that you’ve left unanswered and I haven’t chased you on….

Cos I’m absolutely certain a number of posters in here have no interest in another back and forth between me and you.

And I’m not at all certain it will get us anywhere.

Surprised about Corrigan in particular, would have had him down as an above average prospect. Guess there's something they're not seeing from him in training. I'd have loved him at Connacht a year ago but I think he's probably a bit too similar to Diarmaid O'Connell. Mahon Ronan would be a better fit for us.

With undersized backs getting cut left right and centre (O'Leary Kareem, McErlean, and Farrell just this summer), you'd have to question if a lot of these guys would have been better served converting to 9 heading into senior cycle?