Ireland Team Talk XII: Farrell's First Fifteen

Amateur hour from the IRFU and Humphreys with how Lowe was treated withdrawing his agreed +1 year extension to the RWC and then trying to lowball him by cutting his salary by 50%. That’s the most insulting thing. It’s an appalling look for Irish rugby.

Jury is well and truly out on Humphreys. Giving the U20s gig to his mate was one thing. We had a disastrous year which was unsurprising as Doak hadn’t exactly a good track record before the appointment.

Cutting the 7s program and how the players were blind sighted by the announcement (as per Terry Kennedy) was another mistep. But messing around experienced players will hurt Irish rugby in the short (with team morale this summer/and squad depth at the next RWC) and long term (who wants to stay with an employer who may very well mess them around when you’re at your most vulnerable as a player?). We saw Murray and POM get messed around. Think we’ll see more players with something still to offer jumping before pushed.

Lowe marginally favoured over Stockdale? That’s like saying NZ have a marginally better RWC record than Ireland 😀

Your last point here is the interesting one.

EoS mentioned this on the Indo Sport podcast last week. If both club and country wanted to keep James Lowe and he wanted to stay, you make a deal happen.

In my line of work, when all the parties want a deal, we go back and forth until we get one done.

Sounds like this one sits with the IRFU but they were happy to Leo/Leinster to take the flak/heat.

Farrell to bring in the non Leinster players who are in the frame for the summer tour to a 3 day training camp on Monday according to Murray Kinsella.

He says it’s expected to be less than 15 players with 32/33 to be named next week. 17+ Leinster players then with less than 15 from the other 3.

LH: O’Toole Bohan Hooker: Stewart TH: Illo 2nd Row: Murray Izzy Beirne BR: Prendergast Timoney Ward Jansen SH:Casey Doak OH: Crowley Centres: McCloskey Postlethwaite Aki Back 3: Baloucoune

18 names above I think are all in with a good shot, so minimum of 4 won’t be chosen if Kinsella is correct. Maybe Stewart, Murray (Beirne if injured obviously), 1 of Ward/Jansen and Postlethwaite (McCloskey if injured) the 4 least likely for me. All the above though deserving of a place in the squad in my opinion.

If Beirne is injured and only Casey + Crowley travel, that must be the lowest ever representation for Munster, and must be enough for Flanagan to fall on his sword.

The very fact he’s missed so many games in such a short window is actually the strongest argument for why he shouldn’t arguably be on a central contract. And yeah, he’s a high quality player but he’s not a nailed on starter even when healthy - he plays the same position as Robert Baloucoune and Tommy O’Brien, either of whom could very credibly start ahead of him.

You focus on that side of my point though with your usual nitpicking, but ignore the actual central point - that James Lowe very clearly should have been on a central contract (and had he been a player for any other province he almost certainly would have been).

You might, I’m not so sure Andy Farrell would though. Lowe is a very different player to all of them, and remains an extremely effective winger.

Balacoune has, because of injuries, effectively has had a career of relative mediocrity, relative to his ceiling and his talents. When he can stay healthy and is at his best, he has the potential to be a world class winger potentially, he has absolutely everything. He just has not been remotely close to delivering on his ability.

I focused on Lowe’s 6 Nations minutes because it’s the tournament the IRFU consistently prioritises, and where we don’t rotate heavily the squad. I used the numbers there to show how Lowe has played the 4th most minutes of any player in Irish rugby in that tournament since making his debut, to illustrate very conclusively that he has been an absolutely integral player for Ireland for years now. My point was - he absolutely should have had a central contract, and there are very few logical arguments looking at his record as to why he didn’t get one.

I’m reasonably comfortably with my assertion, given what we saw in this past 6 Nations, that any combination of Hansen, Baloucoune and TOB would be ahead of Lowe in Farrell’s eyes. Alas, we won’t get to find out now.

Balacoune has, because of injuries, effectively has had a career of relative mediocrity, relative to his ceiling and his talents.

Two uses of the word “relative” is indicative of a serious level of backtracking, imo.

And again, there absolutely is a clear argument that Lowe should have had a central contract these past few years. I haven’t denied that.

But only highlighting Hansen’s 6 Nations minutes - where he’s been injured - as a means to comparatively illustrate that is more than a little selective.

Fwiw, the fact Lowe wasn’t on a Central contract just further demonstrates that the IRFU have a remit beyond Central Contracts and Leinster. Otherwise we might’ve been having this “40%” conversation earlier.

I’m not backtracking, as I didn’t make the original comment ffs, so I don’t particularly care about this at all.

It’s hard to argue though he’s had any kind of great career - he turns 29 in a couple of months from now, and he’s on 80 caps for Ulster and just 8 for Ireland. It’s not his fault, he just hasn’t been able to stay healthy, but when he burst on the scene it would have looked like the sky was the limit for him.

If Lowe or Conan were playing for one of the other provinces and all else was equal about their international representation over the past few years, they’d have had CCs.

That phrase if it aint broke dont fix it applies here, the broken pieces were in the other provinces where the structural improvements are not going to be addressed.

It’s not hard to understand why Lowe was never on a CC. He wasn’t developed by Leinster. He was already an established, high quality Super Rugby player before he signed. A Māori AB regular who was in and around NZ squads. I think he was supposed to get capped in 2015 but he got injured. Plus the fact that Leinster had nearly their whole team on CCs, it would have been very bad optics, and I’d argue, plain wrong for the IRFU to be fully funding his contract on top of the 11 they already funded. People may bring up JGP, but he was nowhere near the calibre of player Lowe was when he came to Leinster, and developed massively in his time there. Lowe was a shoe in to play for Ireland after 3 years the minute he signed for Leinster.

Not sure anyone ever made the comment which is causing such anguish, but he absolutely has had a disappointing career through a combination of injury, bad luck, limited chances (not all of which he made the most of) and most importantly, playing the same position as some really good players.

But with Lowe gone, Stockdale very unlikely to hit the heights and Hansen picking up a lot of injuries, we suddenly look very light on the wings so it would be fantastic if Baloucoune can deliver. TOB is great but just not as exciting as I would like and after that, is there anyone coming behind? Not as far as I can see.

Who are these 1014 shady group exactly?

They have funded some big NIQ signings in the past de Allende and RG - who did not work

Who else did they fund?

Is the 1014 group still on board, would they fund someone like Lomax?

Lastly could this 1014 group be advised to help in a different way, not all NIQ funding but more maybe funding into pathways, foundations, things like:

coaching at schools/youths/AIL

Facilities - 4G pitches or gyms for clubs/schools

Helping more schools to get to A level

Identifying new underage competitions etc

Would the above funding be a better long term investment from 1014 rather than shiny expensive and ultimately useless signings like RG

What’s shady about them? Just because they want to remaining anonymous?

That’s not shady.

Munster won a URC with De Allende in the team. Which, prior to this coming weekend, is the same as Leinster over the last 4 seasons.