Ireland Tour to New Zealand 2012 Discussion thread

irishbucsfan

unplayable wrote: »

Clearlier wrote: »

Take a closer look at how SOB plays now and forget how he played a year ago. He is fast developing into a top quality 7. Many believe that he outplayed McCaw in both tests.

one swallow doesnt make a summer

And what about his performance against France in the 6 Nations? Or numerous times for Leinster?

The guy is clearly a top class back row forward, as is Heaslip.

jimmybeige

unplayable wrote: »

all 4 teams who made the semis had a world class number 7. mccaw, pocock, warburton and bonnaire. all specialist in their position. just saying its no coincidence. a back row needs balance and we dont have it.we are just picking the 3 best back row players

Isn't Bonnaire essentially a 6 except they play with different numbers in France? I have never known him to be a world class groundhog.

DATABOY

Heaslips form has been poor de last 2 years,bar the last game i think we can all agree on.there hav been no alternatives until POM burst on the seen dis year with sum brilliant performances and nows his big opportunity to take dat no.8 jersey and for heaslip to buck up!

sixy

Cpt_Blackbeard wrote: »

No poster here will deny that Wallace has had a good season, but that doesn't ease my worries. He is returning from holiday in Portugal to be thrown straight in against the Kiwis with only two days of training under his belt. Not only that, but he has had a very patchy career at international level and is half the size of his opposite number.

Hopefully he'll go well, but it is a risky selection decision. Ideally he'll be employed in the 2nd 5 role which Sexton filled last week, and we won't have to see more ridiculous crashball stuff we've endured with him in the team in the past.

Aye makes you wonder why we didn't take him when deccie obviously doesn't see mcfadden as a 12. At least wallace should be freshened up a bit after a long season, just hope he wasn't enjoying too many pints at the pool bar in portugal

Fireball07

unplayable wrote: »

one swallow doesnt make a summer

But a flock of swallows??

SOB is an excellent 7. And that was never Ireland's problem to begin with...it wasn't the lack of turnovers that cost us... it was what he did with the ball after.

jimmybeige wrote: »

Isn't Bonnaire essentially a 6 except they play with different numbers in France? I have never known him to be a world class groundhog.

Yeah, I'd have thought so. Bonnaire's not bad in that regard but he's no Pocock. And Dusautoir does a lot of the work...but so did/does Heaslip for Ireland.

rrpc

unplayable wrote: »

look lets not get too excited. i just think we need a specialst 7 and if sean obrien is that man then great. lets keep an eye on it. anyway so +17 is a great line for the weekend. i assume everyone is in agreement with that

Oh dear, George Hook has registered on boards :eek:

Sean O'Brien has been the standout seven this season, both for Leinster and Ireland. The turnover he got just at the death of the HEC semi against Clermont was absolute class. He couldn't be shifted by any of the Clermont forwards, stayed on his feet and won the penalty.

unplayable

DATABOY wrote: »

Heaslips form has been poor de last 2 years,bar the last game i think we can all agree on.there hav been no alternatives until POM burst on the seen dis year with sum brilliant performances and nows his big opportunity to take dat no.8 jersey and for heaslip to buck up!

ataboy

Podge_irl

DATABOY wrote: »

Heaslips form has been poor de last 2 years,bar the last game i think we can all agree on.

We really can't.

rrpc

DATABOY wrote: »

Heaslips form has been poor de last 2 years,bar the last game i think we can all agree on.there hav been no alternatives until POM burst on the seen dis year with sum brilliant performances and nows his big opportunity to take dat no.8 jersey and for heaslip to buck up!

bamboozle

DATABOY wrote: »

Heaslips form has been poor de last 2 years,bar the last game i think we can all agree on.there hav been no alternatives until POM burst on the seen dis year with sum brilliant performances and nows his big opportunity to take dat no.8 jersey and for heaslip to buck up!

sure, he was also so lucky that the other 7 lads in the Leinster pack carried him along as they won the last two HC's...

unplayable

bamboozle wrote: »

sure, he was also so lucky that the other 7 lads in the Leinster pack carried him along as they won the last two HC's...

im talking purely about ireland here. im from munster sodont go around saying thats leinstertainment!!!! cmon ye must admit heaslip has been poor considering his previous high standards for ireland

Teferi

DATABOY wrote: »

Heaslips form has been poor de last 2 years,bar the last game i think we can all agree on.there hav been no alternatives until POM burst on the seen dis year with sum brilliant performances and nows his big opportunity to take dat no.8 jersey and for heaslip to buck up!

unplayable wrote: »

ataboy

I would imagine that these two posters IP address would match if anyone cared to investigate it.

irishbucsfan

unplayable wrote: »

bamboozle wrote: »

sure, he was also so lucky that the other 7 lads in the Leinster pack carried him along as they won the last two HC's...

im talking purely about ireland here. im from munster sodont go around saying thats leinstertainment!!!! cmon ye must admit heaslip has been poor considering his previous high standards for ireland

He is regularly our highest tackler. Regularly leads the teams in turnovers. No idea what games you've been.watching

rrpc

unplayable wrote: »

im talking purely about ireland here. im from munster sodont go around saying thats leinstertainment!!!! cmon ye must admit heaslip has been poor considering his previous high standards for ireland

I take it you didn't bother reading that article I helpfully linked for you. Here's a snippet (relating only to his Ireland role):

Heaslip has not had a vintage season, but he has been asked to play a game that doesn’t really take advantage of the things that he does well on the rugby pitch, and Ireland employ tactics that aren’t all that clever. O’Connell taking on more ball doesn’t occur by accident, or because Heaslip “disappears” – it happens too often for that. It has all the appearances of a tactical decision, a gameplan. The guy who doesn’t have good hands or much pace carries the ball into contact, and the other guy who has both those qualities hits the ruck.

Seph503

I think unplayable and databoy are one in the same. Not much point arguing with them lads.

EDIT: Teferi said it, damn not paying attention!

RoundBox11

Careful Now wrote: »

Considering mcfadden is a stone and a half heavier than wallace yes of course I think he is more likely to be run over by SBW than if it was mcfadden.

The thing about Wallace is, although he's light, he's very strong and has good technique. So much so that he's a much better defender than people give him credit for. I'd question his listed weight anyway. He looks a fair bit bigger than D'Arcy here

Wallace is a great defender tbh. If he misses a tackle this weekend, that doesn't change it btw. So don't be lighting turf for the pitchforks now.

sydthebeat

given a preference of wallace in centre with earls on wing...
or earls in centre with trimble on wing...

i pick wallace every time.

d-gal

sydthebeat wrote: »

given a preference of wallace in centre with earls on wing...
or earls in centre with trimble on wing...

i pick wallace every time.

Very true. I'd love for earls to get a full run at centre in the Irish set up but in the wingers we have there at the mo we are much better off with Earls on the wing. At least he can score tries!!

Monty Burnz

RoundBox11 wrote: »

He looks a fair bit bigger than D'Arcy here

To be fair, he has the advantage of standing closer to the camera here, and also the camera is using a wide-angle lens.

finatron

Monty Burnz wrote: »

To be fair, he has the advantage of standing closer to the camera here, and also the camera is using a wide-angle lens.

how the hell can you tell that

ScissorPaperRock

Getting excited for this game now. Although it makes me nervous that people think we might be able to win. It tends not to work out in our favour whenever we start to think we could win a game.

It's funny though that we've arguably had our best games recently against the top quality teams - Australia, France, New Zealand (2nd test)

sixy

ScissorPaperRoc wrote: »

Getting excited for this game now. Although it makes me nervous that people think we might be able to win. It tends not to work out in our favour whenever we start to think we could win a game.

It's funny though that we've arguably had our best games recently against the top quality teams - Australia, France, New Zealand (2nd test)

Have to beat them at some point, seems as good a time as any...

the_doctor199

finatron wrote: »

[/U]

how the hell can you tell that

Data is on the image, was shot at 17mm.

wonton

completely irrelevent to everything to do with anything

but darcys bicep in this pic looks so weird

Swiwi

rrpc wrote: »

You might have a read of this. Gives a very good insight into Heaslip's supposed 'drop' in form and indicates why he plays better for Leinster than Ireland and coincidentally why he's been playing so well in NZ.

Great blog, that website, whoever writes it knows a bit about rugby.
Off to watch the soccer...does that get me banned permanently from this site

WeeBushy

Swiwi wrote: »

Great blog, that website, whoever writes it knows a bit about rugby.
Off to watch the soccer...does that get me banned permanently from this site

Burn him!

:pac:

shootermacg

o'Brien has been pinged since the world cup when turning over ball, perfectly legally IMO.
Hope these test make the refs sit up and take notice, might have another can't-do-any-wrong Richie clone on our hands .
I personally rate him higher than Warburton as long as the ref isn't on his back.

If I was Heaslip I'd go back to the barnstorming, if appears some guys appreciate a back row running over a number 9s more than one who contributes everywhere else, sure didn't oBrien get player of the year running at backs!

^
That last part about Heaslip is sarcasm BTW:D

wonton

cheers for editing that, I was about to say its pretty odd to write a whole two paragraphs and then say it was sarcasm :pac:

Monty Burnz

RoundBox11 wrote: »

how the hell can you tell that

By the look of the picture. It's not terribly wide - probably 35mm sort of range.