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Ireland Team Talk XI: Team of nervoUS MOD warning Post 1
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Best is on my ignore list
A coach lives and dies by his selections. Its without question the hardest part of the job.
Farrell is on a very steep learning curve. Conversely he doesn't have the players available to make those selection choices harder!
Its imperative that he uses this 8 team thing to try and establish a new leadership group, a more balanced attack (eg. why not try Frawley at 12? v Wal or Georgia) and introduce Lowe, Baird, Casey & Lowry.0 -
For the short term Andy needs to build a cohesive unit that he trusts, if you look at the RWC what England and SA had was that you knew exactly what the team would be and if someone was out you knew straight away who would come in, same with Ireland in 2018 and NZL up until 2019 (which is why I believe they inevitably were found out in Japan). I would like Farrell to spend 2020 doing this and then and only then would I like him to start adding the tools to the armoury.0
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shootermacg wrote: »I'd like to see Daly, Haley brought into the squad.
Both about 6'3 good in the air, good tacklers Haley is probably the better attacker, but Daly is very solid all round.
Haley is solid defensively and has good footwork but I don't think he's good enough. He's also played a lot of rugby between his time at Sale and Munster so I don't think he's much room to improve.
I'd look at Daly as someone who hasn't reached his ceiling yet.0 -
thomond2006 wrote: »Haley is solid defensively and has good footwork but I don't think he's good enough. He's also played a lot of rugby between his time at Sale and Munster so I don't think he's much room to improve.
I'd look at Daly as someone who hasn't reached his ceiling yet.
What's the story with Gallagher actually, has he been injured? I would've thought he'd have been in the mix if he kicked on in the couple of games there's been, he had started to make a fair impression with Sarries the season before.0 -
Squidgy Black wrote: »What's the story with Gallagher actually, has he been injured? I would've thought he'd have been in the mix if he kicked on in the couple of games there's been, he had started to make a fair impression with Sarries the season before.
Played for the A's last weekend.0 -
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A couple of thoughts from an outsider perspective:
- Surprised at all the comments about the Irish pack lacking size/power. Ryan and Furlong are two of the biggest and meanest baby-eaters in world rugby and the backrow prospects aren't lacking for size. Leinster really missed Furlong on the weekend.
- Surprised a guy like Conroy from the 7s seemingly hasn't been able to make the step into the 15 man game (excuse my ignorance if he has been and failed). Genuine blistering pace.0 -
A couple of thoughts from an outsider perspective:
- Surprised at all the comments about the Irish pack lacking size/power. Ryan and Furlong are two of the biggest and meanest baby-eaters in world rugby and the backrow prospects aren't lacking for size. Leinster really missed Furlong on the weekend.
- Surprised a guy like Conroy from the 7s seemingly hasn't been able to make the step into the 15 man game (excuse my ignorance if he has been and failed). Genuine blistering pace.
Well i have a friend who is a coach and he told me Simon Easterbuy was shocked that he was cut he had presumed he was an exile or the like as they were all watching some sevens footage last December as a coaching group.
However the Connacht forum, people said he wasn't cut but turned down a contract.
People will say his defence is crap. It hasn't stopped Stockdale.
We do have big powerful lads but we must look at conditioning. Our lads are fit but there does seem to be a case of us going down the lithe NZ route. Which means we can be bullied but be able to get within a score in the 70th minute. I suppose its tiny margins and just the nature of rugby now. It was obvious during the World Cup and it failed badly for us. I do question whether a Costello or the like would make it anymore in Ireland. Vunipola in an Irish system would be told to trim down i'm guessing which is not his game. Personally i much prefer having a few monsters in the pack.0 -
Furlong is one guy and wasn't around at the weekend. Ryan is a great player but he's not a monster. He's a big unit but would still give us several kilos to most other test locks. The Irish and Leinster websites have him as 106kg which is almost certainly incorrect but I still wouldn't put him at any more than 112kg.
That would be very light for a test lock. You'd be hard pressed to find too many others who are coming in under 115kg.
Our back rowers are fairly average in size. Conan is a solid size but Doris isn't carrying much bulk and relies more on dynamism and identifying space. Stander is the closest we have to it in terms of someone who is very robust physically and is heavier than people would expect. Ruddock would be the other.
Connors and VDF are very lightweight for top level flankers. They're completely dependent on work rate and technique. POM isn't a big bloke eithter and again relies more on smarts than power. We've guys like Penny coming through who simply aren't going to cut it at test level ever due to their size. Hodnett and O'Sullivan in Munster are great athletes but again, very small. Josh Murphy is someone that could potentially put on another few kg and be an option. Coombes is another. But they're probably not as talented rugby players as others.
I was listening to OTB last night and had to laugh when Barnes or Toland (can't recall which) was discussing how NZ overcome this issue with an incredibly high skill level. When they won in 2015, their pack was filled with guys who had brilliant skills but they were also monsters physically; four of their front five were 120kg+.
We're never going to compete with teams regularly with power and are going to have to be smarter and more accurate to win games. It's nothing new. We've always been smaller than a lot of other teams.0 -
Wouldn't have picked Ryan to be so light, nor the others. Certainly not lacking in height.0
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Well i have a friend who is a coach and he told me Simon Easterbuy was shocked that he was cut he had presumed he was an exile or the like as they were all watching some sevens footage last December as a coaching group.
However the Connacht forum, people said he wasn't cut but turned down a contract.
People will say his defence is crap. It hasn't stopped Stockdale.
We do have big powerful lads but we must look at conditioning. Our lads are fit but there does seem to be a case of us going down the lithe NZ route. Which means we can be bullied but be able to get within a score in the 70th minute. I suppose its tiny margins and just the nature of rugby now. It was obvious during the World Cup and it failed badly for us. I do question whether a Costello or the like would make it anymore in Ireland. Vunipola in an Irish system would be told to trim down i'm guessing which is not his game. Personally i much prefer having a few monsters in the pack.
Billy Vunipola would have been a prop if he played in Ireland.0 -
OneLungDavy wrote: »Billy Vunipola would have been a prop if he played in Ireland.
You mustn't have seen him when he was a teenager, he was never going to be a prop .....0 -
Furlong is one guy and wasn't around at the weekend. Ryan is a great player but he's not a monster. He's a big unit but would still give us several kilos to most other test locks. The Irish and Leinster websites have him as 106kg which is almost certainly incorrect but I still wouldn't put him at any more than 112kg.
That would be very light for a test lock. You'd be hard pressed to find too many others who are coming in under 115kg.
Our back rowers are fairly average in size. Conan is a solid size but Doris isn't carrying much bulk and relies more on dynamism and identifying space. Stander is the closest we have to it in terms of someone who is very robust physically and is heavier than people would expect. Ruddock would be the other.
Connors and VDF are very lightweight for top level flankers. They're completely dependent on work rate and technique. POM isn't a big bloke eithter and again relies more on smarts than power. We've guys like Penny coming through who simply aren't going to cut it at test level ever due to their size. Hodnett and O'Sullivan in Munster are great athletes but again, very small. Josh Murphy is someone that could potentially put on another few kg and be an option. Coombes is another. But they're probably not as talented rugby players as others.
I was listening to OTB last night and had to laugh when Barnes or Toland (can't recall which) was discussing how NZ overcome this issue with an incredibly high skill level. When they won in 2015, their pack was filled with guys who had brilliant skills but they were also monsters physically; four of their front five were 120kg+.
We're never going to compete with teams regularly with power and are going to have to be smarter and more accurate to win games. It's nothing new. We've always been smaller than a lot of other teams.
I agree with the current pack argument. However i disagree with the always small part. For whatever reason we've always favoured lighter guys. We had and have huge men Buckley, Davidson, Browne, Hayes, Costello and for whatever reason they've rarely been universally accepted. McCloskey currently. Porter is an example, he definitely looks like he's trimmed down. We have a 6,9 lock Munster are afraid to play and they cut a 6.9 lock last year. I'm not saying height/size = good but we definitely don't help ourselves at all. I think Irish rugby convinces itself of the argument and then thinks its so clever to have done it differently. Size will always be important in Rugby. We don't have pace- cut Conroy or whoever, we don't have size - don't pick a brute or encourage players to pack on size.
New Zealand have definitely moved to a lighter model as they too were also bullied. Still more powerful than us, granted.0 -
Size does matter. Now more than ever in rugby.
There was a lot of grumbling from some of the provinces around the World Cup that the National S&C programme got the whole approach to the World Cup wrong. The team were seriously conditioned but too light.
Aki played about 92kg for example. Connacht now have him back up towards 102kg.
We have seen someone like Ultan Dillane much less effective when he has dropped off in weight. In fact, it coincided with him missing out on national selection. Last season when he put the kilos back on, he got back into the national squad. Those 2-3 kilos can make a huge impact on how a players performs. And Ireland don’t easily produce players with explosive power like him.
We have also seen it go the other way. Chan Healy is a good example where he found the heavier weight challenging.
So these fluctuations do have a genuine impact on performance-selection-winning-losing.
It’s definitely not everything but it is more important to a country like ours than we think.0 -
I was listening to OTB last night and had to laugh when Barnes or Toland (can't recall which) was discussing how NZ overcome this issue with an incredibly high skill level. When they won in 2015, their pack was filled with guys who had brilliant skills but they were also monsters physically; four of their front five were 120kg+.
It took a while for both Retallick and Whitelock to get to that size. I don't think Retallick would have been 120+ in 2015. I remember when they both first arrived on the pro-rugby scene, they were definitely leaner so I would expect (and hope) the likes of Ryan, Baird, Doris and Deegan to bulk up over the next few years. One thing I remember about Tony Woodcock when I met him a couple of times was his lack of size. At first glance he did not look like he was 120kg but then you noticed that he was all muscle. Whereas Faumauina and the Franks brothers looked big.0 -
Fairly stark warning for rugby in general with the small crowds tests abandoned in the GP tonight.
Clubs in England are seemingly on the brink of bankruptcy.0 -
I'm not sure all this talk of size is relevant at all. Wales are a small team but England's size doesn't seem to worry them. That is because they have world class fielders.
England play the same game against them as they do against us but it usually results in a Welsh counter attack. The reason for this is Wales have superb back 3 players.
People have given RK a lot of stick in the past about his attack, but that's probably 10% of what it takes to be a back 3 player. The nearest we have is Addison, but god knows when he'll be fit again.0 -
Size is nothing more than a convenient excuse, in 2018 & 2017 we have virtually the same pack yet they weren’t getting thrown around like rag doll all the time, the reason we are getting bullied is we are just running into brick walls and then act surprised when we get put on our asses, if we tried that in 2018 the same thing would have happened. It wasn’t just England, Japan,NZL even Italy bullied us because we lost our head in all these games and resorted to running into brick walls because we didn’t want to risk screwing up more than we already had. If you look at the Saracens pack on Saturday, was it really man for man that much bigger than the Leinster pack? Certainly not to the extent that they would get bullied to the extent they did.0
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shootermacg wrote: »I'm not sure all this talk of size is relevant at all. Wales are a small team but England's size doesn't seem to worry them. That is because they have world class fielders.
England play the same game against them as they do against us but it usually results in a Welsh counter attack. The reason for this is Wales have superb back 3 players.
People have given RK a lot of stick in the past about his attack, but that's probably 10% of what it takes to be a back 3 player. The nearest we have is Addison, but god knows when he'll be fit again.
Wales didn’t have those world class fielders against England this time around and still weren’t bullied off the park, we are getting bullied because we aren’t approaching these games with the right mindset. Our mindset should be trying to get around playing that style like in 2018 or 2017 but instead it appears to just sit down and take our inevitable beating, a total loser mentality. Japan and NZL without monsters in their pack did exactly the same thing to us because in the end size is not the reason our players are getting bullied.
Again Wales having a good back three is not really a good enough excuse for why the Irish pack gets driven pack 100 meters every time they get the ball yet the Welsh pack isn’t and might I remind people it’s the exact same with Scotland. We are playing extremely dumb and unimaginative rugby against England and when you do that you get the same result you have always got, which is being driven into the ground.
I mean Leinster continuing with a driving maul at the front of the line out repeatedly when it became obvious that Saracens would take it down everytine like they are known to do but instead Leinster just keep doing it...that the definition of insanity...0 -
Our carrying has been atrocious for some time. A hangover of the Schmidt era when hitting a body and creating the ruck was paramount. Ryans carry against Itoje was a good example of what we've been missing.0
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Our carrying has been atrocious for some time. A hangover of the Schmidt era when hitting a body and creating the ruck was paramount. Ryans carry against Itoje was a good example of what we've been missing.
Exactly, what annoys me also is we keep lying to ourselves and thinking if we get a bunch of monsters things will be better...not if they keep walking into contact and waiting to get absolutely smashed they will! The big issue I think is the Scots and Welsh look for space but the Irish look for contact. I don’t think there is a better image out there than the one in the RWC where Kearney is presenting the ball on the ground and you have 4 Irish covering the ruck and not one kiwi insight...what brain power went into that?0 -
UAEguy2020 wrote: »Exactly, what annoys me also is we keep lying to ourselves and thinking if we get a bunch of monsters things will be better...not if they keep walking into contact and waiting to get absolutely smashed they will! The big issue I think is the Scots and Welsh look for space but the Irish look for contact. I don’t think there is a better image out there than the one in the RWC where Kearney is presenting the ball on the ground and you have 4 Irish covering the ruck and not one kiwi insight...what brain power went into that?
For me its both though. We still need the odd monster. And we do produce them but for whatever reason they are either the weakest, or as i fear are perceived as the weaker. I mean the 120kg man isn't going to win your shuttle training etc. Porter has clearly lost a few kgs for example.
I mean they are capable of it. Henderson on Estebeth. Ryan etc. Obviously we miss peak SOB and further back somebody like Wallace. But it looks like Munster have both a beast (Ahern) and a great carrier (hodnett) coming through in two positions. lets start blooding them.0 -
For me its both though. We still need the odd monster. And we do produce them but for whatever reason they are either the weakest, or as i fear are perceived as the weaker. I mean the 120kg man isn't going to win your shuttle training etc.
I mean they are capable of it. Henderson on Estebeth. Ryan etc. Obviously we miss peak SOB and further back somebody like Wallace. But it looks like Munster have both a beast and a great carrier coming through in two positions. lets start blooding them.
I agree but I don’t think size is the issue, with basically the same pack we didn’t get smashed in 2018 like in 2019. We have someone like Leavy to come back in who I believe is the most underrated forward we have produced in recent years and for me is up there with the likes of Underhill and I believe he was a big missing link and I think is an example of why size isn’t our issue. Along with him being a tank he also has imo the best rugby brain in the Irish pack and therefore doesn’t run into contact all the time, he is always looking for space and to offload which sets defenders and I personally think other players follow his lead when he does this.
At Munster I think Knox is a tank but also I think you have players like Hodnett and O’Sullivan who are both beasts and have really good rugby IQ’s which will be a huge lift (I will be fuming is Hodnett isn’t our 7 in the CC this year, just what we are crying out for), you also have players like Wycherley and Coombes for example who can get us going around the park. I also think Ahern is someone who needs to be fast tracked, maybe in exadurating but I believe he will be our best SR in 2023, one of the best prospects I have seen come through in Irish rugby in recent times.0 -
shootermacg wrote: »I'm not sure all this talk of size is relevant at all. Wales are a small team but England's size doesn't seem to worry them. That is because they have world class fielders.
I've seen this assumption made a number of times in the past as people often equate Wales and Ireland in rugby circles.
The Welsh pack is big. Very big. The team that was in the RWC and got to the semi final had two props of 120kg and 130kg respectively. Gethin Jenkins, Samson Lee and Adam Jones also were all over 120kg. Luke Charteris, Jake Ball and AWJ are all 120kg+. Their back row is often lighter but they just churn out phenomenal athletes and exceptionally skilled wing forwards for fun.
Their centres are usually over 100kg (Parkes and Davies both are as were Roberts and Scott Williams). North is a monster of a winger. Adams isn't a monster but he'd be bigger than average.
Gatland made it his business to select massive teams with Wales more often than not.0 -
I've seen this assumption made a number of times in the past as people often equate Wales and Ireland in rugby circles.
The Welsh pack is big. Very big. The team that was in the RWC and got to the semi final had two props of 120kg and 130kg respectively. Gethin Jenkins, Samson Lee and Adam Jones also were all over 120kg. Luke Charteris, Jake Ball and AWJ are all 120kg+. Their back row is often lighter but they just churn out phenomenal athletes and exceptionally skilled wing forwards for fun.
Their centres are usually over 100kg (Parkes and Davies both are as were Roberts and Scott Williams). North is a monster of a winger. Adams isn't a monster but he'd be bigger than average.
Gatland made it his business to select massive teams with Wales more often than not.
And yet we haven't lost to Wales lately. So again, I am saying that size is not the defining factor. Our back 3 allow teams to put us under pressure and dictate the areas we play in. England literally just kicked to the middle of the pitch against us, that's all they did when they needed territory.
If we'd have snapped up those loose balls the score would have been a lot closer.
Sure we are static when receiving the ball, which is annoying, but when you're giving space for other teams to play into, then it's a back 3 issue.0 -
I've seen this assumption made a number of times in the past as people often equate Wales and Ireland in rugby circles.
The Welsh pack is big. Very big. The team that was in the RWC and got to the semi final had two props of 120kg and 130kg respectively. Gethin Jenkins, Samson Lee and Adam Jones also were all over 120kg. Luke Charteris, Jake Ball and AWJ are all 120kg+. Their back row is often lighter but they just churn out phenomenal athletes and exceptionally skilled wing forwards for fun.
Their centres are usually over 100kg (Parkes and Davies both are as were Roberts and Scott Williams). North is a monster of a winger. Adams isn't a monster but he'd be bigger than average.
Gatland made it his business to select massive teams with Wales more often than not.
Well said. There's always this misconception that certain countries do or don't have massive packs, it's become a cliche.
France, England and South Africa almost always get the label 'monster pack' even when they have a relatively small one. Australia had probably the biggest pack of all time recently but never but never get the label, the same with Wales.
I guess it's tradition.0 -
UAEguy2020 wrote: »I agree but I don’t think size is the issue, with basically the same pack we didn’t get smashed in 2018 like in 2019. We have someone like Leavy to come back in who I believe is the most underrated forward we have produced in recent years and for me is up there with the likes of Underhill and I believe he was a big missing link and I think is an example of why size isn’t our issue. Along with him being a tank he also has imo the best rugby brain in the Irish pack and therefore doesn’t run into contact all the time, he is always looking for space and to offload which sets defenders and I personally think other players follow his lead when he does this.
At Munster I think Knox is a tank but also I think you have players like Hodnett and O’Sullivan who are both beasts and have really good rugby IQ’s which will be a huge lift (I will be fuming is Hodnett isn’t our 7 in the CC this year, just what we are crying out for), you also have players like Wycherley and Coombes for example who can get us going around the park. I also think Ahern is someone who needs to be fast tracked, maybe in exadurating but I believe he will be our best SR in 2023, one of the best prospects I have seen come through in Irish rugby in recent times.
Size becomes an issue when you don’t have an extremely well drilled, committed set of forwards who are athletes. For example would an Ireland U20’s side survive vs full Ireland side? No they’d be eaten alive physically despite being professional athletes who train together the same amount of time as the full senior squad. Size is a factor but it can be overcome with the right coaching, drilling of forwards and style of play. One way to counteract it is to hit rucks in 2’s and 3’s as opposed to individuals hitting on 3 separate entries. Double Hitting the ball carrier in a tackle by two players. Sure it sucks in more defenders but if you knock him backwards and win the resulting ruck by 3 teammates hitting it like ravenous animals it negates that. Commitment counts for everything but sometimes if it’s the larger team doing the things I said like Sarries wolf pack do then size becomes a factor.0 -
Furlong is one guy and wasn't around at the weekend. Ryan is a great player but he's not a monster. He's a big unit but would still give us several kilos to most other test locks. The Irish and Leinster websites have him as 106kg which is almost certainly incorrect but I still wouldn't put him at any more than 112kg.
That would be very light for a test lock. You'd be hard pressed to find too many others who are coming in under 115kg.
Our back rowers are fairly average in size. Conan is a solid size but Doris isn't carrying much bulk and relies more on dynamism and identifying space. Stander is the closest we have to it in terms of someone who is very robust physically and is heavier than people would expect. Ruddock would be the other.
Connors and VDF are very lightweight for top level flankers. They're completely dependent on work rate and technique. POM isn't a big bloke eithter and again relies more on smarts than power. We've guys like Penny coming through who simply aren't going to cut it at test level ever due to their size. Hodnett and O'Sullivan in Munster are great athletes but again, very small. Josh Murphy is someone that could potentially put on another few kg and be an option. Coombes is another. But they're probably not as talented rugby players as others.
I was listening to OTB last night and had to laugh when Barnes or Toland (can't recall which) was discussing how NZ overcome this issue with an incredibly high skill level. When they won in 2015, their pack was filled with guys who had brilliant skills but they were also monsters physically; four of their front five were 120kg+.
We're never going to compete with teams regularly with power and are going to have to be smarter and more accurate to win games. It's nothing new. We've always been smaller than a lot of other teams.
I wouldn't describe players who are 100-105kg (or several kilos heavier in JvdF's case) as "very lightweight" if they're opensides. I'd say most top opensides would maybe weigh in between 102 and 108kg. A lot of them are around 105 kilos and tipping the scales at only just over 100kg isn't a barrier to making it to the top if you consider Michael Hooper.
They'd obviously have to hit pretty hard pound-for-pound if they're only 100-102kg, but openside is more about understanding the game and getting in the right positions to support play than just weighing a lot.
I thought Penny was looking very solidly build in the upper legs/glutes region in training photos, so I wouldn't be surprised if he's added a bit of mass on top of the 102 kg Leinster have him down as.
Of course, if you've got an openside who's only around 100kg, maybe size/mass would become more important at blindside and number 8.0 -
Guinness RFC wrote: »Size becomes an issue when you don’t have an extremely well drilled, committed set of forwards who are athletes. For example would an Ireland U20’s side survive vs full Ireland side? No they’d be eaten alive physically despite being professional athletes who train together the same amount of time as the full senior squad. Size is a factor but it can be overcome with the right coaching, drilling of forwards and style of play. One way to counteract it is to hit rucks in 2’s and 3’s as opposed to individuals hitting on 3 separate entries. Double Hitting the ball carrier in a tackle by two players. Sure it sucks in more defenders but if you knock him backwards and win the resulting ruck by 3 teammates hitting it like ravenous animals it negates that. Commitment counts for everything but sometimes if it’s the larger team doing the things I said like Sarries wolf pack do then size becomes a factor.
If anything the Irish U20s pack showed you to a tee how to combat a big physical pack and could not have exploited the English pack any better if they tried! Size is a factor but as with anything in life it’s never one only factor that decides somethings, it’s multiple factors. Like at the weekend it was quite clear that Saracens have weaknesses in the back because everyone was in the defensive line yet you rarely saw Leinster try to exploit that and instead played right into Saracens hands. The other thing is like I said that Saracens pack wasn’t really that much bigger than the Leinster pack but the difference is when you run straight at a brick wall you will get put on your ass no matter the size of the player, put any of those Saracens players up against a competent u15s team and ask them run at a u15s pack alone without support and I promise you the u15s team will put them on their ass, size is important but using your brain is even more important.0 -
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Youre always going to lose a physical battle having one out runners against 2 man tackles. Leinster were brain dead in how they approached the game. I'd argue Leinster and Ireland's biggest deficiency is a mental one, in that they haven't shown an ability to adapt to pressure. Leinster needed leadership on the pitch to change up what they were doing. Very disappointed that guys like Sexton and Ringrose didn't manage that0
This discussion has been closed.
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