Leinster Team Talk/Gossip/Rumours Thread XII (The Byrne Supremacy)

"La Rochelle are locally funded". You'd swear they were the local junior Bs running a raffle for a turkey and a tin of Kimberleys to buy a new set of jerseys.

The Top 14 TV rights are more than €100 million per season. Add to that whatever they get from Europe (which will be a lot this year) and pretty decent crowds and they aren't short of cash.

The one thing that La Rochelle don't have is a load of miserable c*nts waiting for them to fail so they can feel better about their own team's sh1tness, but if they keep on this trajectory, it won't be long coming.

It'll be interesting to see how O'Brien gets on as a coach. As a player he didn't demonstrate as much footballing nous as Leamy did. And will he realise that most players don't possess the physical capabilities he had when he's coaching them?

La Rochelle budget for this season is 28 million euro. There is 41 senior players and a massive academy/espoirs squad of 43 players.

They have a list of sponsors on their website and they are most definitely not locally funded. And there is absolutely nothing wrong with any of that either.

I'm aware of the salary cap but was pointing out the similarities in squad sizes which I am going to suggest have similar costs amongst the overall budgets.

The idea that LAR are locally funded is total BS.

What relevance has your second paragraph to anything? Cullen has still achieved 4 league titles and a European Cup in the last 5 years. And could make it 5 in 5 if he wins the next three games.

What disparity? The provinces are functioning well! Leinster lads are playing at each province! There's four more off to Connacht, with another going into the Connacht academy! Leinster develop and try to retain their players. There's Leinster players in each province. What do you want? Should they send more to the other provinces and just be the providers for the game in Ireland? Let's not have the other provinces develop their own lads? Population advantages or not, what Leinster have produced in recent years is great.

I don't see why acknowledging the fact Leinster have more internationals than other provinces means I'm in favour of some sort of artificial redistribution programme. I'm not. Just leave it up to individuals to decide what's best for them.

The other provinces rely on Leinster to provide players! At least recently. We can all piss n moan about Leo etc! The reality is, there's a lot of talent being spread around the provinces, from Leinster. They were outplayed last week. The pack and squad was loaded with Irish players. They fell short. If the Leinster players weren't winning or making Euro finals, there would be less in the Irealand squad.

There is no bonus to redistribution of Leinster players to other provinces. Plenty have moved by their own desire. Apologies if I came across as a plonker!

Well done La Rochelle. Probably a bit of hype with Leinster with their 1.5 second rucks. It's reminding of the hype the Dubs used to get. That said, La Rochelle so much stronger than URC teams. The only way I think Leinster could realistically prepare for these teams is to play Munster or Ulster with 17 players.

My only gripe is what I have been saying for a long while. I don't think either of the Byrnes are Sexton's successor and it should be Frawley. Ross is a great URC player when you are dominating. Turn up the pressure and he doesn't look comfortable at all.

I don't care if Leinster see Frawley as a 12. Carter and Wilko both played 10 / 12 interchangeably and it shouldn't be so unusual in the modern game. We were never going to get 80 mins from sexton and I would have preferred seeing Frawley come on at 60 and that being something Leinster were doing regularly in big games.

Next year, I think ok to bring in a decent utility back - another Isa please. And for some of those big games 6 forwards on the bench.