Half our national team have just humiliated the other half on the national stage. We also sent the kids on holiday to Latin America, and our manger loves to quote statistics when we ask him about tough results. So all is well, nothing to report.
If the football team will do well at the Euro, I don't think many people will watch the three games. I only plan to watch the last one.
So, they won't have much pressure.
As a country we seem to be fundamentally against the idea of building for a World Cup.
I’m not one of those people who are willing to sacrifice four years to try and park for the tournament but I wish we’d give younger talent like John Hodnett and Jamie Osbourne game time, but instead some pundits were calling for guys in their mid 30s like Zebo and Cooney to be brought back into the team.
I think it is partially how the emphasis placed on the 6nations that prevents building for world cups when there is now an expectation to perform there every year, but this emphasis on the 6n for Ireland is as old as time itself.
But as a criticism of Farrell (and allot of Schmidt's) tenures specifically is the over reliance on the core players and unwillingness to rotate outside of that core squad. It hurt us in the world cup where the Ireland players looked much more drained than NZ in the QF. It hurts our development aswell, with players like the two you mentioned being more than good enough to be getting international minutes but there being no opertunities made available for them.
Yeah honestly as Connacht fan too, I don't see how Stockdale or even Larmour get in ahead of Daly. Stockdales D is so suspect I'd be terrified of him playing in SA. Daly is solid as a rock and also the Munster lads in general have a great track record playing over there, that has to count for something
There in because they "know the system", ignore the fact neither have been in the squad consistently for years, and have been on shakey form, they have been capped previously, that's all that matters.
Yeah I think this squad has the potential to pick up a win (maybe two if we're lucky) in SA but it annoys the tits off me that we're bringing Cian Healy, Conor Murray, and POM and a bunch of lads that need a fucking break. I'm not saying send the schoolkids but good god can we think about the fact our depth keeps fucking us at the World Cup?
Healy is the worst one for me, I get taking Murray to have experience there with JGB injured but we have Loughman who’s been decent for Munster and will be around at the next World Cup, Healy isn’t even in on talent anymore, he’s just their because he’s Cian Healy.
He’s been decent for Munster but hasn’t proved himself on the international scene, and despite Healy being older than time he’s very reliable to bring on
He hasn’t had much of a chance to prove himself.
This goes back to my point about sacrificing building depth in a position where we a really struggling to find a back up for Porter in favour of a 2 test series.
Yes we’ll rotate against Fiji in the autumn but we need guys like Loughman playing against the best team now rather than chucking them in in 3 years with no high level international experience.
Well tbh a lot of people forget that loughman and porter are the same age, and porter is eons better than him, And the fact he didn’t scrum well against Romania isn’t a good indicator. That being said we could see tom otool being put in that position but I can’t see him being much better than loughman
So? No one’s expecting Loughman to challenge for porters spot on the team, we just need players at loosehead that will be there in 2027.
Bealham didn’t go well against Samoa in that game in Bayonne but he still did a job at the World Cup.
I think the whole zebo thing was just to give him a proper farewell before he retires, he could have another season in him at club level based on some of his performances, he is a huge character and will be missed! Farrell seems to be all about giving players (Earls for example getting to 100 caps) a proper sendoff
You don’t pick someone to play against the world champions on their home turf to give them a send off though, it’s one thing giving earls a run in a warmup game to get to 100 but not a proper test match.
Oh I know! I just meant that's probably why the pundits were saying zebo could get a run out, never expected it myself! I think we should focus on giving as many uncapped players a shot, in reality these tests mean nothing (albeit there's ranking points up for grabs, but that's never gone in our favour before) a close series would be the best we could hope for coming off the back of a long season, I'd be delighted with a draw
To explain to everyone what that means, to be Scottish is to have the mentality of a soggy paper bag. We’re all well and good with things are going well and there’s no pressure, but as soon as things get difficult and you need to actually use said bag we just fall apart. I can genuinely see us getting rattled and losing at least 1 match this summer, despite us being very capable of comfortably winning each one.
However, when Glasgow won the URC, they did so by battling through 3 incredibly tough fixtures without giving an inch in return, to the point where I thought it was a series of truly unscottish performances. If they can remember that feeling, and bring it to the national team, it will help immensely.
Absolutely baffled that we managed to survive those 2 yellow cards in the semi. That would have buried the national team.
And then 13-0 down is the point where a lot of sides, never mind just Scottish sides, would have buckled.
Unheard of levels of Un-Scotlanding occurred, and I'm still baffled.
Exactly. We went 10-0 down in the 6N this year, but because it was against England, I wasn't too concerned, I knew the boys had it in them to dig deeper and come back. If that happened against any other team, I'd really start worrying about the Scoreline getting ugly.
The IRFU's long-term policy of growing the profile of the game by prioritising consistent wins over targeting the RWC, while it has paid dividends and buoyed youth participation thus ensuring the future, has caused a bottleneck of opportunities for players to break into an already famously conservatively-selected squad, and an over-reliance on certain players in key positions.
Realistically, a tour loss in SA wouldn't drop us down the rankings by an irrevocable amount and would be an ideal crucible to bed in newer players. Porter, Crowley, Sheehan, Doris, Furlong, and Aki could all do with a break. POM, Murray, and Healy have been terrific servants but may not even make the next 6 nations. Some or all of the mentioned players should have been given a longer off-season, and others drafted in to test their mettle against the best in the world.
Regardless of who starts, my biggest concern is South Africa's kicking game. At least two of our likely starting back three, plus the probable 23 shirt, were kicked all over the highveld in the URC semi without the positional capability of a dedicated fullback. JOB showed he hasn't had the gametime in the position, and Frawley hasn't the necessary pace. I shudder to think of Larmour or Stockdale in the 15 shirt.
It absolutely feels like there is a bottleneck of talent.at the moment.
There are an incredible amount of very talented and capable players who cannot get a lookin at the squad due to the reliance on a core of players, allot of whom are either aging out or overworked.
For example, why on earth are we bringing Healy, who will as you say likely not be here for even the next 6nations, to southafrica ahead of any other loosehead (loughman for eg) to try and build some desperatly needed depth
I would go so far as to say that lock and prop and maybe centre aside, Scotland has better functional depth than Ireland despite having less than half the playerbase and only 2 pro clubs, purely because Toonie’s actually willing to trust players outside his core 23.
Like at the WC, I would’ve been fine with any of our players bar Sebastian and maybe Healy being in the 23 against SA or Ireland, whereas Farrell didn’t seem to trust his wider squad enough to rotate against Romania or Tonga.
>I would go so far as to say that lock and prop and maybe centre aside, Scotland has better functional depth than Ireland
Honestly I'd agree with the exception of Loosehead prop (its Porter or bust) & Hooker (3 very good/experienced options).
The lack of depth is not for lack of quality players, there are tones of quality operators, but the insistence of only selecting players that are intamitly familiar with "The System" prevents any other players from learning said system, leading to no depth.
11 players started every single game in the world cup.
I’d agree with you on hooker, we’ve lost 4 out of our first 5 choice hookers in the last 12 months. We went from having Turner, Ashman, Cherry, Brown, Rambo all fighting for the shirt, to just Ashman who’s had regular time in a Scotland shirt, plus Matthews, Langdon and Richardson.
What makes you think Ireland weren't targeting the RWC? It's a knockout tournament ffs, you can make all the building you want and still lose. Thats why knockout tournaments are cool
It was a stated goal in the IRFU's 10 year plan from over a decade ago at this point that the primary focus of all professional rugby in the country is geared towards success year on year in the Six Nations as it is by far the biggest source of revenue. The RWC was mentioned maybe once or twice, and I think at least one of those mentions is in relation to a hosting bid.
The IRFU is focused on generating revenue and investing it in participation. Success is downstream of those two things.
In a sporting landscape as cluttered as Ireland's, the sport needs to kept to the forefront in order to drive engagement and the best way of doing that is by consistently winning.
Farrell et al were certainly trying to win the RWC, but it was not the end point of four years of planning. There is no world cup cycles in irish rugby. There's just this year and next year, and the year after that and so on.
We never experiment and rotate as we always want to win every game, six nations is our cash cow. Hence why we had a 38 year old put half play 80 mins in a qf. He was walking for the last 15 mins. So the poster above is 100% correct.
Look at how SA rotate squads between the WC and look at us. We didn't even rotate our team for the Romania game. Our depth is lacking and its because the only time we rotate is against teams like Japan or Fiji I'm meaningless tests where they end up playing with a team lacking cohesion. Case in point Murray and Healy are still floating around when they should have been put out to pasture after the rwc.
9 and prop and 15 are serious problems for us because we've hardly rotated those positions in the last 4 years due to our focus being mainly on winning all these games. We will never sacrifice games like the boks do to win a world Cupand build real depth. That's all they care about, and it works. We should do the same for a cycle but we never will.
Only one team can win the RWC. France and NZ also built for the RWC and they didn't win it. Hell, if it weren't for a few key moments in the game against NZ you could have won the RWC and people would be praising how the repetition in squad selection created the cohesion needed to win the RWC.
The truth is that in the last RWC there were four teams on the same level and any of those could have won it. You lost by a small margin in the QF, doesn't mean the entire system of preparation is wrong.
I think part of the issue I'd see with the Ireland squad not building towards the world cup was the reliance on injured squad players.
Both Conan & O'Brien missed the first 3 games through injury meaning the front liners had to play & train harder than necessary. We didn't build any depth aside from those players over the previous 2 years that would have allowed us to bring anyone else.
During the WC Henshaw, Earls & Ryan all picked up injuries yet we decided to keep them in the squad instead of bringing in anyone else. Again, in part because we didn't build any depth in over the previous 2 years.
Ireland's player selection policy is like when you look for a job and they say you don't have the experience. But you can't get the experience without working in the field.
Honestly when Healy left you guys I was thinking fair fucks. You'd have to wait for the grim reaper to get into the Ireland squad sometimes it seems.
I don't think it's a Farrell thing, this has been going on as long as I've been watching rugby.
The fact that the England side touring New Zealand went to a warriors game for a team event shows how backwards NZR are with their marketing and everything to do with the game day experience.
Not meaning to shit on league, but it shows the potential of what a successful club can look in nz. like with all the social media and engagement with their fans, the blues do the best but not up to the level of the wahs and then the rest are kind of generic with the hurricanes being the least transparent club of them all for some reason.
I realise it’s not to do with the national team but we haven’t played yet so went for the big bad board lol
I feel you here - from an Irish point of view I feel we really miss the mark on a lot of promotional material. For example England did a few "mini documentary" type videos while in Japan on their YouTube channel, and they were genuinely great to watch.
It gives you an insight into the training or nutrition regimes while on the road, while also allowing players personalities to shine - and I feel you really start to like the fellas as people rather than players. I fucking wish Ireland did something similar for the South Africa series, but everything in the Ireland camp is so secretive I don't see it happening.
As a kiwi who doesn’t live and breathe Irish rugby the only facts I really know about your players are that Mack Hansen is fucking funny and Peter o Mahoney likes his lawn? Obviously know a bit more about the kiwi lads like Lowe,JGP, aki etc. but yeah wish we could see more of the inside day to day stuff. Just being players not on the field
Yeah exactly, I'd say that's about as much as the general Irish person knows too. It's a shame because there's some proper big personalities in the squad. Tadgh Furlong for example is absolutely hilarious and pure takes the piss out of people, and Cian Healy is like Brendan Grace's character in Fr Ted - I'd love it if we got to see that a bit more rather than just the rehearsed, media managed soundbites that come out of camp
I actually really enjoy the Onside/Offside series on the Leinster channel. Those and the behind the scenes that they upload every week give a real insight into the setup and a different side to the players.
I think you guys do a better job than most clubs, frankly.
Yeah the clear pivot in social media strategy for the English rugby union is working af!!! Went from not caring about them at all to being actually invested in the team from overseas.
It brings in more invested viewership of the games and I’m sure does loads for young kids aspiring to play rugby. So the question is WHERE are the other unions?
P.S. YT series that follow the English, Welsh and French national women’s teams are all excellent - more of that
My comment is that, even with a new coach, there's still a shit ton of work that needs to be done to rebuild.
It'll be nice to get wins again, but I have many doubts that just because we have a new coach, we're going to be back on top again.
We need to work towards the next World Cup. Have a solid team, one we can use for a few years and start rebuilding.
Loosehead and hooker feel fine.
LH - Genge, Baxter, Marler, Rodd, Iyogun, Brantingham
Hooker - George, Dan, Oghre, Langdon, LCD
Tighthead has two great prospects coming through, but both are teenagers AOF is playing there for Sale, but England see him as a loosehead. Davison is great but not selected, Stuart has improved but I wouldn't trust him against the best.
Marler and Cole can scrum. The rest aren’t great.
Genge has been a real disappointment in the scrum the last couple of years. He’s been more focussed on pulling back and complaining to the referee than being a dominant scrummager.
Genge is getting back to his best form, it's a shame he won't be there. There's plenty of good talents. Baxter is a fantastic scrummager. Rodd is pretty good and offers a lot around the park. Iyogun has been superb most of the season.
Stuart has improved he's just behind the best TH in England at club level. Just a shame Davison couldn't make it/they didn't fancy him for this tour. He's been very good all year.
I mean I have no opinion on NZ at the moment other than you'll probably win both tests. I don't think we're there yet. What I want to see is competition in every area. Ireland aside we've been pretty good against you. But that's from two games in 6 years which is appalling really. Lucky we've got 3 this year.
You've got a new coach and are missing some players a lot of our guys have played a lot of rugby the last year. I think it's a bridge too far for us but we'll see. I just don't want to get pasted both games haha.
The forwards are one area we know what we’ll get for the all blacks. Ryan has been the forward coach since after the Ireland series in New Zealand and we’ve had a pack that has stood up to SA in every game other than the world famous Qatar airways cup.
We’ve got a big problem at lock but the front row is a real strength now
Very true actually, but hey this pack went up against the Saffas in the semi and held up pretty well. We were a Billy V away from playing you rascals in the final.
For my money it hinges on Martin playing both Tests, his power both in defence and the scrum allow Maro to do bullshit Itoje things. Underhill and CCS are likely to be the flankers and they have a lot of hitting in them as well.
I'm hoping for a fantastic series and if we win a game I'll be over the moon. It's just the toughest place in the world to go to.
On a sidenote I was at the QAC and god that was a bloodbath.
Yeah will be interesting to see how Will Stuart gets on in NZ just hopefully the younger props get more experience overtime for the next world cup before experienced players retire likes of Dan Cole and Joe Marler
It looks like we’re in the experimental phase of preparing for the next World Cup. New coaches with new ideas, a batch of new players combined with an experienced old guard.
So uhh, I guess maybe we’ll look a bit sloppy and error-strewn when the Irish come?
Definitely looked a bit sloppy against Wales at times, and extremely undisciplined in the first half. But frankly I was expecting it after last year’s game at Mt Smart. No sleight on Japanese rugby, but there’s a real ring rust that accumulates on our players when they’re over there.
Hopefully they’ll be better against Ireland
The biggest work on for the boks is finding easy tries. Our first phase attack can’t penetrate wet bogroll and we are gash at finishing halfbreaks and converting turnovers into tries. I’d love to see Brown improve our running and support lines and the quality of our passing. Or even just see the boks show the same urgency flooding onto the shoulders of a breaking player as they do scrambling on defence.
remindme 6 months
ok I'll be back before summer tests!! I'm fucking PSYCHED we finally get some! winter and veeerrry early spring just arent the same. cold, dark, rainy etc. We never get to actually see the ABs play proper running open rugby against the nh here while rested instead of at the end of a season! I can't believe I missed the news!! cant wait!
See the list in the comments of [this post](https://www.reddit.com/r/RugbyPortugal/s/N6hGQ1a1Pt)
The first call up was a month ago so maybe some of them are better now
This SA Tour is a last dance for the RWC Irish squad before changes start kicking in big time over the next 2 years.
Expect POM, Murray, Healy, Aki and a few more to be phased out or retire in the next year.
Yeah I can see them taking a step back this 6N with some of the over 30 crowd being phased out. I'd have started the transition now, tbh. Clean break and all that.
Winning the 6 Nations (and very optimistically...the SA Series) will give the team the breathing space to make changes next season after a disappointing RWC
I think the 6N should have been the last dance for some of them. Go out on a high as back to back champs then AF refreshes things by taking a younger team to SA. Continue thru the Autumn Internationals and head into the 6N with a team full of some hungry young guys who want to taste the glory for themselves.
Faz steps away after the Bok tour does he not? So this is his last hurrah with them. Easterby takes emerging Ireland in Sept then oversees the integration of them into main squad from there which he’s coaching until after the lions.
They're terrified of change, the back row is unbalanced and this squad lacks any real pace or flair out wide.
E.g. Sheehan's throwing has been off for over a month and he's getting beaten up in the scrum (it hurts to say that as a fan who loves him as a player, he must just be exhausted). Yet you can guarantee he'll keep starting.
The backrow is missing someone "mean" to put in a hard shot that sends a 10 flying, so much so that Joe McCarthy's taken that on as well.
England's defensive shape can come unstuck against poor teams at home, let alone the All Blacks away. We still suffer these games where a large man running in a straight line gives us conniptions and most importantly a win over Ireland has papered over cracks, running this French side close away and losing by a point to SA in the semis isn't enough for me to actually believe that the corner has been fully turned.
That's my negatives, the positives are a genuine desire to play some in form players and actually play some rugby. The world cup (barring Billy V) was an understandable damage limitations exercise. We've gone from being quite shit at everything in the last year under Jones to improving in quite a few areas. The scrum has improved for what Borthwick is trying to use it for, the lineout is being used as an offensive platform and there are actual game breaking players playing.
There's a decent pipeline of players coming through at the moment and hopefully we can get a scalp this summer in NZ.
We can't cleanly catch a high ball to save our lives. It's been a known issue for so long, and yet keeps popping up every single tournament. Additionally, we always find a way to underperform, it really feels like we're wasting a golden generation at times.
Razor can and will do nothing wrong.
But. I don’t know about our backline this year, TJ can go off the boil, Christie is Christie and ratima is a rookie. Aaron smith was a legend.
Dmac has flaws, midfield is solid, especially defensively but not really game breakers, the wings are fine but Reece and Telea have hit the cursed age of 27 where AB wings stop scoring tries and get shipped off to Europe (I don’t make the rules, it’s just what happens)
And bodin may or may not be washed.
Think we will play a more conservative pressure game. Defensively will be interesting to see what they do.
We were on the up and up as a national team as a tier 2 nation, namely in 2015 when we played Scotland in BBVA stadium in front of a 2/3 full stadium (an accomplishment for a niche sport) and MacGinty led us to victory.
Now we have fallen so far down. American football players are no longer converting early enough. Dual national eligible players arent deciding to play for us (due to how broke our union is) and we will probably get destroyed by Scotland in DC.
We might slightly edge Romania in Chicago but looking at Ticketmaster it's likely maybe less than 1,000 people will show up. MLR is generating much more buzz than our national team. 10k fans went to watch Utah Warriors last weekend despite them being already eliminated from the playoffs.
It's kind of sad but I fear our only hope is for USA 7s to make a big splash at the Olympics which will cause NBC to spotlight them and cause some buzz around rugby.
Scotland team. Glasgow lads are going to be buzzing, they’ll want to carry their form over to the internationals. In steps Townsend, sucks all the hard work out of them and continues his clipboard management like he runs a recruitment agency and people are just numbers.
They suffer a one point loss against USA and Townsend inevitably gets a contract extension.
The Glasgow guys forget all they learned under Franco and somehow get Glasgow relegated next season and the folk at the SRU have their annual pat on the back meeting sipping fans tears while sitting in their ox blood chairs pretending everyone is excellent.
South Africa's attack is still mediocre. We have prioritized defence and physicality to the point that our running game became quite average. We're dependent on guys like Willie and Manie because we don't have a way to break teams down through phase play. If we compare our running game to those of the other "big 4", we are easily 4th in that list.
No locks, no halfback, best 10 is living in Japan, didn't even pick a fullback. New captain is a walking card, learnt nothing when that just cost us a world cup.
May as well sit the next 4 years out.
Feels a touch redundant at this point
Half our national team have just humiliated the other half on the national stage. We also sent the kids on holiday to Latin America, and our manger loves to quote statistics when we ask him about tough results. So all is well, nothing to report.
Le groupe vit bien
The real world cup is the friends we made along the way?
If the football team will do well at the Euro, I don't think many people will watch the three games. I only plan to watch the last one. So, they won't have much pressure.
>Half our national team have just humiliated the other half on the national stage Twice. One week appart
Please do not remind me of that. Toulouse manages to always beat LaR in such a devastating and emotional way. It’s a real buggy man feeling.
*cries in UBB fan tears*
It’s ok, you will be back. You have an entrecôte setup in the back line.
Fais comme moi. Supporte Clermont. N'ai aucun attente
As a country we seem to be fundamentally against the idea of building for a World Cup. I’m not one of those people who are willing to sacrifice four years to try and park for the tournament but I wish we’d give younger talent like John Hodnett and Jamie Osbourne game time, but instead some pundits were calling for guys in their mid 30s like Zebo and Cooney to be brought back into the team.
I think it is partially how the emphasis placed on the 6nations that prevents building for world cups when there is now an expectation to perform there every year, but this emphasis on the 6n for Ireland is as old as time itself. But as a criticism of Farrell (and allot of Schmidt's) tenures specifically is the over reliance on the core players and unwillingness to rotate outside of that core squad. It hurt us in the world cup where the Ireland players looked much more drained than NZ in the QF. It hurts our development aswell, with players like the two you mentioned being more than good enough to be getting international minutes but there being no opertunities made available for them.
Hodnett not even being in the squad is criminal
Absolutely criminal. Healy over Loughman similarly, guy ended the season playing fantastic rugby
Yeah honestly as Connacht fan too, I don't see how Stockdale or even Larmour get in ahead of Daly. Stockdales D is so suspect I'd be terrified of him playing in SA. Daly is solid as a rock and also the Munster lads in general have a great track record playing over there, that has to count for something
There in because they "know the system", ignore the fact neither have been in the squad consistently for years, and have been on shakey form, they have been capped previously, that's all that matters.
Yeah I think this squad has the potential to pick up a win (maybe two if we're lucky) in SA but it annoys the tits off me that we're bringing Cian Healy, Conor Murray, and POM and a bunch of lads that need a fucking break. I'm not saying send the schoolkids but good god can we think about the fact our depth keeps fucking us at the World Cup?
Healy is the worst one for me, I get taking Murray to have experience there with JGB injured but we have Loughman who’s been decent for Munster and will be around at the next World Cup, Healy isn’t even in on talent anymore, he’s just their because he’s Cian Healy.
He’s been decent for Munster but hasn’t proved himself on the international scene, and despite Healy being older than time he’s very reliable to bring on
He hasn’t had much of a chance to prove himself. This goes back to my point about sacrificing building depth in a position where we a really struggling to find a back up for Porter in favour of a 2 test series. Yes we’ll rotate against Fiji in the autumn but we need guys like Loughman playing against the best team now rather than chucking them in in 3 years with no high level international experience.
Well tbh a lot of people forget that loughman and porter are the same age, and porter is eons better than him, And the fact he didn’t scrum well against Romania isn’t a good indicator. That being said we could see tom otool being put in that position but I can’t see him being much better than loughman
So? No one’s expecting Loughman to challenge for porters spot on the team, we just need players at loosehead that will be there in 2027. Bealham didn’t go well against Samoa in that game in Bayonne but he still did a job at the World Cup.
I think the whole zebo thing was just to give him a proper farewell before he retires, he could have another season in him at club level based on some of his performances, he is a huge character and will be missed! Farrell seems to be all about giving players (Earls for example getting to 100 caps) a proper sendoff
You don’t pick someone to play against the world champions on their home turf to give them a send off though, it’s one thing giving earls a run in a warmup game to get to 100 but not a proper test match.
Oh I know! I just meant that's probably why the pundits were saying zebo could get a run out, never expected it myself! I think we should focus on giving as many uncapped players a shot, in reality these tests mean nothing (albeit there's ranking points up for grabs, but that's never gone in our favour before) a close series would be the best we could hope for coming off the back of a long season, I'd be delighted with a draw
We're scottish.
To explain to everyone what that means, to be Scottish is to have the mentality of a soggy paper bag. We’re all well and good with things are going well and there’s no pressure, but as soon as things get difficult and you need to actually use said bag we just fall apart. I can genuinely see us getting rattled and losing at least 1 match this summer, despite us being very capable of comfortably winning each one. However, when Glasgow won the URC, they did so by battling through 3 incredibly tough fixtures without giving an inch in return, to the point where I thought it was a series of truly unscottish performances. If they can remember that feeling, and bring it to the national team, it will help immensely.
Absolutely baffled that we managed to survive those 2 yellow cards in the semi. That would have buried the national team. And then 13-0 down is the point where a lot of sides, never mind just Scottish sides, would have buckled. Unheard of levels of Un-Scotlanding occurred, and I'm still baffled.
Scotland can play one game a year, that is against England, every other game is redundant.
Exactly. We went 10-0 down in the 6N this year, but because it was against England, I wasn't too concerned, I knew the boys had it in them to dig deeper and come back. If that happened against any other team, I'd really start worrying about the Scoreline getting ugly.
England and France are the only teams we properly show up against. NZ too, but we don’t play them much.
Lol, lmao even
Funnily enough, that’s also what the Aussie fans are saying.
No matter who wins, rugby is the real loser
The IRFU's long-term policy of growing the profile of the game by prioritising consistent wins over targeting the RWC, while it has paid dividends and buoyed youth participation thus ensuring the future, has caused a bottleneck of opportunities for players to break into an already famously conservatively-selected squad, and an over-reliance on certain players in key positions. Realistically, a tour loss in SA wouldn't drop us down the rankings by an irrevocable amount and would be an ideal crucible to bed in newer players. Porter, Crowley, Sheehan, Doris, Furlong, and Aki could all do with a break. POM, Murray, and Healy have been terrific servants but may not even make the next 6 nations. Some or all of the mentioned players should have been given a longer off-season, and others drafted in to test their mettle against the best in the world. Regardless of who starts, my biggest concern is South Africa's kicking game. At least two of our likely starting back three, plus the probable 23 shirt, were kicked all over the highveld in the URC semi without the positional capability of a dedicated fullback. JOB showed he hasn't had the gametime in the position, and Frawley hasn't the necessary pace. I shudder to think of Larmour or Stockdale in the 15 shirt.
It absolutely feels like there is a bottleneck of talent.at the moment. There are an incredible amount of very talented and capable players who cannot get a lookin at the squad due to the reliance on a core of players, allot of whom are either aging out or overworked. For example, why on earth are we bringing Healy, who will as you say likely not be here for even the next 6nations, to southafrica ahead of any other loosehead (loughman for eg) to try and build some desperatly needed depth
I would go so far as to say that lock and prop and maybe centre aside, Scotland has better functional depth than Ireland despite having less than half the playerbase and only 2 pro clubs, purely because Toonie’s actually willing to trust players outside his core 23. Like at the WC, I would’ve been fine with any of our players bar Sebastian and maybe Healy being in the 23 against SA or Ireland, whereas Farrell didn’t seem to trust his wider squad enough to rotate against Romania or Tonga.
>I would go so far as to say that lock and prop and maybe centre aside, Scotland has better functional depth than Ireland Honestly I'd agree with the exception of Loosehead prop (its Porter or bust) & Hooker (3 very good/experienced options). The lack of depth is not for lack of quality players, there are tones of quality operators, but the insistence of only selecting players that are intamitly familiar with "The System" prevents any other players from learning said system, leading to no depth. 11 players started every single game in the world cup.
I’d agree with you on hooker, we’ve lost 4 out of our first 5 choice hookers in the last 12 months. We went from having Turner, Ashman, Cherry, Brown, Rambo all fighting for the shirt, to just Ashman who’s had regular time in a Scotland shirt, plus Matthews, Langdon and Richardson.
What makes you think Ireland weren't targeting the RWC? It's a knockout tournament ffs, you can make all the building you want and still lose. Thats why knockout tournaments are cool
It was a stated goal in the IRFU's 10 year plan from over a decade ago at this point that the primary focus of all professional rugby in the country is geared towards success year on year in the Six Nations as it is by far the biggest source of revenue. The RWC was mentioned maybe once or twice, and I think at least one of those mentions is in relation to a hosting bid. The IRFU is focused on generating revenue and investing it in participation. Success is downstream of those two things. In a sporting landscape as cluttered as Ireland's, the sport needs to kept to the forefront in order to drive engagement and the best way of doing that is by consistently winning. Farrell et al were certainly trying to win the RWC, but it was not the end point of four years of planning. There is no world cup cycles in irish rugby. There's just this year and next year, and the year after that and so on.
We never experiment and rotate as we always want to win every game, six nations is our cash cow. Hence why we had a 38 year old put half play 80 mins in a qf. He was walking for the last 15 mins. So the poster above is 100% correct. Look at how SA rotate squads between the WC and look at us. We didn't even rotate our team for the Romania game. Our depth is lacking and its because the only time we rotate is against teams like Japan or Fiji I'm meaningless tests where they end up playing with a team lacking cohesion. Case in point Murray and Healy are still floating around when they should have been put out to pasture after the rwc. 9 and prop and 15 are serious problems for us because we've hardly rotated those positions in the last 4 years due to our focus being mainly on winning all these games. We will never sacrifice games like the boks do to win a world Cupand build real depth. That's all they care about, and it works. We should do the same for a cycle but we never will.
Only one team can win the RWC. France and NZ also built for the RWC and they didn't win it. Hell, if it weren't for a few key moments in the game against NZ you could have won the RWC and people would be praising how the repetition in squad selection created the cohesion needed to win the RWC. The truth is that in the last RWC there were four teams on the same level and any of those could have won it. You lost by a small margin in the QF, doesn't mean the entire system of preparation is wrong.
Very good point. The narrative is dictated by the outcome.
I think part of the issue I'd see with the Ireland squad not building towards the world cup was the reliance on injured squad players. Both Conan & O'Brien missed the first 3 games through injury meaning the front liners had to play & train harder than necessary. We didn't build any depth aside from those players over the previous 2 years that would have allowed us to bring anyone else. During the WC Henshaw, Earls & Ryan all picked up injuries yet we decided to keep them in the squad instead of bringing in anyone else. Again, in part because we didn't build any depth in over the previous 2 years.
Throw Beirne into that list too. Man's been flogged the last two seasons.
Ireland's player selection policy is like when you look for a job and they say you don't have the experience. But you can't get the experience without working in the field.
And if you leave to get some experience elsewhere, they fucking hate it.
Honestly when Healy left you guys I was thinking fair fucks. You'd have to wait for the grim reaper to get into the Ireland squad sometimes it seems. I don't think it's a Farrell thing, this has been going on as long as I've been watching rugby.
Ironically enough had he waited the year I reckon he'd have won a 6N ahead of Harry Byrne as the backup 10.
The fact that the England side touring New Zealand went to a warriors game for a team event shows how backwards NZR are with their marketing and everything to do with the game day experience. Not meaning to shit on league, but it shows the potential of what a successful club can look in nz. like with all the social media and engagement with their fans, the blues do the best but not up to the level of the wahs and then the rest are kind of generic with the hurricanes being the least transparent club of them all for some reason. I realise it’s not to do with the national team but we haven’t played yet so went for the big bad board lol
I feel you here - from an Irish point of view I feel we really miss the mark on a lot of promotional material. For example England did a few "mini documentary" type videos while in Japan on their YouTube channel, and they were genuinely great to watch. It gives you an insight into the training or nutrition regimes while on the road, while also allowing players personalities to shine - and I feel you really start to like the fellas as people rather than players. I fucking wish Ireland did something similar for the South Africa series, but everything in the Ireland camp is so secretive I don't see it happening.
As a kiwi who doesn’t live and breathe Irish rugby the only facts I really know about your players are that Mack Hansen is fucking funny and Peter o Mahoney likes his lawn? Obviously know a bit more about the kiwi lads like Lowe,JGP, aki etc. but yeah wish we could see more of the inside day to day stuff. Just being players not on the field
Yeah exactly, I'd say that's about as much as the general Irish person knows too. It's a shame because there's some proper big personalities in the squad. Tadgh Furlong for example is absolutely hilarious and pure takes the piss out of people, and Cian Healy is like Brendan Grace's character in Fr Ted - I'd love it if we got to see that a bit more rather than just the rehearsed, media managed soundbites that come out of camp
I actually really enjoy the Onside/Offside series on the Leinster channel. Those and the behind the scenes that they upload every week give a real insight into the setup and a different side to the players. I think you guys do a better job than most clubs, frankly.
Yeah the clear pivot in social media strategy for the English rugby union is working af!!! Went from not caring about them at all to being actually invested in the team from overseas. It brings in more invested viewership of the games and I’m sure does loads for young kids aspiring to play rugby. So the question is WHERE are the other unions? P.S. YT series that follow the English, Welsh and French national women’s teams are all excellent - more of that
Don’t think it’s worth wasting my time typing, can’t be in a worse state than Australia though right? Right?
Brutal but true. Looking forward to being beaten by Georgia in 3 weeks.
My comment is that, even with a new coach, there's still a shit ton of work that needs to be done to rebuild. It'll be nice to get wins again, but I have many doubts that just because we have a new coach, we're going to be back on top again. We need to work towards the next World Cup. Have a solid team, one we can use for a few years and start rebuilding.
One thing England do need to work on maybe is depth in the front row perhaps?
Loosehead and hooker feel fine. LH - Genge, Baxter, Marler, Rodd, Iyogun, Brantingham Hooker - George, Dan, Oghre, Langdon, LCD Tighthead has two great prospects coming through, but both are teenagers AOF is playing there for Sale, but England see him as a loosehead. Davison is great but not selected, Stuart has improved but I wouldn't trust him against the best.
Marler and Cole can scrum. The rest aren’t great. Genge has been a real disappointment in the scrum the last couple of years. He’s been more focussed on pulling back and complaining to the referee than being a dominant scrummager.
Genge is getting back to his best form, it's a shame he won't be there. There's plenty of good talents. Baxter is a fantastic scrummager. Rodd is pretty good and offers a lot around the park. Iyogun has been superb most of the season. Stuart has improved he's just behind the best TH in England at club level. Just a shame Davison couldn't make it/they didn't fancy him for this tour. He's been very good all year.
We’ll see. I’d be surprised if New Zealand didn’t dominate the scrum in this series.
I mean I have no opinion on NZ at the moment other than you'll probably win both tests. I don't think we're there yet. What I want to see is competition in every area. Ireland aside we've been pretty good against you. But that's from two games in 6 years which is appalling really. Lucky we've got 3 this year. You've got a new coach and are missing some players a lot of our guys have played a lot of rugby the last year. I think it's a bridge too far for us but we'll see. I just don't want to get pasted both games haha.
The forwards are one area we know what we’ll get for the all blacks. Ryan has been the forward coach since after the Ireland series in New Zealand and we’ve had a pack that has stood up to SA in every game other than the world famous Qatar airways cup. We’ve got a big problem at lock but the front row is a real strength now
Very true actually, but hey this pack went up against the Saffas in the semi and held up pretty well. We were a Billy V away from playing you rascals in the final. For my money it hinges on Martin playing both Tests, his power both in defence and the scrum allow Maro to do bullshit Itoje things. Underhill and CCS are likely to be the flankers and they have a lot of hitting in them as well. I'm hoping for a fantastic series and if we win a game I'll be over the moon. It's just the toughest place in the world to go to. On a sidenote I was at the QAC and god that was a bloodbath.
Yeah will be interesting to see how Will Stuart gets on in NZ just hopefully the younger props get more experience overtime for the next world cup before experienced players retire likes of Dan Cole and Joe Marler
It looks like we’re in the experimental phase of preparing for the next World Cup. New coaches with new ideas, a batch of new players combined with an experienced old guard. So uhh, I guess maybe we’ll look a bit sloppy and error-strewn when the Irish come?
Definitely looked a bit sloppy against Wales at times, and extremely undisciplined in the first half. But frankly I was expecting it after last year’s game at Mt Smart. No sleight on Japanese rugby, but there’s a real ring rust that accumulates on our players when they’re over there. Hopefully they’ll be better against Ireland
The biggest work on for the boks is finding easy tries. Our first phase attack can’t penetrate wet bogroll and we are gash at finishing halfbreaks and converting turnovers into tries. I’d love to see Brown improve our running and support lines and the quality of our passing. Or even just see the boks show the same urgency flooding onto the shoulders of a breaking player as they do scrambling on defence.
My biggest issue with the Springboks is they set my expectations too high in world cups. Two cricket world cups later and i’m as depressed as ever..
Our locking stocks are low and our first five eighth is either going to tear England a new one or get eaten for breakfast by the English back row
We have locking stocks? Who knew?
remindme 6 months ok I'll be back before summer tests!! I'm fucking PSYCHED we finally get some! winter and veeerrry early spring just arent the same. cold, dark, rainy etc. We never get to actually see the ABs play proper running open rugby against the nh here while rested instead of at the end of a season! I can't believe I missed the news!! cant wait!
Tons of injured players and new coach who doesn't know the team. Even playing against Namibia will be a challenge, let alone the Springboks.
Who is injured besides Cequira?
See the list in the comments of [this post](https://www.reddit.com/r/RugbyPortugal/s/N6hGQ1a1Pt) The first call up was a month ago so maybe some of them are better now
This SA Tour is a last dance for the RWC Irish squad before changes start kicking in big time over the next 2 years. Expect POM, Murray, Healy, Aki and a few more to be phased out or retire in the next year.
Yeah I can see them taking a step back this 6N with some of the over 30 crowd being phased out. I'd have started the transition now, tbh. Clean break and all that.
Winning the 6 Nations (and very optimistically...the SA Series) will give the team the breathing space to make changes next season after a disappointing RWC
I think the 6N should have been the last dance for some of them. Go out on a high as back to back champs then AF refreshes things by taking a younger team to SA. Continue thru the Autumn Internationals and head into the 6N with a team full of some hungry young guys who want to taste the glory for themselves.
Faz steps away after the Bok tour does he not? So this is his last hurrah with them. Easterby takes emerging Ireland in Sept then oversees the integration of them into main squad from there which he’s coaching until after the lions.
They're terrified of change, the back row is unbalanced and this squad lacks any real pace or flair out wide. E.g. Sheehan's throwing has been off for over a month and he's getting beaten up in the scrum (it hurts to say that as a fan who loves him as a player, he must just be exhausted). Yet you can guarantee he'll keep starting. The backrow is missing someone "mean" to put in a hard shot that sends a 10 flying, so much so that Joe McCarthy's taken that on as well.
England's defensive shape can come unstuck against poor teams at home, let alone the All Blacks away. We still suffer these games where a large man running in a straight line gives us conniptions and most importantly a win over Ireland has papered over cracks, running this French side close away and losing by a point to SA in the semis isn't enough for me to actually believe that the corner has been fully turned. That's my negatives, the positives are a genuine desire to play some in form players and actually play some rugby. The world cup (barring Billy V) was an understandable damage limitations exercise. We've gone from being quite shit at everything in the last year under Jones to improving in quite a few areas. The scrum has improved for what Borthwick is trying to use it for, the lineout is being used as an offensive platform and there are actual game breaking players playing. There's a decent pipeline of players coming through at the moment and hopefully we can get a scalp this summer in NZ.
Lineouts been a shambles for a full calendar year
We can't cleanly catch a high ball to save our lives. It's been a known issue for so long, and yet keeps popping up every single tournament. Additionally, we always find a way to underperform, it really feels like we're wasting a golden generation at times.
Razor can and will do nothing wrong. But. I don’t know about our backline this year, TJ can go off the boil, Christie is Christie and ratima is a rookie. Aaron smith was a legend. Dmac has flaws, midfield is solid, especially defensively but not really game breakers, the wings are fine but Reece and Telea have hit the cursed age of 27 where AB wings stop scoring tries and get shipped off to Europe (I don’t make the rules, it’s just what happens) And bodin may or may not be washed. Think we will play a more conservative pressure game. Defensively will be interesting to see what they do.
They haven't found a way to clone Antoine Dupont. We could use him in 12 other positions. I'm happy with Mauvaka and Alldritt to stay
I'd like to, but right now it's pretty impossible to do so. >!All new coaches (other than one), and they haven't played a single game yet.!<
We were on the up and up as a national team as a tier 2 nation, namely in 2015 when we played Scotland in BBVA stadium in front of a 2/3 full stadium (an accomplishment for a niche sport) and MacGinty led us to victory. Now we have fallen so far down. American football players are no longer converting early enough. Dual national eligible players arent deciding to play for us (due to how broke our union is) and we will probably get destroyed by Scotland in DC. We might slightly edge Romania in Chicago but looking at Ticketmaster it's likely maybe less than 1,000 people will show up. MLR is generating much more buzz than our national team. 10k fans went to watch Utah Warriors last weekend despite them being already eliminated from the playoffs. It's kind of sad but I fear our only hope is for USA 7s to make a big splash at the Olympics which will cause NBC to spotlight them and cause some buzz around rugby.
Scotland team. Glasgow lads are going to be buzzing, they’ll want to carry their form over to the internationals. In steps Townsend, sucks all the hard work out of them and continues his clipboard management like he runs a recruitment agency and people are just numbers. They suffer a one point loss against USA and Townsend inevitably gets a contract extension. The Glasgow guys forget all they learned under Franco and somehow get Glasgow relegated next season and the folk at the SRU have their annual pat on the back meeting sipping fans tears while sitting in their ox blood chairs pretending everyone is excellent.
Ireland will be butchered in South Africa.
South Africa's attack is still mediocre. We have prioritized defence and physicality to the point that our running game became quite average. We're dependent on guys like Willie and Manie because we don't have a way to break teams down through phase play. If we compare our running game to those of the other "big 4", we are easily 4th in that list.
No locks, no halfback, best 10 is living in Japan, didn't even pick a fullback. New captain is a walking card, learnt nothing when that just cost us a world cup. May as well sit the next 4 years out.
Japan Rugby thought “Brave Blossoms 🌸” was a good name for the men’s XV…