Glasgow V Leinster Rainbow Cup Friday 4th June 2015

[Boss_cat2]

And that's a red in your book!, have you ever seen a red for that before? He got a yellow and that's that.

What about the shoulder to the head on McDonald, he will have some black eye after that. Don't get me wrong I thought penalty myself, but it could have been yellow. Same with the gouge on Hastings, infarct I would.not be surprised if that gets cited..

[hugonaut]

That was a really sloppy second half performance from Leinster. We made an awful lot of skill errors and struggled badly with the ref. JVDF had an excellent game, Josh Murphy very strong and Ronan Kelleher had some really good moments in the pack, but overall we really lacked coherency.

Felt sorry for Hugo Keenan to have two tries scratched out through no fault of his own. He was lively throughout. Ross was particularly immobile throughout – positively statuesque. Garry took a lot out of the ball ... he's looking for some form, it's not the worst thing in the world. He would have been better giving a pass earlier on a number of occasions last night though, not least because he would have been available to get one back.

Didn't understand why JOB was picked at No11 before the game and coming out of it I still don't!

[alanair]

And that's a red in your book!, have you ever seen a red for that before? He got a yellow and that's that.

What about the shoulder to the head on McDonald, he will have some black eye after that. Don't get me wrong I thought penalty myself, but it could have been yellow. Same with the gouge on Hastings, infarct I would.not be surprised if that gets cited..

Hastings is lucky he didnt get his head knocked off by Several Leinster players . The guy is an obnoxious tw@t … Glasgow lucky to be getting rid of him to Gloucester.

[blaker]

Hard to get too worked up over a pretty dead rubber event but - to my mind anyway - there’s a few themes here that apply across many recent games / the season;
- RByrne hyper static. One hopes it’s due in part to an injury but his lack of gain line threat and habit of shovelling ball along has been exposed a lot this year.
- HKeenan is a remarkably deceptive attacking force.
- GRingrose has begun to rely almost exclusively on cutting back inside and is very rarely making passes to outside runners. It sometimes brings joy but is overall a big negative for me.
- We have been forced to play a lot of the “next in line” guys this year and some look to be short of that next level up. No disgrace and no suggestion that they aren’t working to the max/trying and fully committed but EByrne, ROL, RMoloney etc dont appear to be up to a level to replace / step in for the likes of Healy/Toner etc which they’ll have to do.

We seem to lack a bit of leadership/nous. Felt like a game we allowed ourselves to get wound up in. Would Fardy have allowed that?

While on paper this hasn’t been a bad year, I think we have regressed fairly significantly. Many of our stalwarts have aged on (Fardy, Toner, Sexton, Cronin, Healy) while some future stalwarts have had very mixed years (Ryan, Lowe, Ringrose, Larmour). There’s mitigating circumstances but, aside from the scrum, I can’t think of any part of our game that is better. I’m not clued in enough to ID the reasons but I’d imagine a combination of factors such as a drop off in quality as generational legends move on, a “big fish small pond” bully effect from playing in this godawful quality league and injuries / COVID are there.

One other factor I’d like to posit though - is there any risk that there’s a staleness / fatigue with the coaches? Lancaster and Leo are in seat a long time now. They freshen up the other roles a lot but they’ve been here for the entire careers to date of many of our players.

[Boss_cat2]

See below

[Boss_cat2]

A lot of niggle in the game, I reckon because Leinster got frustrated that we were not only matching them physically but that we totally out-matched you in energy. Maybe your guys had already mentally switched off in the Rainbow Cup, I don't know; but you seemed very flat and not at the races.

I don't get the Hastings irk, he is not a dirty player but you guys targeted him a few times, and two players with hands in his face during the Ryan neck roll incident, and blood next to his eye just after. Earlier there was a few late tackles too earlier in the game.

[Blue Man]

This is a really, really poor performance. Lineout gone to shite, forwards struggling and we're constantly playing on back foot.

We've had quite a few of these this season too.

Let's not let a ridiculous reffing performance cloud that.

Agree 100%. In truth, it was a poor season by Leinster’s high standards, in particular back play has regressed

[cormac]

Been a fairly frustrating stop-start season what with the truncated Pro14, games being called off, no crowds etc. 60 players involved in match-day squads, regular last minute withdrawals, injury after injury, extended international window in the Autumn.

We've played 25 matches so far this season and the following big players have played in less than half of them;

Cian Healy: 7 starts 3 sub
Sean Cronin: 5 starts 5 sub
Johnny Sexton: 5 starts 1 sub
Tadhg Furlong: 4 starts 2 sub
Jack Conan: 8 starts 4 sub
Jamison Gibson-Park: 4 starts 3 sub
Garry Ringrose: 9 starts 0 sub
Andrew Porter: 6 starts 5 sub
Dan Leavy: 4 starts 5 sub
Max Deegan: 0 starts 1 sub
Jordan Larmour: 9 starts 2 sub
Robbie Henshaw: 9 starts 0 sub
James Lowe: 5 starts 0 sub
James Ryan: 9 starts 1 sub
Caelan Doris: 6 starts 0 sub
Ciaran Frawley: 8 starts 1 sub
Hugo Keenan: 11 starts 0 sub
Ronan Kelleher: 6 starts 3 sub
Will Connors: 2 starts 1 sub

Three senior squad players, Adam Byrne, Conor O'Brien and Vakh Abdaladze, haven't played a single minute.

I think the injury issues have shone through in our performances as we've struggled to put together a real run of form. The impact on training must have been huge too.

If I could wish for one thing for Leinster next season it's to have much better luck on the injury front.

[LeRouxIsPHat]

I actually thought Ringrose had a good game. It did look like he missed chances to move the ball but Glasgow were constantly looking for intercepts and I thought he used the step back inside quite well and looked very strong in contact when he carried. Defence seemed to be very strong too.

[wixfjord]

- RByrne hyper static. One hopes it’s due in part to an injury but his lack of gain line threat and habit of shovelling ball along has been exposed a lot this year.

Ross was one of our best players last night. Tackled like a demon, kicked well and attacked well.

[blaker]

- RByrne hyper static. One hopes it’s due in part to an injury but his lack of gain line threat and habit of shovelling ball along has been exposed a lot this year.

Ross was one of our best players last night. Tackled like a demon, kicked well and attacked well.

He’s a brilliant place kicker, very good kicking from hand, immensely brave and technically good on the tackle and varies his game nicely with short kicks behind. He’s a very good player.

He is however quite a deep lying player who - certainly this year - has shown an inclination towards “stand and deliver” play where he is shaping to shovel ball on before he receives it.

I’d disagree that he attacked very well last night but he certainly didn’t cost us the game.

He’s not fast and that’s fine. He’s not a huge unit and that’s fine. But I think he will always be a level short if he doesn’t take the ball flatter more consistently and/or disguise his intentions a bit better.

[wixfjord]

- RByrne hyper static. One hopes it’s due in part to an injury but his lack of gain line threat and habit of shovelling ball along has been exposed a lot this year.

Ross was one of our best players last night. Tackled like a demon, kicked well and attacked well.

He’s a brilliant place kicker, very good kicking from hand, immensely brave and technically good on the tackle and varies his game nicely with short kicks behind. He’s a very good player.

He is however quite a deep lying player who - certainly this year - has shown an inclination towards “stand and deliver” play where he is shaping to shovel ball on before he receives it.

I’d disagree that he attacked very well last night but he certainly didn’t cost us the game.

He’s not fast and that’s fine. He’s not a huge unit and that’s fine. But I think he will always be a level short if he doesn’t take the ball flatter more consistently and/or disguise his intentions a bit better.

I agree that he can 'stand and deliver' a lot, in fact I've called that out ad nauseum.

But last night he was far flatter, threatened the line and was using the inside ball to great effect, particularly when we were going forward in the first half.

[wixfjord]

Utterly stupid from Josh. He needs to learn to hold his discipline a bit better. I'd say there'll be a ban for this.

https://twitter.com/gharkness23/status/ ... 4352573440

[Keith]

- RByrne hyper static. One hopes it’s due in part to an injury but his lack of gain line threat and habit of shovelling ball along has been exposed a lot this year.

Ross was one of our best players last night. Tackled like a demon, kicked well and attacked well.

He’s a brilliant place kicker, very good kicking from hand, immensely brave and technically good on the tackle and varies his game nicely with short kicks behind. He’s a very good player.

He is however quite a deep lying player who - certainly this year - has shown an inclination towards “stand and deliver” play where he is shaping to shovel ball on before he receives it.

I’d disagree that he attacked very well last night but he certainly didn’t cost us the game.

He’s not fast and that’s fine. He’s not a huge unit and that’s fine. But I think he will always be a level short if he doesn’t take the ball flatter more consistently and/or disguise his intentions a bit better.

Level short of what?

[wixfjord]

Level short of what?

A level short of top Euro and test level I would say.

Which I think is probably a fair reflection of where Ross B is and likely will be.

He's a superb player and give me him over Carbery at 10 any day. But he does lack a little bit of athleticism and a real sharp attacking game.

(I do think he was very good last night btw, this is a wider comment.)

[blaker]

Ross was one of our best players last night. Tackled like a demon, kicked well and attacked well.

He’s a brilliant place kicker, very good kicking from hand, immensely brave and technically good on the tackle and varies his game nicely with short kicks behind. He’s a very good player.

He is however quite a deep lying player who - certainly this year - has shown an inclination towards “stand and deliver” play where he is shaping to shovel ball on before he receives it.

I’d disagree that he attacked very well last night but he certainly didn’t cost us the game.

He’s not fast and that’s fine. He’s not a huge unit and that’s fine. But I think he will always be a level short if he doesn’t take the ball flatter more consistently and/or disguise his intentions a bit better.

Level short of what?

Well, what do we hope the Leinster 10 to be? Realistically with the teams objectives and history you’d expect most of the first 15 to be of high international caliber with some world class individuals. Ross Byrne is a very good player - don’t get me wrong - but I think the addition of a higher level of gain line threat/pass variation would elevate him to top class international standard. We’re talking icing rather than the cake

[LeRouxIsPHat]

Obviously he’ll never be much of a running threat but don’t forget that he could still be carrying an injury. Even with the recent break we’re still very short on tens and he could well be struggling.

[FLIP]

Obviously he’ll never be much of a running threat but don’t forget that he could still be carrying an injury. Even with the recent break we’re still very short on tens and he could well be struggling.

Yeah, I did see him hobbling temporarily after putting in a huge clearance kick at one point.

[hugonaut]

Obviously he’ll never be much of a running threat but don’t forget that he could still be carrying an injury. Even with the recent break we’re still very short on tens and he could well be struggling.

I think it's very, very likely that he's carrying something and not at 100%. Between not place-kicking a couple of weeks ago and his immobility last night, I think he's gritting his teeth and getting on with it. There's a lot to be said for it and always has been – rugby hasn't changed that much.

[CiaranIrl]

Did Rob Russell come off the bench at all? Jimmy O'Brien was a total non entity on the left wing.
I thought Cian Kelleher showed up well. It seems really strange that we're letting Kelleher go to Ealing all things considered. There must be something else at play. The contract in Ealing can't be worth much.