Leinster v Toulouse HC SF Sat 14th May 3:00pm

[CiaranIrl]

I’d be happy with Dev coming in somewhere as well, his work in the lineout, maul, and scrum are all areas we struggled in and he excels there. I think we can improve the lineout with the same personnel as yesterday, not sure about the other areas. I’d also be happy for Dunne to come in and just work his arse off for the last half an hour while others try and do the fancy stuff.

I like Molony but for me it’s hard to look beyond him as being a position we should look at changing or at least have a better backup plan this week.

Agree with all that. Malony is excellent, but in many ways he's a 'less good version' of James Ryan. He's a workhorse, he's smart, he's good in the lineout, he clears rucks and tackles with excellent technique etc. But I was a bit taken aback when the IT & 42 interviews with him last week said he was 107kgs. That's giving up an awful lot of size to most second rows out there - 10kgs off Ryan, 20kgs off Toner and a preposterous 40kgs off Meafou.

Information on player weights can be very inaccurate. Sometimes its not updated for years. Molony is 113Kg on the Leinster website for eg. I bet that even that is out of date and he has naturally beefed up since then as men tend to do as they move into the later 20s.
I remember the 2019 world rugby website having Bundee Aki at 6'8'' and James Ryan at 14stone. And the TV graphics would use that info in pack weights graphics, mad.
One of the Irish U20s this season was listed as 132stone an 3'6'', and this stuff dosent get changed very quickly.

Yeah, I would usually disregard it, but it was an interview with him by Thornley.

[blockhead]

Agree with all that. Malony is excellent, but in many ways he's a 'less good version' of James Ryan. He's a workhorse, he's smart, he's good in the lineout, he clears rucks and tackles with excellent technique etc. But I was a bit taken aback when the IT & 42 interviews with him last week said he was 107kgs. That's giving up an awful lot of size to most second rows out there - 10kgs off Ryan, 20kgs off Toner and a preposterous 40kgs off Meafou.

Information on player weights can be very inaccurate. Sometimes its not updated for years. Molony is 113Kg on the Leinster website for eg. I bet that even that is out of date and he has naturally beefed up since then as men tend to do as they move into the later 20s.
I remember the 2019 world rugby website having Bundee Aki at 6'8'' and James Ryan at 14stone. And the TV graphics would use that info in pack weights graphics, mad.
One of the Irish U20s this season was listed as 132stone an 3'6'', and this stuff dosent get changed very quickly.

Yeah, I would usually disregard it, but it was an interview with him by Thornley.

Yeah but 16st 11lbs at 6'6'' is quite thin tbh.

[MylesNaGapoleen]

Tough on munster to go out the way they did. munster stopped dupont quite well. felt a lot of the french stars looked tired. not the same zing. maybe that was down to munster scrapping around the breakdown...they did that well in the 2nd half.

toulouse pack worries me. they are powerful.

Can't see how the bookies have us as favs. I think this could be a classic Heino semi final. I think we have enough to edge it.

[blockhead]

Tough on munster to go out the way they did. munster stopped dupont quite well. felt a lot of the french stars looked tired. not the same zing. maybe that was down to munster scrapping around the breakdown...they did that well in the 2nd half.

toulouse pack worries me. they are powerful.

Can't see how the bookies have us as favs. I think this could be a classic Heino semi final. I think we have enough to edge it.

[Serb]

They have us as favourites because we’re at home. Toulouse aren’t as good as they were last season, both Ulster and Munster should had put them away and we’re a much better side than both of them. I think we’ll win by more than a score.

[nc6000]

They have us as favourites because we’re at home. Toulouse aren’t as good as they were last season, both Ulster and Munster should had put them away and we’re a much better side than both of them. I think we’ll win by more than a score.

That is exactly my thinking, they both should have beaten Toulouse and we're a better team than both of them.

[curates_egg]

They have us as favourites because we’re at home. Toulouse aren’t as good as they were last season, both Ulster and Munster should had put them away and we’re a much better side than both of them. I think we’ll win by more than a score.

That is exactly my thinking, they both should have beaten Toulouse and we're a better team than both of them.

Well, Ulster did the double on us this season, which is the only tangible way of measuring who’s better.

[johng]

Have a look at the teamsheets for those 2 games. And then at the one v Leicester.

[Oldschool]

I’d be happy with Dev coming in somewhere as well, his work in the lineout, maul, and scrum are all areas we struggled in and he excels there. I think we can improve the lineout with the same personnel as yesterday, not sure about the other areas. I’d also be happy for Dunne to come in and just work his arse off for the last half an hour while others try and do the fancy stuff.

I like Molony but for me it’s hard to look beyond him as being a position we should look at changing or at least have a better backup plan this week.

Agree with all that. Malony is excellent, but in many ways he's a 'less good version' of James Ryan. He's a workhorse, he's smart, he's good in the lineout, he clears rucks and tackles with excellent technique etc. But I was a bit taken aback when the IT & 42 interviews with him last week said he was 107kgs. That's giving up an awful lot of size to most second rows out there - 10kgs off Ryan, 20kgs off Toner and a preposterous 40kgs off Meafou.

Information on player weights can be very inaccurate. Sometimes its not updated for years. Molony is 113Kg on the Leinster website for eg. I bet that even that is out of date and he has naturally beefed up since then as men tend to do as they move into the later 20s.
I remember the 2019 world rugby website having Bundee Aki at 6'8'' and James Ryan at 14stone. And the TV graphics would use that info in pack weights graphics, mad.
One of the Irish U20s this season was listed as 132stone an 3'6'', and this stuff dosent get changed very quickly.

Honestly that's a disgrace considering the organisation involved.
Some basic validation would prevent big errors in stats like that.

[wixfjord]

Have a look at the teamsheets for those 2 games. And then at the one v Leicester.

Or the league table.

[Oldschool]

There might be an argument for Dev on the bench though. He's powerful and will be good in mauls. He'll be a risk to their possession in lineouts. He has a big half hour in him, if he's not carrying anything.

I imagine that Toulouse would feel pretty good about facing an academy guy who just turned 21 and made his debut this year. He's never faced anything like Toulouse in a Heineken Cup semi. Toner is ready, he's done it before and he knows what's coming. Hopefully he'll do it again.

Only issue with dev and healy too, being on the bench is that an early injury and we're fooked.

[wixfjord]

If you're going to put a large physical second row who's leaving at the end of the season on the bench, I'd go for Dunne ahead of Toner.

Personally I'd stick with Baird though, and aim to play our game rather than try to stop theirs.

We should attack their lineout on every throw and get Ryan/Molony/Baird up in the air.

Scrum will be a struggle on their ball no matter who we play, but Baird coming in against tired legs and told to empty himself for 30 minutes is a very strong proposition.

[propertymad]

Having a good laugh at those calling for Toner .... are you lads smoking crack or what?

Speed of ball and speed of players will beat Toulouse .... just like it blew Leicester out of the water in the first half on Saturday

We should be aiming to run them ragged in the semi, not start some 'big lad' who is nowhere near this level anymore

Same starting second rows with Baird on the bench

I wouldn't change the backrow either

The pack in general will be much better for that run out and there's another 20% uplift in them after what has been a 3 week layoff

[wixfjord]

Having a good laugh at those calling for Toner .... are you lads smoking crack or what?

Speed of ball and speed of players will beat Toulouse .... just like it blew Leicester out of the water in the first half on Saturday

We should be aiming to run them ragged in the semi, not start some 'big lad' who is nowhere near this level anymore

Same starting second rows with Baird on the bench

I wouldn't change the backrow either

The pack in general will be much better for that run out and there's another 20% uplift in them after what has been a 3 week layoff

I would agree.

I don't understand the calls for Toner to start against Tigers or play against Toulouse. It's not the Dev of 5-6 years ago we're talking about here, his levels have dropped considerably for the last 12-18 months.

[RoboProp]

Having a good laugh at those calling for Toner .... are you lads smoking crack or what?

Having never done crack or any class A ever, I can't speak with any first-hand knowledge of the effects of crack. I would think though they'd be out looking for a fix rather posting if they were on crack

I would agree on some of the points. I think we should play our game, high-tempo, try and fatigue their big units. Dev as much as I love him is not the player to suit these tactics. Baird on the other hand off the bench running rings around tired 140kg piano movers could be fruitful for us

[blockhead]

Having a good laugh at those calling for Toner .... are you lads smoking crack or what?

Speed of ball and speed of players will beat Toulouse .... just like it blew Leicester out of the water in the first half on Saturday

We should be aiming to run them ragged in the semi, not start some 'big lad' who is nowhere near this level anymore

Same starting second rows with Baird on the bench

I wouldn't change the backrow either

The pack in general will be much better for that run out and there's another 20% uplift in them after what has been a 3 week layoff

I would agree.

I don't understand the calls for Toner to start against Tigers or play against Toulouse. It's not the Dev of 5-6 years ago we're talking about here, his levels have dropped considerably for the last 12-18 months.

Wow!

[wixfjord]

Some interesting stats comparing weekend performances:





We'll need to keep ball in play time very high on Sat and keep our collision dominance high too.

Attacking that Toulouse lineout will also be critical.

[LeRouxIsPHat]

There’s no perfect selection here, you could argue for and against every single second row except Ryan IMO. Dev was excellent against Munster and is good in the areas we were weak in on Saturday, not sure why those positives would be ignored when weighing his up his potential involvement, which for me would just be on the bench anyway.

Dev has been one of our most consistent players over the last ten years. Those days are gone and you don’t quite know if he’s going to be good or bad, but when he is good I think he’s still better than Molony.

[LeRouxIsPHat]

Amazing that some people thought the Toulouse backs were poor, 526m made, 12 clean line breaks, 38 defenders beaten, and 25 offloads. I’m not sure how much of that can be attributed to the backs and obviously they played for 100 minutes, but that backs up what I thought I saw from them. The second and third tries were outstanding as well.

[ronk]

Having a good laugh at those calling for Toner .... are you lads smoking crack or what?

Speed of ball and speed of players will beat Toulouse .... just like it blew Leicester out of the water in the first half on Saturday

We should be aiming to run them ragged in the semi, not start some 'big lad' who is nowhere near this level anymore

Same starting second rows with Baird on the bench

I wouldn't change the backrow either

The pack in general will be much better for that run out and there's another 20% uplift in them after what has been a 3 week layoff

I like Baird, he has potential to be a special player. Right now he's a promising young international getting gametime against Argentina and Italy. And he's been out with a back injury since Feb, and wasn't ready for the weekend.

One doesn't need to be a drug fueled maniac to see an issue with that. To beat Toulouse with quick ball we need to HAVE the ball.