Leinster V Cardiff, Sat 28th Jan 17:05

[mildlyinterested]

Who's Josh O'Hare?

Sub academy backrow

Looks like soroka is injured.

Culhane trained.

[LeinsterLeader]

Who's Josh O'Hare?

Sub academy backrow

Looks like soroka is injured.

Culhane trained.

Didn't see Martin M either. He injured too?

[Colmodon]

Who's Josh O'Hare?

Sub academy backrow

Looks like soroka is injured.

Culhane trained.

Didn't see Martin M either. He injured too?

Tore his ACL in training a few months ago I thought?

[Dave Cahill]

Think he's gone for the season, I seem to recall reading that?

[LeinsterLeader]

Wow back-row really is attritional

Amazing to think that that even with our injuries and 6N call-ups, one of Deegan, Penny, Ruddock or Connors still won't be able to get a start on Saturday.

We truly are blessed in that position.

[curates_egg]

Wow back-row really is attritional

Amazing to think that that even with our injuries and 6N call-ups, one of Deegan, Penny, Ruddock or Connors still won't be able to get a start on Saturday.

We truly are blessed in that position.

We can call on three internationals and Scott Penny, who looks like he could be standard. Two promising academy guys training with them as well, and one sub-academy.

Based on the two different sets of training pics, I could see only two second rows training fully: Molony and Deeny. Jenkins was just jogging.

We've no lock in the academy. While Soroka has played there, he's injured.
Can Culhane play lock at a push?
Or are we relying on Rhys to potentially cover there? He hasn't played there in a good few years.

In addition to losing Charlie Ryan, we lost three players who played there for us at the end of the season: Dev, Josh Murphy and Jack Dunne. You would imagine we might have looked to keep one of them if we had known.
Ryan, McCarthy and Baird are all down as locks in our squad, and away with Ireland.

So, essentially, we are down seven lock options we had last season (four permanently). The one we added is unavailable.

[mildlyinterested]

Dunne and Murphy were offered contracts but opted to leave.

[ronk]

If Jack Dunne starts this weekend he will have double the number of starts this season that he had in his entire Leinster career. Made his Heineken Cup debut this month.

It was a pity to lose him and I think he had a future at Leinster, but it's been a good move for him so far.

[curates_egg]

Dunne and Murphy were offered contracts but opted to leave.

Fair enough.
Is it still true that provinces can't outbid each other?
That is, Murphy chose to go to Connacht on the same money?
If so, there was really nothing we could do about that.

Doesn't change our screwedness this weekend, with only two available second rows.

Can Culhane play there?

[Serb]

Interesting, didn’t know we offered contracts to that pair. Looking at how they are getting on now, it was probably the right call for both of them to leave. Murphy is getting a lot of game time with Connacht and Dunne is making European squads with Exeter, he almost certainly wouldn’t be doing that with us.

It does leave us in a pickle for the second row however. You’d have to assume it’s Deeny & Molony with Ruddock as cover. We may be aiming to try and get both locks to go the full 80 — Deeny went 80 against Ospreys, Molony has gone the full 80 eight times this season already.

[curates_egg]

Interesting, didn’t know we offered contracts to that pair. Looking at how they are getting on now, it was probably the right call for both of them to leave. Murphy is getting a lot of game time with Connacht and Dunne is making European squads with Exeter, he almost certainly wouldn’t be doing that with us.

It does leave us in a pickle for the second row however. You’d have to assume it’s Deeny & Molony with Ruddock as cover. We may be aiming to try and get both locks to go the full 80 — Deeny went 80 against Ospreys, Molony has gone the full 80 eight times this season already.

Molony is on 884 minutes. Another 80 minutes would put him up to 964.
He has been an absolute legend for us over the past two seasons...but we are becoming extremely dependent on him.

[ronk]

Interesting, didn’t know we offered contracts to that pair. Looking at how they are getting on now, it was probably the right call for both of them to leave. Murphy is getting a lot of game time with Connacht and Dunne is making European squads with Exeter, he almost certainly wouldn’t be doing that with us.

It does leave us in a pickle for the second row however. You’d have to assume it’s Deeny & Molony with Ruddock as cover. We may be aiming to try and get both locks to go the full 80 — Deeny went 80 against Ospreys, Molony has gone the full 80 eight times this season already.

Molony is on 884 minutes. Another 80 minutes would put him up to 964.
He has been an absolute legend for us over the past two seasons...but we are becoming extremely dependent on him.

Molony is the only Irish member of the first choice 23 who doesn't have to go to international camps. Of course his gametime stands out.

It's a rare player who's good enough to play all the time for Leinster but can't get into the Ireland team.

[Dave Cahill]

It's a rare player who's good enough to play all the time for Leinster but can't get into the Ireland team.

The last time we had a player like that he was a second row too!

[curates_egg]

Interesting, didn’t know we offered contracts to that pair. Looking at how they are getting on now, it was probably the right call for both of them to leave. Murphy is getting a lot of game time with Connacht and Dunne is making European squads with Exeter, he almost certainly wouldn’t be doing that with us.

It does leave us in a pickle for the second row however. You’d have to assume it’s Deeny & Molony with Ruddock as cover. We may be aiming to try and get both locks to go the full 80 — Deeny went 80 against Ospreys, Molony has gone the full 80 eight times this season already.

Molony is on 884 minutes. Another 80 minutes would put him up to 964.
He has been an absolute legend for us over the past two seasons...but we are becoming extremely dependent on him.

Molony is the only Irish member of the first choice 23 who doesn't have to go to international camps. Of course his gametime stands out.

It's a rare player who's good enough to play all the time for Leinster but can't get into the Ireland team.

Yes but, as I have posted on other threads, his minutes are also well above our players who go to Irish squads, taking their Irish minutes into account, with the exception of Sheehan. Only Ross Byrne is also at the same level.

The point is more that we are so short at second row that we have no choice but to play him for 80 minutes, despite his high load. He doesn't seem jaded at the moment. But, if he were to get injured, our dependence on him puts us in a very difficult position.

[ronk]

Molony is on 884 minutes. Another 80 minutes would put him up to 964.
He has been an absolute legend for us over the past two seasons...but we are becoming extremely dependent on him.

Molony is the only Irish member of the first choice 23 who doesn't have to go to international camps. Of course his gametime stands out.

It's a rare player who's good enough to play all the time for Leinster but can't get into the Ireland team.

Yes but, as I have posted on other threads, his minutes are also well above our players who go to Irish squads, taking their Irish minutes into account, with the exception of Sheehan. Only Ross Byrne is also at the same level.

The point is more that we are so short at second row that we have no choice but to play him for 80 minutes, despite his high load. He doesn't seem jaded at the moment. But, if he were to get injured, our dependence on him puts us in a very difficult position.

Don't go looking up Gary Ringrose's or Jimmy O'Briens total gametime.

By the end of the 6N Ryan will be ahead in minutes barring injury. It's a very manageable load.

[Ruckedtobits]

Certainly almost 5 months into a Season, 900 minutes is a very manageable load for a fit second-row, particularly with rest breaks taken into account. The current load is certainly not excessive when you compare it to second-rows in the 2011-16 period.

[JKBA]

Starting to think on we will never see Henshaw or Jenkins again. I was under the impression they weren’t out with significant injuries initially.

Jenkins had issues with his hamstring last season too.

Need him for run-in, no need to rush him back.

Agree it’s just sometimes after the injury “update” I’m not sure if a player will be back the following week or might actually be deceased.

Joking aside, hope he’s back soon. He had a great start to the season and like you said will be needed for the run-in

[ronk]

We played Cardiff this weekend a year ago.

McCarthy made his debut.

Hope we get a better result. Be nice to see someone rise as fast as McCarthy.

[ronk]

There's been a fair old chance in the squad since then too.

https://all.rugby/match/15013/urc-2021- ... f-leinster

[curates_egg]

Molony is the only Irish member of the first choice 23 who doesn't have to go to international camps. Of course his gametime stands out.

It's a rare player who's good enough to play all the time for Leinster but can't get into the Ireland team.

Yes but, as I have posted on other threads, his minutes are also well above our players who go to Irish squads, taking their Irish minutes into account, with the exception of Sheehan. Only Ross Byrne is also at the same level.

The point is more that we are so short at second row that we have no choice but to play him for 80 minutes, despite his high load. He doesn't seem jaded at the moment. But, if he were to get injured, our dependence on him puts us in a very difficult position.

Don't go looking up Gary Ringrose's or Jimmy O'Briens total gametime.

By the end of the 6N Ryan will be ahead in minutes barring injury. It's a very manageable load.

Excessive or not is not the point I’m making. Dependence is.
We’ve only got two fit second rows available this week. And Deeny is very raw.
It’s a squad weakness I’m pointing to, rather than individual player management.