blaker wrote: ↑February 15th, 2021, 9:47 am
the spoofer wrote: ↑February 15th, 2021, 9:40 am
Lets be honest lads and ladies. Does anyone really think that our coaching set up are capable of getting more out of the Irish squad than Joe did?
Not at all. And I think that’s what underpins the frustration people have. At a macro level, running Wales close, away, with 14 men and losing by 2 v a much better France despite loads of injuries isn’t the end of the world.
But deep down you know that we have regressed quite a bit and the above is kind of papering over the cracks. Our coaching ticket is materially worse than why went before and, arguably, worse than 2 of the 4 provinces while individual unit components of Conn and Ulster are better too.
I'd go further than that - the Ireland coaching team is arguably weaker than any of the provinces and definitely weaker in some of the key positions. Look at the lineups.
Ireland - Farrell, Catt, Easterby, Fogarty, O'Connell
Leinster - Cullen, Lancaster, Contepomi, McBryde
Munster - Van Graan, Larkham, Ferreira, Rowntree
Ulster - McFarland, Peel, Grant, Payne
Connahct - Friend, Carolan, Duffy, Wilkins
I'd have any of the provincial head coaches ahead of Farrell, I'd have any of the provincial attack coaches ahead of Catt, I'd have any of the provincial defence coaches ahead of Easterby. It's only up front that Ireland has effective coaches and the line out, scrum and maul run by Fogarty and POC is clearly not the problem. Whoever had the final decision bringing in somebody with a minima;l track record like Catt should be shown the door - Larkham and Contepomi are far superior imho.
And then look at Irish coaches doing well in England and France - McCall, ROG, Muldoon, Prendergast, Davidson - and others with recent Irish links like Lam.
There's a top rate coaching team among all of those, but will never happen as Nucifora and the blazers will never accept they made a big mistake elevating Farrell beyond his station, and bringing in somebody as useless as Catt in the one coaching position where we need a real pro. The only good thing they have done is bring in POC to sort out the line out and leave Fogarty to do a pretty decent job with the forwards.