Andy Farell's Reign of Terror

[Oldschoolsocks]

I used to work with a guy who sneered when somebody asked for a panini at the sandwich counter in work, he’d be like “it’s panino, panini is plural”, he also sneered at me when he overheard me talking about my one month anniversary of being married he was like “anniversary means year, I hate when people say month or six month anniversary”. I explained to him that if he actually bothered to look up the Oxford English Dictionary that he’d actually find that he was just a c**t and could he please f%~k the f%~k of because he was an annoying c**t. I found that strategy worked quite well…


Not calling anyone in here a bad word btw, just remembering that guy who was more concerned about using the correct word than using words correctly.

[The Doc]

I used to work with a guy who sneered when somebody asked for a panini at the sandwich counter in work, he’d be like “it’s panino, panini is plural”, he also sneered at me when he overheard me talking about my one month anniversary of being married he was like “anniversary means year, I hate when people say month or six month anniversary”. I explained to him that if he actually bothered to look up the Oxford English Dictionary that he’d actually find that he was just a c**t and could he please f%~k the f%~k of because he was an annoying c**t. I found that strategy worked quite well…


Not calling anyone in here a bad word btw, just remembering that guy who was more concerned about using the correct word than using words correctly.

I'm hurt

Sent from my LE2123 using Tapatalk

[Oldschoolsocks]

I used to work with a guy who sneered when somebody asked for a panini at the sandwich counter in work, he’d be like “it’s panino, panini is plural”, he also sneered at me when he overheard me talking about my one month anniversary of being married he was like “anniversary means year, I hate when people say month or six month anniversary”. I explained to him that if he actually bothered to look up the Oxford English Dictionary that he’d actually find that he was just a c**t and could he please f%~k the f%~k of because he was an annoying c**t. I found that strategy worked quite well…


Not calling anyone in here a bad word btw, just remembering that guy who was more concerned about using the correct word than using words correctly.

I'm hurt

Sent from my LE2123 using Tapatalk

Love ya too Doc,

[riocard911]

There was me thinking "anyhoo" was an Irishism of the Nordie variety. Am I wrong?

[johng]

If it was the septics would never have got their hands on it

[Oldschoolsocks]

I think I got anyhoo from one of the baddies on Buffy the Vampire Slayer, the lad who was the mayor and turned into a big dinosaur thing.

[Oldschoolsocks]

So, it looks at least very wrong that Loughman was allowed return to the pitch this morning. Surely there is a duty of care that was not upheld…

[fourthirtythree]

So, it looks at least very wrong that Loughman was allowed return to the pitch this morning. Surely there is a duty of care that was not upheld…

Things like that, no citing let alone lengthy, substantial ban from the late, cheap, full power head shot in the England Barbarians game, no citings from the English semi finals, lots of leniency and a policy of reducing bans for "reasons"....

RFU, IRFU, World Rugby - you're going to face a lot of court cases. A lot. Very, very expensive ones.

[Twist]

NZR seem to be holding their hands up on this one https://www.the42.ie/jeremy-loughman-2-5804831-Jul2022/

I confess I thought the decision to bring him back on was made by Ireland

[sunshiner1]

by Twist


NZR seem to be holding their hands up on this one https://www.the42.ie/jeremy-loughman-2-5804831-Jul2022/

I confess I thought the decision to bring him back on was made by Ireland

I don't care who is to blame as long as they get this sh*t sorted.

[ronk]

The player. Okay he was making his debut for Ireland and didn't want to go out after two minutes.

I don't care, it's one he got away with because they didn't notice straightaway. It needs to be clear that players should understand that not speaking up will do more damage to their career (as well as their health) than speaking up. If the system doesn't make that 100% clear to players then it has failed.

I hope he's okay.

[Oldschoolsocks]

NZR seem to be holding their hands up on this one https://www.the42.ie/jeremy-loughman-2-5804831-Jul2022/

I confess I thought the decision to bring him back on was made by Ireland

Regardless of him passing the HIA, surely at least one of the coaching or medical staff must have known he was Fubar

[wixfjord]

The player. Okay he was making his debut for Ireland and didn't want to go out after two minutes.

I don't care, it's one he got away with because they didn't notice straightaway. It needs to be clear that players should understand that not speaking up will do more damage to their career (as well as their health) than speaking up. If the system doesn't make that 100% clear to players then it has failed.

I hope he's okay.

You're blaming some someone with a brain injury for not diagnosing their own brain injury in real time?!

You can't blame the player, that's stupid.

Players will play until they're told not to. They're not going to diagnose themselves with concussion.

The literal purpose of having team doctors and particularly independent doctors is to take the decision out of their hands and bring a level headed, medically based external opinion.

The failure in the system is them, not Loughman.

In fact the Irish coaches and the ref should shoulder a lot more 'blame' if we're handing it out than the individual himself.

[ronk]

You think he didn't know that he'd stumbled like that?

He was getting a once in a career shot and didn't want to blow it. Players have to be part of the solution and empowered to trust that they don't need to take risks.

We have independent Dr's because we don't and can't fully trust players, coaches and team Dr's to do the right thing.

Faz can say he reviewed the footage at halftime and brought him off and that he didn't see the incident live and who's to question that. Maybe it's true, it probably is.

The system can never really work if players are trying to fake being well and get rewarded for doing so. It's not all on them, but it can't be fixed without them. If they don't trust the system then it's the system that needs to change.

Should other people have taken that possibility away from him, yes. But he was an important link in the chain. Having played on with concussion symptoms he should be stood down for longer as part of the return to play.

[wixfjord]

You think he didn't know that he'd stumbled like that?

He was getting a once in a career shot and didn't want to blow it. Players have to be part of the solution and empowered to trust that they don't need to take risks.

We have independent Dr's because we don't and can't fully trust players, coaches and team Dr's to do the right thing.

Faz can say he reviewed the footage at halftime and brought him off and that he didn't see the incident live and who's to question that. Maybe it's true, it probably is.

The system can never really work if players are trying to fake being well and get rewarded for doing so. It's not all on them, but it can't be fixed without them. If they don't trust the system then it's the system that needs to change.

Should other people have taken that possibility away from him, yes. But he was an important link in the chain. Having played on with concussion symptoms he should be stood down for longer as part of the return to play.

Yes exactly.

The reason why why we take it out of a player's hands is because it makes no sense to trust someone who is concussed to diagnose themselves with concussion.

Have you ever been concussed? The whole point is you're confused and have limited perspective about what's going on around you.

You want someone in that position to have the calmness and mental acuity to diagnose themselves?! And you want to blame them for not doing that?!

Blaming a player for not going off and ignoring the the independent doctor, team doctor, team coaches and referee allowing him to play on is just total cr@p.

[Oldschoolsocks]

You think he didn't know that he'd stumbled like that?

He was getting a once in a career shot and didn't want to blow it. Players have to be part of the solution and empowered to trust that they don't need to take risks.

We have independent Dr's because we don't and can't fully trust players, coaches and team Dr's to do the right thing.

Faz can say he reviewed the footage at halftime and brought him off and that he didn't see the incident live and who's to question that. Maybe it's true, it probably is.

The system can never really work if players are trying to fake being well and get rewarded for doing so. It's not all on them, but it can't be fixed without them. If they don't trust the system then it's the system that needs to change.

Should other people have taken that possibility away from him, yes. But he was an important link in the chain. Having played on with concussion symptoms he should be stood down for longer as part of the return to play.

I played when concussed more than once, I definitely don’t remember knowing I’d been concussed. It’s a brain trauma injury and none of the decision wrt staying on can be left to the player for the simple reason that their judgement is impaired.

TLDR, it’s likely he didn’t know he was concussed.

[hugonaut]

You think he didn't know that he'd stumbled like that?

He was getting a once in a career shot and didn't want to blow it. Players have to be part of the solution and empowered to trust that they don't need to take risks.

We have independent Dr's because we don't and can't fully trust players, coaches and team Dr's to do the right thing.

Faz can say he reviewed the footage at halftime and brought him off and that he didn't see the incident live and who's to question that. Maybe it's true, it probably is.

The system can never really work if players are trying to fake being well and get rewarded for doing so. It's not all on them, but it can't be fixed without them. If they don't trust the system then it's the system that needs to change.

Should other people have taken that possibility away from him, yes. But he was an important link in the chain. Having played on with concussion symptoms he should be stood down for longer as part of the return to play.

I played when concussed more than once, I definitely don’t remember knowing I’d been concussed. It’s a brain trauma injury and none of the decision wrt staying on can be left to the player for the simple reason that their judgement is impaired.

TLDR, it’s likely he didn’t know he was concussed.

Yeah, I was concussed on the pitch a few times. Vastly different experiences. Once I got my nose broken by a stray elbow and saw stars – never really knew if I was concussed or if that was just a pain reaction. I went down in a heap either way ... like I was hit with a 10lb hammer, by all accounts. Went down, stayed down. The sideliners were looking at me through their fingers. Since then, I have always admired players who played on with a broken nose, because it was ridiculously f*cking sore!

Another time was completely different, and I had to piece it together afterwards with my mates and with the coaches. It was an early senior squad training in school, a sunny afternoon on relatively hard ground, and at some stage I took a bang in the head. I vaguely remember sort of walking/jogging over to one of the coaches and him asking me some questions – might have been during some 7-vs-8 or doing Hennie Mullers, I literally can't remember except that there were people around me and I was running and then veered over to the coach – and then his expression changing. I don't know what I said to him, I just remember him looking at me funny at first, like wondering why I was running over to him, and then him looking worried.

I was brought back to the changing rooms and sat down, the coach, another teacher who had coached me in a previous year and a couple of team-mates talking to me, asking me questions and keeping me alert. Apparently I was telling them that the last thing I could remember was doing fireman carries/wheelbarrow races, then grids [which I got in the wrong order], but I had been out there on autopilot after that for 25-30 minutes doing 5m/22m shuttle runs with pad hits at the turn, some 7-vs-8, Mullers ... I have never remembered even a snapshot of it. I couldn't tell you what order those things were in, because I was only told about it. I might have been concussed doing tackle grids and my brain didn't make any memories from then on, it might have happened hitting a pad and then I forgot things that had happened earlier. I couldn't tell you.

Apparently I didn't fall over, I wasn't running weird, I didn't start talking gobbledegook. I wasn't behaving noticeably differently until I went over to the coach. I was sat out for three weeks after that, as was the practice at the time. I had a headache for some of the next day, and maybe feeling a little foggy for another day or two after that, but nothing beyond that. No physical bump on the head, no bruise, not a noticeable mark on me.

What struck me later is a] that I was lucky that the coaches and the lads took good care of me and b] it's not like I made the decision to try and stay on. I literally have no memory of what I was thinking. I know myself that I'm not especially determined or super-competitive, it's not like the 'inner me' wanted to keep pushing on. I just don't know.

I never had any disjointed memories [like you might have from going on a bender], there's just a blank. I don't know why I went over to the coach at that point, rather than two minutes earlier or five minutes later. Odd situation. I would say it was worrying for people around me [because I forgot stuff afterwards as well – I remember the coach's expression and then my next memory is being in the pavilion, about 150m away, telling him something about my bike]. For me though, just an odd situation. I didn't feel particularly worried or unsettled, I don't think I was upset that I couldn't remember things. I didn't want to go back out there, but it was because I felt tired and woozy, like I had taken a sleeping pill. It wasn't a terrible feeling.

Apologies for the essay, I swear there's a point! And the point is ... sometimes you can get concussed innocuously. It doesn't have to look like much. You don't even have to stay on the ground. All concussions are different. Players aren't always insisting that they want to stay on because they're super competitive, or because they want to finish out the game, or because they think they're being crafty and pretending they're not concussed ... they might be just arguing because they're unsettled, or naturally argumentative, or because they don't know that the guy they're talking to is a doctor. Their brains aren't working like they normally would.

TLDR; the same as the TLDR from OSS's post above.

[ronk]

Broken noses aren't all the same. I have breathing problems from a deviated septum and nose bleeds every day, 15-20 years later.

Played on, didn't think it was a big deal, suspected a break. I'm not wildly tough or competitive.

In retrospect I think I went through concussions for a while but never diagnosed. Thought it was a neck issue.

When I was a sailing instructor a student smashed her head on the boom and I caught her before she hit the deck. Carried her off the boat. She got an overnight in hospital with concussion.

Times have changed and we know a lot more about it now. We're calling concussions that would have been play on years ago, we were wrong then. We don't know all the facts from Wednesday but there are a lot of stories of pro players who hid concussion problems over the years.

A lot of thing were lined up for this moment of this game for a guy at that stage of his career to want to stay on. My focus isn't really on blame. The point I was trying to make was that having stayed on the field with symptoms of concussion that the return to play protocols should mandate a much slower return. What I understand about the science suggests that that's a correct position to take.

One of the points of the changes to the laws is to try to remove any incentive for players to play or be asked to play through a possible concussion. The recent changes to the protocol reflect that. But I don't think that it's working as well as it could.

Loughman is an edge case. It's an end of season tour for a guy who got a second chance after being cut earlier in his career. His coach says it's an audition. It the first time in I don't know how long that Ireland played midweek games on tour, specifically as part of RWC prep and it's a huge tour to NZ, the big one. Going off after 2 minutes would throw the rotation plan into disarray. Healy plays a most unwelcome 78 minutes on Wednesday before a Saturday game.

If you go into a tackle badly and get knocked out you're gonna think you let the team down, when you're able to think clearly. Loughman was lucid enough that he was able to pass the HIA (not counting that they missed the automatic fail on the field) and return.

Getting to halftime got everything back on track for Ireland and a 3 week stand-down is a season ended anyway. That should be part of a discussion.

[hugonaut]

Loughman is an edge case. It's an end of season tour for a guy who got a second chance after being cut earlier in his career. His coach says it's an audition. It the first time in I don't know how long that Ireland played midweek games on tour, specifically as part of RWC prep and it's a huge tour to NZ, the big one. Going off after 2 minutes would throw the rotation plan into disarray. Healy plays a most unwelcome 78 minutes on Wednesday before a Saturday game.

If you go into a tackle badly and get knocked out you're gonna think you let the team down, when you're able to think clearly. Loughman was lucid enough that he was able to pass the HIA (not counting that they missed the automatic fail on the field) and return.

Getting to halftime got everything back on track for Ireland and a 3 week stand-down is a season ended anyway. That should be part of a discussion.

Yeah, there's no doubt in my mind that Loughman has been thinking about the tour since getting selected and wanting to make an impression. He has probably thought of nothing else.

It would be baked into his thoughts that he wanted to play for Ireland, so even if he didn't know what he was thinking [for example, if he was experiencing the same symptoms as I experienced], he would be thinking "I want to play for Ireland". He might have had no memory loss at all – he might have seen stars and lost some motor skills briefly. But in itself that loss of balance is a symptom of suspected concussion so it would have been a better outcome if they had been conservative about it.

[Flash Gordon]

The IRFU will advise delegates at its Annual Council Meeting later today (Friday 29th July) that Ireland Men’s Head Coach, Andy Farrell, has signed a two-year contract extension that will see him remain in his position until at least August 2025.

In his address to Council Kevin Potts, Chief Executive, IRFU, will congratulate and thank Andy, his coaching team, support staff and players for their historic win in New Zealand, while also confirming the contract extension.

Ahead of the Council meeting, IRFU Chief Executive Potts said: “I am delighted to confirm that Andy Farrell has accepted a two-year contract extension as the head coach of our men’s international team which will keep him at the helm of that team until at least August 2025, and there is an option to extend the contract further, based on a number of mutually agreed performance markers.

“Andy is one of the finest coaches in the world, he has brought our game to new heights and has the team playing a brand of rugby that excites, entertains, and engages people, while, critically, producing winning results.

“I would like to thank our Performance Director, David Nucifora, for his work in negotiating this extension with Andy.

“I, on behalf of all the Union delegates and Irish Rugby fans across the world, thank Andy for the exceptional impact he has had on Ireland’s performances to date, as we look forward to the year ahead, which will of course include the Rugby World Cup in France.”



Commenting on the new deal, Farrell said: “I am happy to extend my contract with Irish Rugby for a further two years. As a group we have made it clear that we are building towards the 2023 Rugby World Cup, and we have taken some decent strides in that regard in recent months.

“Ahead of the tour to New Zealand myself and David (Nucifora) looked at the opportunities and challenges facing the national squad after the tournament in France. I am excited about continuing to work with the group and with the next generation of Irish international players.”

IRFU Performance Director, David Nucifora, added: “Andy is one of the outstanding coaches in world rugby and his work in leading the transition within the national team since the 2019 Rugby World Cup has been exceptional. Ireland are currently the number one ranked team in the world, an incredibly tough five match tour of New Zealand was a success on several levels and a Triple Crown was secured in the 2022 Six Nations Championship.

“A coach of Andy’s calibre is always going to be in high demand, and we are delighted that he has agreed to extend his contract with the IRFU. This new deal, agreed prior to the Tour of New Zealand, allows us to plan beyond the 2023 Rugby World Cup with the certainty that one of the top coaching talents in the game is spearheading the national programme.”