Stephen Ferris Player Of The World Cup!!!!

Title says it all although O'Brien has been amazing and deserves the pundits creaming over him as they are doing Ferris has defo been better. Many seem to have forgotten that Ferris missed the majority of the season with a rugby finishing injury and that he played in hardly any time in the warm up game4s coming into the world cup which makes his performances even more amazing. Hopefully we get to see him DESTROY Kaino in the final

As for the game on Saturday i am not at all worried i fully expect us to beat Wales who for some reason have got a lot of hype around them when they couldnt beat a South Africa team who played as badly as they could and struggled to beat Samoa.

As for George North i look forward to him recieving the Castro Treatment from Stepho

I take it you haven't been watching Kaino play this year.

Ferris has been outstanding but in New Zealand they have been slobbering over SOB and reckon he is on for player of the tournament.

Disney Ferris is better than Kaino and he will prove this if we play NZ

DOD i agree SOB will defo get player of the tourney and good on him

To be fair Ferris struggled against Kaino and Reid when we played the AB's in the Autumn and Kaino is in serious form as well.

Ferris seems to be even better now though that he's on one leg and can't train during the week .

O'Brien has been sensational and deserves all the plaudits he's getting as does Ferris.

Ferris was my MOM against Italy. He was immense whether smashing in Castrogiavani or ball carrying he was simply everywhere.

SOB was a very close second.

Loved George Hooks comment about Ferris being injured "He is the best thing on one leg since long John Sivler"

Give it a break , loads of players could be going for that title its only been the group stages!!!

Fair enough Bullsbok, but as an Irish man watching this tournament it just feels.... special, I suppose is the word. We have managed to get our best players fit and firing all at the same time. If you took anyone of Ferris, Healy, Ross, SOB, POC, BOD or Bowe out of our team it would be a massive loss. Losing Best could just tip the balance for us as Cronin just won't be on a par with the rest of the pack and his darts and scrummaging are way of Bests standard anyway.

It will still take a massive effort for Wales to beat us and hats off to them if they do. Whatever happens from here this Irish team have done us proud and Stephen Ferris for many of us is the player of the tournament thus far.

Heres hoping we can keep everyone fit. Barring injuries there is no reason we can't go all the way. It feels like I'm 6 years old and Saturday is Christmas morning. (I was always up at 6.00 am on Christmas morning too.)

Bullsbok wrote:Give it a break , loads of players could be going for that title its only been the group stages!!!

Oh cmon Bullsbok... tis only a bit of fun. Not a letter-writing campaign to the IRFU!

I'm with the original poster... I would say Ferris has been Ireland's player of the tournament due to his all round game. And that's coming from a man who's family home is in Tullow!! So there you go!

Next up I'd say Healy... just based on upping his game and all-round performance. Then I'd have SOB... who has been immense... but who so far has just done what we all know he can do. I'm expecting SOB to have an even better 2nd half of the tournament. Starting with wales... so watch out the rest of ye!

Ferris+O'Brien+Heaslip wrote:Title says it all although O'Brien has been amazing and deserves the pundits creaming over him as they are doing Ferris has defo been better. Many seem to have forgotten that Ferris missed the majority of the season with a rugby finishing injury and that he played in hardly any time in the warm up game4s coming into the world cup which makes his performances even more amazing. Hopefully we get to see him DESTROY Kaino in the final

As for the game on Saturday i am not at all worried i fully expect us to beat Wales who for some reason have got a lot of hype around them when they couldnt beat a South Africa team who played as badly as they could and struggled to beat Samoa.

As for George North i look forward to him recieving the Castro Treatment from Stepho

And you lot say it is us Welsh who over hype our team and players.

Seriously, if you think that Ireland will smash Wales then carry on, you lot keep underestimating us and we will carry on as normal. Just think, not so long ago we were tipped to not get out of our group, and now here we are playing you in the quarter finals, so anything could happen.

Kaino ate Ferris in November. I like Ferris but he's not there yet. Would rate Juan Smith and Burger above him too. Italy have a tough front five and Parisse is class but I'd say the NZ tight five can hold their own giving the best loose trio in the world the platform to gain ascendancy. Yup, the Irish loosies are playing fantastically well, but weather and dumb Australian play meant that the game lacked the width that usually helps the Wallabies. NZ aren't that dumb and for all O'Brien's gifts (he is truly world-class), he is not a fetcher. It will be really interesting if the game is played expansively on the weekend as Warburton is playing awesome. To be honest the pressure is on the other two Welsh blokes to get there second.

Disney,we'll have none of your impartial, logical analysis here thank you. Green tinted monacles only.

Pocock was a late withdrawal for Australia. So I'm sure Ireland had long been formulating a plan to counter him. They didn't need to in the end. But hopefully they'll put the practice they'd been doing to good use against Warburton. He's a great player and crucial to Welsh hopes in this match.

No, as we still have the QF SF & Final, and don't forget the 3rd/4th place game

Submachine wrote:Disney,we'll have none of your impartial, logical analysis here thank you. Green tinted monacles only.

Ha the irony of you saying that to someone living and working in Dublin right now

Feckless Rogue wrote:Pocock was a late withdrawal for Australia. So I'm sure Ireland had long been formulating a plan to counter him. They didn't need to in the end. But hopefully they'll put the practice they'd been doing to good use against Warburton. He's a great player and crucial to Welsh hopes in this match.

Good point FR... the talk of the whole WC for Ireland up to that point was how we were going to deal with Pocock... I'm presuming the main answer they've focussed on is an upping of the entire team's physical intensity and speed to the breakdown .... but obviously esp from the 2nd and back rows. Which can thereby neutralise alot of the fetcher's role in the game.

Nos na Gaoithe wrote:

Feckless Rogue wrote:Pocock was a late withdrawal for Australia. So I'm sure Ireland had long been formulating a plan to counter him. They didn't need to in the end. But hopefully they'll put the practice they'd been doing to good use against Warburton. He's a great player and crucial to Welsh hopes in this match.

Good point FR... the talk of the whole WC for Ireland up to that point was how we were going to deal with Pocock... I'm presuming the main answer they've focussed on is an upping of the entire team's physical intensity and speed to the breakdown .... but obviously esp from the 2nd and back rows. Which can thereby neutralise alot of the fetcher's role in the game.

The game Ireland played V Australia employing the "choke" tackle to such effect is exactly what would have negated Pocock and hopefully will negate Warburton

Submachine wrote:

Nos na Gaoithe wrote:

Feckless Rogue wrote:Pocock was a late withdrawal for Australia. So I'm sure Ireland had long been formulating a plan to counter him. They didn't need to in the end. But hopefully they'll put the practice they'd been doing to good use against Warburton. He's a great player and crucial to Welsh hopes in this match.

Good point FR... the talk of the whole WC for Ireland up to that point was how we were going to deal with Pocock... I'm presuming the main answer they've focussed on is an upping of the entire team's physical intensity and speed to the breakdown .... but obviously esp from the 2nd and back rows. Which can thereby neutralise alot of the fetcher's role in the game.

The game Ireland played V Australia employing the "choke" tackle to such effect is exactly what would have negated Pocock and hopefully will negate Warburton

I do love seeing this tactic employed... it really gets your heart pumping when they do it. But I have to say I'm still a little dubious as to how effective it can be against a team that has prepared for it. Remember, when it goes wrong it can lead to a serious loss of yardage. And the Italians seemed to overcome it quite easily the once or twice that we tried to emply it agains them. ...But that may have been because it wasn't a serious part of our gameplan agains them.

Got to agree with Disney, as much as the Irish backrow has been amazing, Kaino has been a one man wrecking crew. His defence has been massive and his determination with ball in hand sees him regularly go through 3-4 tackles whilst racking up the yards.

The thing about the choke tackle is that it results in a scrum. So when you dominate the scrum like we did against England in the 6 Nations and Australia in the World Cup then it's an absolutely brilliant tactic. But the loss of Rory Best will effect our scrum and it's an area the Welsh are very good anyway.

I reckon the Irish were gonna physically beat the cr@p out of Pocock. It's a long standing tactic of Leinster and Munster to target the oppositions main man in the pack. Put him on his arse the first time he touches the ball. And then continually hit him with hard tackles. Warburton is a courageous young lad though. He'll be up for it.

The conditions played a big part. With a sea of green and crap weather no wonder Drico said it felt like Lansdowne. If it's dry teams will use the width more and be less direct into the tackle which will diminish the opportunities for the choke tackle.

Dead right about keeping the ball off the ground though. It negates the fetchers and due to the tighter nature of play that night Ireland were able to do this. I mentioned this in an earlier post on another thread.

It only works if you have a superior scrum though, which won't be the case against Wales so I don't think we will use that tactic very much.

roddersm wrote:It only works if you have a superior scrum though, which won't be the case against Wales so I don't think we will use that tactic very much.

The alternative though is a traditional tackle/ruck situation which offers very quick ball with Warburton on the scene. Would far prefer put in to our own scrum where we should at least be competitive.

Ireland haven't played with a traditional openside since Jonny O'Connor in 2005. Winning the ball on the deck is a job that is distributed thoughout the side so I wouldn't be losing any sleep over it or about how we dealwith Warburton. Heaslip seemed to be performing that role a lot against Italy and O'Connell, D'arcy, Healy and BOD are all excellent at the breakdown and O'Brien is much better than people realise.

Rory Best is one of our best players on the deck and is a big loss though.

Getting back on track, Isreal Dagg is the player of the group stages.....he looks like scoring everytime the ball comes within 10 yards of him.

Ferris has been quality, Wharburton equally good for a joint second, George North for third - makes yards everytime he carrys the ball.

Nah sorry don't agree about Dagg. He's been awesome but so have most of the ABS's side.

O'Brien, Nonu and Warburton have been the standout players for me, closely followed by Kaino, Ferris and SBW.

This is a bit of a windup. ferris has been Ireland's best player,no point naming player of the tournament yet. We won't smash Wales,will be close.

SBW has done nothing special. Nonu has been ABs´best back and Kaino the best forward.

Knockout rugby will see the player of the tournament. Things are starting.

Kaino for me has been the outstanding backrow forward of the group stages. He has been an absolute monster in every game. Always makes yards and is a beast in the tackle, he is a very complete player!

Man, there is a lot of man love on this thread

If Ian "Glass Knees" Ferris makes it through to the final, Ireland win and he's not injured then yes he has a shout.