The Titanic and my best wishes to Ulster.

The media have gone into overdrive on the tragedy a hundred years ago.

Much of this is mawkish and in the case of the Belfast Titanic Museum, cynical commercialism.

But at the root of it the Harland and Wolff was a deeply sectarian organisation which was in no way the last reason for the problems in northern Ireland in the 20th century.

That is why I want Ulster to do well. A side which spans the both the divide and the Irish nations to win the HEC in this centenary year would be welcome by pretty much every neutral (I hope).

Politics aside I am not sure I want the Sarries of the Rabo to win it...

thebluesmancometh wrote:Politics aside I am not sure I want the Sarries of the Rabo to win it...

Que? So are Munster the Maoris of the South and Connacht the Polynesians of the West?

thebluesmancometh wrote:Politics aside I am not sure I want the Sarries of the Rabo to win it...

Being "thebluesman" I assume you support the Blues? So I assume Tito, Rush, Blair, Filise, Molitika, Laulala, Paterson, Parks, Pretorius are all home grown welsh players?

Clermont for me sorry the Irish and there refs really do grate on me

vtg,

yeah and Owens is any better like !!!!!!!!

Rory

3 of those are Welsh qualified, and 6 are leaving for numerous reasons at seasons end!

Pot

Ye if you like!

21st

Owens is 3 steps up from Clancy! Mind you I'm 3 steps up from Clancy!

thebluesmancometh wrote:Rory

3 of those are Welsh qualified, and 6 are leaving for numerous reasons at seasons end!

Pot

Ye if you like!

21st

Owens is 3 steps up from Clancy! Mind you I'm 3 steps up from Clancy!

And we will have 2 south africans next season. We have 2 NZers as well. Maybe we should be the Maoris then

Ignore.

thebluesmancometh wrote:Rory

3 of those are Welsh qualified, and 6 are leaving for numerous reasons at seasons end!

Pot

Ye if you like!

21st

Owens is 3 steps up from Clancy! Mind you I'm 3 steps up from Clancy!

Wannenburg, Danielli, Terblanche are all leaving next year for Ulster. About 5 of those Blues guys are also from NZ, so that kind of makes your comment on Ulster being the Saracens of the Rabo (which I assume is due to our SA players) a bit ridiculous. You have a lot more foreign players than Ulster do, and more NZ players than we have south africans.

Not to mention the fact this is about this year's competition, so your 6 players leaving are still contracted for the Blues..

viewtothegym wrote:Clermont for me sorry the Irish and there refs really do grate on me

Ahhh. There Their They're. Poor boy.

Welsh people are grand. There are gobshytes everywhere though.

James Jones is a very nice man. But he makes Clancy look like.......a real pro like Alain Rolland.

thanks Portnoy!

roddersm wrote: thanks Portnoy!

No problem Rodders. I mean it as well.

And congratulations for being the first on-topic poster on this thread.

There's plenty of room on the Ulster bandwagon Portnoy!

Don't doubt your sincerity for a second sir! Much appreciated!

HQ is about mid-way between Belfast and Clermont-Ferrand so far as the airlines are concerned. G.L. (p.s. I wouldn't want Tigers back-to-back Heineys to become non-unique .

Roll on the bandwagon...

I thought you were going to say you hoped the unsinkable wasn't going to sink this time

On the subject of Saffers - don't know if you'd noticed but they are everywhere these last many years - teachers at my son's school, the local team I play in we have about 5, companies you go out to do business with, the bloke who comes to do your new bathroom, all over the place this side of the water

It's not that surprising to find a few of them playing rugby in Ulster.

Talking of the Titanic it is imperative to know that of all the travesty and lost lives so much good came from it. The basics of the Maratime Collision Regulations of which rule number 1 is that it is imperative that a call to rescue be answered beyond all other duties at sea, the understanding of the benefits of having permanent Radio operators monitoring radio channels for safety and accident, even the calls of MAYDAY, PAN PAN and Securite were devised as a result of the Titanic sinking.

The results of which have no doubt saved millions and millions of lives at sea since 1912.

Also talking of the Titanic, as we say here.

"It was grand when it left Belfast!"

Thanks for your support Portnoy. Much appreciated...Just for you!

Maesteg,

Like it says on the Golden Syrup tin, "out of strength comes forth sweetness".

You'd like to have Ulster united across the denominations than the appalling divides which characterised (as typified by Harland and Woolff) it in the 20th century.

I just hope that Irish rugby which never relented to partitional pressures, can once more do its bit to transcend the heinous prejudices of the past.

A few things.

One should never discuss politics with anyone from Northern Ireland. It's a good way to ruin a friendship.

Why is there such a focus on our SA players? My lovely Welsh girlfriend loves to remind me of the fact that we have 4 SA playing for us! At the start I put it down to her being an Ospreys fan but even our friends in the Southern Media like to focus on it?? We're allowed the exact same NIQ players. So why the focus on us?

Also it wasn't the Titanic that sunk. It was a her sister ship the Olympia that had its back broken so was switched with the purpose of sinking to allow for insurance fraud. Like we say, 'She was fine when she left here.... And she still was fine when the Olympia was decommissioned in 1935.'

The Olympic Jay?

My understanding is that at the Titanic launch missed the Olympic by about a foot.

I stand corrected. A quick Google solves everything. For anyone who doesn't know:-

The conspiracy goes that the Olympic was damaged in a crash with a Royal Navy vessel which resulted in the back of the ship being broke, making her non sea worthy. The insurance company ruled that in was the Olympic's fault and refused to pay out.
She was then sent to Belfast for repairs at the same time the Titanic was being built. Because H&W only had one dry dock the ships had to take turns getting fixed, though the Olympic was beyond repair. They reckon the switch happened during one of these swaps and no one was the wiser. I should mention that the ships were the same class so they had very few differences.
There is a whole pile of evidence that supports this theory and it makes for interesting reading. Like another ship that went across the Atlantic with no one accept blankets and rescue gear and then stopped close to where the Titanic went down. Where they expecting something???

Good stuff if your that way inclined.

Are you saying that somehow the men who worked on these vessels didn't notice that one 882 ft long ship was taken out of dry dock and then put back again.

That none of them noticed that the ships had been swapped?

These men placed the rivets in those ships individually. I suspect they would have noticed that swap in a split second. And that was even if they could have managed the actual swap without half of East Belfast noticing!

If the Olympic was beyond repair how did they get her to Mid Atlantic?

MrsP wrote:Are you saying that somehow the men who worked on these vessels didn't notice that one 882 ft long ship was taken out of dry dock and then put back again.

That none of them noticed that the ships had been swapped?

These men placed the rivets in those ships individually. I suspect they would have noticed that swap in a split second. And that was even if they could have managed the actual swap without half of East Belfast noticing!

If the Olympic was beyond repair how did they get her to Mid Atlantic?

It's not that I am saying it, rather the revisionist historians and certain Titanic enthusiasts who argue it- it's not my historical area and I have never done research on it so I don't really have an opinion on it- I'm just presenting the argument. It is a real theory. Published books and journals.

To answer your questions. Yes, that is exactly what thy are saying. You have to remember that H&W was a massive company with thousands upon thousands of people working on the ships. And changing ships from dry dock is not as simple as a 10 minute turn around, and of course they had to swap a few times. It would take the best part of a day, and of course with thousands of people running around working doing their individual jobs, such as riveter or welder say, a swap would be possible in the organised chaos.

A broken back does not mean a ship will sink. Just means she's not safe. You should read about it. Very interesting. Like I said it's outside my area, kind of, right time period wrong subject. But looking at history and all the amazing and awful things that has happened I wouldn't be surprised if this was true. For other interesting historical events look up the United Fruit Company and Guatemala, the assassination of Ngo Dinh Diem or the War of 1812, which was the British attempt to re-invade America, with a guest appearance from an Ulster man- he burned down the Whitehouse.

Just done a quick Google. Piles of stuff came up on google and youtube. Have a watch. I would say it would be very interesting watching.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=II-JVcaW0O0&feature=related

MrsP wrote:Are you saying that somehow the men who worked on these vessels didn't notice that one 882 ft long ship was taken out of dry dock and then put back again.

That none of them noticed that the ships had been swapped?

Mrs P, are you suggesting what I think you are?... That extra-terrestrial beings with advanced technologies and powers may have been somehow involved in this?

thebluesmancometh wrote:Rory

3 of those are Welsh qualified, and 6 are leaving for numerous reasons at seasons end!

Yeah, that is something to feel proud about.

thebluesmancometh wrote:Politics aside I am not sure I want the Sarries of the Rabo to win it...

Spoken by a supporter of a club with as many if not more foreigners in their team as Ulster.
We will take the field against Edinburgh with 11 Irishmen on the pitch and 8 on the bench - stands up against just about any other team (16 of the 23 will have been born in Ulster itself - who can match that !)

But hey who wants facts to get in the way

We will have 4 NIQ players for next year - how many NWQ at Cardiff next year. ?

Yes, the very best of luck to Ulster. I'm sure all 9 counties are delighted to have "Portnoy's" support.

Enjoy your semi final and pray ASM beat Leinster.

JayMaster3000 wrote:

MrsP wrote:Are you saying that somehow the men who worked on these vessels didn't notice that one 882 ft long ship was taken out of dry dock and then put back again.

That none of them noticed that the ships had been swapped?

These men placed the rivets in those ships individually. I suspect they would have noticed that swap in a split second. And that was even if they could have managed the actual swap without half of East Belfast noticing!

If the Olympic was beyond repair how did they get her to Mid Atlantic?

It's not that I am saying it, rather the revisionist historians and certain Titanic enthusiasts who argue it- it's not my historical area and I have never done research on it so I don't really have an opinion on it- I'm just presenting the argument. It is a real theory. Published books and journals.

To answer your questions. Yes, that is exactly what thy are saying. You have to remember that H&W was a massive company with thousands upon thousands of people working on the ships. And changing ships from dry dock is not as simple as a 10 minute turn around, and of course they had to swap a few times. It would take the best part of a day, and of course with thousands of people running around working doing their individual jobs, such as riveter or welder say, a swap would be possible in the organised chaos.

A broken back does not mean a ship will sink. Just means she's not safe. You should read about it. Very interesting. Like I said it's outside my area, kind of, right time period wrong subject. But looking at history and all the amazing and awful things that has happened I wouldn't be surprised if this was true. For other interesting historical events look up the United Fruit Company and Guatemala, the assassination of Ngo Dinh Diem or the War of 1812, which was the British attempt to re-invade America, with a guest appearance from an Ulster man- he burned down the Whitehouse.

I saw something about the switch, but it turns out the everything for the Olympic was marked with one number and the Titantic another, this included plates, chests of drawers etc everything, all the items recovered from Titantic match it's numbers. so unless they not only switched ships without anyone noticing but everything on them it remains a nice theory, there were very obvious differerences between the ships, including one haveing an enclosed promanade and the other open that would be noticeable to anybody.

What is intresting is there was a white star employee, on the Olympic, when it had its accident, survived the sinking of the Titantic, and the Britantic (third sistership) that sank after hitting a mine in WW1.

I kind of understand where the OP is coming from on this and can identify with much of his reasoning. However, the real pride I have always felt in our game is experienced every time an Ireland team takes to the field, a beacon of sanity and unity, ignoring the consequences of partition and generations of sectarianism to represent all of Ireland. The allowing of rugby internationals to be played at Croke Park was another unbelievable landmark which showed just how far we have come.

As for Ulster, I am right behind them. I have always had a leaning towards them partly for the OPs reasons but mainly because my English grammar school proudly sported the Red Hand of Ulster as part of our badge, the consequence of it's founder's source of wealth and influence in Ulster landholdings. During the troubles it was an uncomfortable link, which as a young man abhorring the misery and violence being experienced, I was not proud of. With the emergence of non sectarian Ulster as a rugby playing entity I could put those feelings aside and accept the historical ties in a different light.

Rugby in Ireland is and always will be close to my heart for all that it represents.

Rory_Gallagher wrote:

thebluesmancometh wrote:Politics aside I am not sure I want the Sarries of the Rabo to win it...

Being "thebluesman" I assume you support the Blues? So I assume Tito, Rush, Blair, Filise, Molitika, Laulala, Paterson, Parks, Pretorius are all home grown welsh players?

You can add Kyriacou to that list - someone in this thread needs to look up the word hypocrite.

Cardiff could possibly field 7 NWQ forwards next year.

thebluesmancometh wrote:Politics aside I am not sure I want the Sarries of the Rabo to win it...

Utterly cretinous comment.

Fair play to the OP for starters

As to the “Sarries of the Rabo” comment, well… I think people have issues with Ulster not because they have such a large foreign legion (because it’s the same size or smaller as most teams in Ireland or the UK) but because the foreign players that they have are so bloody good!

If your team was struggling to find a home grown TH prop that could play in the knockout stages of the HC wouldn’t you be doing feicin cartwheels if they managed to nab John Afoa? If your team was looking for a commanding scrum half who could take place kicks and dictate the pace of the game provide consistency while allowing your (trying to put this nicely) mercurial outhalf to have his good and bad days you’d be overjoyed at the signing of Pienaar! Another one that amazed me when he signed was Jared Payne, many people were putting him in their team of the S15 season last year, and they nabbed him AND got him in as a project player!

Ulster have done what most teams are striving to do, they’ve put together a squad with Irish players and truly world class imports. Fair play to them and f**k the begrudgers…

That’s without even mentioning Johan Muller and Pedrie Wannenburg…

Indeed Mick. It's good to see Cardiff are following our example by bringing in Andi Kyriacou (Ireland), Robin Copeland (Ireland) and Campese Ma'afu (Fiji) for next season.

Actually Copeland would have been a good signing for an Irish team. Irish qualified, young lock/backrow.

Mickado wrote:That’s without even mentioning Johan Muller and Pedrie Wannenburg…

Some might say that Brad Thorn, Doug Howlett, Rocky Elsom, Philipe Contepomi, BJ Botha,Christian Cullen, Jean De villiers, Paul Warick, Nathan Hines and Isa Nacewa are or were half decent players too .......

There’s a thread on Copeland on the Leinster site Notch, the consensus is that Tom (Tim?) Denton signed by us from Rotherham is of similar quality and is also IQ.

Yeah Rodders, they’re all class. But over the years we’ve had some terrible crap on our books, Clint Newland, Juan Gomez, Mariano Galarza, Harry Vermass (to name just a few). It’s one thing to have a couple of good imports and fill the rest of the spaces with mediocre journeymen, but Ulster are filling their entire allocation with good players. That’s really my point.

Leinster next year might well only have 2 foreign players on our books, VDM and Nacewa. That’s an even better position to be in, but until Ulster can do that, they’re going about their business the right way, IMO.

Ulster had some shocking NIQ players over the years too- it's funny, when we had the same number of NIQ players as we do now but most of them were terrible... no-one raised a peep. Isn't that weird?

Zactly, you can have foreign players so long as their dire. That seems to be the message.

Mickado wrote:
Yeah Rodders, they’re all class. But over the years we’ve had some terrible crap on our books, Clint Newland, Juan Gomez, Mariano Galarza, Harry Vermass (to name just a few). It’s one thing to have a couple of good imports and fill the rest of the spaces with mediocre journeymen, but Ulster are filling their entire allocation with good players. That’s really my point.

Yeah I'm just messing Mick . I suppose my point is that there's been quite a few high profile and very influential NIQ signings over the years, many of them by Leinster and Munster and none have been met with the media criticism and negative spin that Ulster have recieved.

I've seen Elsom, Nacewa and Contepomi for example win as many games for Leinster as Pienaar has for us, more maybe. Thats not a criticism, thats why we sign these guys!

It's great that Leinster are reaching a point that they need very few NIQ's and Munster just a few in certain key positions but it seems some people want to begrudge Ulster from signing the kind of high profile players that the other provinces have had for years.

Apart from Justin Harrison I can't think of many top international signings we've had in recent times.

I give you an Ulster backrow of Feather, Webb, Pfister - all NIQ and all crap

Yeah, bad times. When we had those lads I remember the constant stream of newspaper articles about how many foreign imports we... oh, I don't actually! I don't remember anyone saying anything!

Ulster fans,

I agree with you entirely.

However it is the amount of top players signed in such a short space of time that gets people saying the foreign legion thing. 24 months ago Ulster didn't have Pienaar, Muller, Terblanche, Payne, Wannenburg, Afoa etc. Its been such a short period of time. Elsom, Contepomi and Nacewa have been spread over almost a decade.

It just looks to people that Ulster got a bit of cash and bought success in a short period of time.

Please note I'm not criticising Ulster I have zero problem and I do NOT agree with it but thats how some people get feel about them.

Rob Dewey was a cracker too....

To be honest Stag, I feel it's the reporting in the media that shapes how people feel about us more than anything else. That and the high profile of these players. You'd hardly notice some of our bad NIQ signings were on the pitch they were so average. They flew underneath the radar. Now we've lads like Pienaar winning us games- genuinely top class players. You're going to remember the guy who kicked the winning penalty in the last minute a lot more than the journeyman who had no impact on the game.

I know which is better for Ulster and Ireland anyway!

Notch, I think its a chicken and egg situation.

Do the media play to the crowd and portray you in a certain light?

or

Do the crowds get feel that way because of how the media portray you?

Teams get reputations for silly things. I don't think Munster and Leinster will ever lose their tags of "10 man rugby" and "7s style Ladyboys" no matter how they play for example.

red_stag wrote: Elsom, Contepomi and Nacewa have been spread over almost a decade.

Jeebus that decade went in quick, I can remember Elsom rampaging about and Contepomi pulling of those magic tricks like it was.... 3 years ago.....

I also remember Munster fielding a backline containing Mafi, Tipoki (or de villiers), Howlett and Warwick at the same time.

Rodders, yes but Dr Phil joined Leinster in 2002-2003. Then the others arrived in later and they rarely if ever had a core group of incredible foreign talent together at one time much like Ulster do.

Leinster and Munster should be signing a higher class of foreigner.

Why not:

Healy, Strauss, Ross
Thorn, Cullen
O'Brien, Heaslip, McCaw
Genia, Sexton
Sonny Bill Williams, O'Driscoll
Fitzgerald, Nacewa, Kearney

Thats still just 5 NIQ and 1 Project Player.

If your gonna buy foreign buy a good bloody player.

red_stag wrote:Rodders, yes but Dr Phil joined Leinster in 2002-2003. Then the others arrived in later and they rarely if ever had a core group of incredible foreign talent together at one time much like Ulster do.

Leinster and Munster should be signing a higher class of foreigner.

Hmm I don't know stag. Yes we have 4 or 5 top NIQ's now but we got lucky with Pedre and Terblanche is 38.

Leinster had Thorn and and Nacewa on the pitch last weekend. I'm not sure if you can get a higher calibre of player than that! Strauss in their project, the same as Payne.

Dougie Howlett was on fire until he got injured, Mafi has been ever present and Botha has been vital to Munster.

I really don't think there is much in it and too much is made of Ulsters imports vs the other Irish teams.