Ireland's November 2013 Series

First topic message reminder :


Ireland v Samoa at Aviva Stadium
Saturday, November 9, kick-off 5.45pm

Ireland v Australia at Aviva Stadium
Saturday, November 16, kick-off 5.45pm

Ireland v New Zealand at Aviva Stadium
Sunday, November 24, kick-off 2pm

aucklandlaurie wrote: Question for you Irish guys:

Looking at the above November programme, I see all games are played at Aviva Stadium.
Does it not cause arguements on the Irish rugby union that the games arent spread a bit around the country? Would it not help promote rugby throuhout the Country if Internationals were played in different areas at some stage?

Footnote: Do not read this post as some sort of snide criticism of Aviva stadium, because it isnt, as in my opinion Lansdowne road is one of the best rugby grounds in the World.

The IRFUs business arrangements mean that full home tests can't be played anywhere but the Aviva, thats what the Fiji game in November didn't have caps awarded.

Would love at least a Wolfhounds game at Ravenhill when its redeveloped

marty2086 wrote: ...but what Ireland need is some real ball carrying back rows

Who would have thought we'd be saying this two years ago?

profitius wrote:Lets get one thing straight, Diack isn't in POMs class. I don't know where this myth about POM not being physical enough comes from.

You should watch 'em both and compare. O'Mahony is marginally the better player. Marginally. Certainly Diack was the closest player in Irish Rugby in terms of ability and style to O'Mahony I could think of.

Laurie,

There was an agreement when the stadium was built that all our internationals would be played there. That's why the game this season against (?)Fiji(?) was not a "capped" match as it was played at (?) Thomond (?)

Marty2086 & MrsP,

Thanks for that, I was never aware of the arangement and I can see the sense of it. As much as I would love to see the ABs play all their home tests at Eden Park, I would have to admit that it wouldnt be long before civil war broke out.

There's not a big enough stadium to hold the major tests elsewhere, so it hasn't been an issue. Dublin being the exclusive venue for our tests is a relatively new thing just having been brought in in the last sixty years. Before that games alternated between Belfast and Dublin.

I think they really screwed up when they said all tests would be played in Dublin because every now and again we play a minnow nation at home and tickets are never much in demand- we really should be looking to move these games around and bring the game to a wider audience.

The whole Aviva exclusivity shows that the IRFU are money first rugby second. It is frankly ridiculous that Sexton won his first cap against Fiji at the RDS whereas Jackson didn't win his at (the larger) Thomond against Fiji.

Aside from that risible anomaly it is also a slight on the Fiji Test team who deserve more respect.

The Great Aukster wrote:The whole Aviva exclusivity shows that the IRFU are money first rugby second. It is frankly ridiculous that Sexton won his first cap against Fiji at the RDS whereas Jackson didn't win his at (the larger) Thomond against Fiji.

Aside from that risible anomaly it is also a slight on the Fiji Test team who deserve more respect.

It's also banks and business talking though.

The Sponsor puts up the money for the naming rights and then says 'well, it's like if we're going to cough up the money, we want a little guarantee that the 'name' gets sufficient publicity.... all Internationals have to be held at Lansdowne so that the 'name' gets the publicity.'

Plus, IRFU had to pay back their share to banks and Lansdowne games gets them over the line quicker. So I don't think IRFU had a lot of leeway.

Better deal would have been to say no to sponsor and to hold onto Lansdowne Road name as I think the bigger investor in the project was the Irish goverment itself anyway...if anybody deserved naming rights it was them. The Dail?

SecretFly wrote:

The Great Aukster wrote:The whole Aviva exclusivity shows that the IRFU are money first rugby second. It is frankly ridiculous that Sexton won his first cap against Fiji at the RDS whereas Jackson didn't win his at (the larger) Thomond against Fiji.

Aside from that risible anomaly it is also a slight on the Fiji Test team who deserve more respect.

It's also banks and business talking though.

The Sponsor puts up the money for the naming rights and then says 'well, it's like if we're going to cough up the money, we want a little guarantee that the 'name' gets sufficient publicity.... all Internationals have to be held at Lansdowne so that the 'name' gets the publicity.'

Plus, IRFU had to pay back their share to banks and Lansdowne games gets them over the line quicker. So I don't think IRFU had a lot of leeway.

Better deal would have been to say no to sponsor and to hold onto Lansdowne Road name as I think the bigger investor in the project was the Irish goverment itself anyway...if anybody deserved naming rights it was them. The Dail?

Understand that SF, but how much foresight does it take to know that Ireland will have fixtures that won't fill the Aviva? They could easily have negotiated a few exclusions that wouldn't have affected the name exposure at all.

The Great Aukster wrote:The whole Aviva exclusivity shows that the IRFU are money first rugby second. It is frankly ridiculous that Sexton won his first cap against Fiji at the RDS whereas Jackson didn't win his at (the larger) Thomond against Fiji.

Aside from that risible anomaly it is also a slight on the Fiji Test team who deserve more respect.

Its just a lack of foresight is what it is. The IRFU consistently overstated demand in the run-up to the grand re-opening. The 100 euros fiasco and this exclusivity clause. Remember they thought they could fill the Aviva at those sky high prices initially and were humiliated when only about 30,000 fans turned up for the opener. "Why wouldn't people fill the stadium to see Canada or Fiji?" they must have thought.

Well, the first game against a smaller team was the second test at the stadium against Samoa and Samoa have a particularly good side now; certainly not a 'minnow' side on the pitch, a seriously good rugby team. Anyway, that didn't get 60% of the stadium full and the atmosphere was funereal. I think that was the point everyone in the IRFU probably realised this exclusivity clause was gonna be a real downer...

The ABs have recently been most complimentary about playing on the Lansdowne Road surface, In fact the only criticism I can recall is that when you are in mid field you cant put up a "bomb", because you cant judge where the goal line is, as the white metal goal posts get lost in the white metal structure in the background.

Notch wrote:

profitius wrote:Lets get one thing straight, Diack isn't in POMs class. I don't know where this myth about POM not being physical enough comes from.

You should watch 'em both and compare. O'Mahony is marginally the better player. Marginally. Certainly Diack was the closest player in Irish Rugby in terms of ability and style to O'Mahony I could think of.

Well if you think that fair enough. One of them is being talked about for the Lions the other isn't


POM is also one of Irelands main ball carriers so if you want to add Henderson for his ball carring ability then you might have to shuffle the backrow and lose out on another area or put him into second row but some people think thats a bad idea. I would prefer to see him in the second row myself. I'd say Schmidt won't be in any hurry to start him but might be targetting him to be a starter by the time the world cup comes around.

Btw, I don't see too many other teams full of ball carriers like some people are suggesting. Ireland are not lacking in that regard. The MAIN problem with Kidneys teams was bad attack coaching.

profitius wrote:Well if you think that fair enough. One of them is being talked about for the Lions the other isn't.

You can't be serious...

aucklandlaurie wrote: Question for you Irish guys:

Looking at the above November programme, I see all games are played at Aviva Stadium.
Does it not cause arguements on the Irish rugby union that the games arent spread a bit around the country? Would it not help promote rugby throuhout the Country if Internationals were played in different areas at some stage?

Footnote: Do not read this post as some sort of snide criticism of Aviva stadium, because it isnt, as in my opinion Lansdowne road is one of the best rugby grounds in the World.

I think the whole way that only games in Aviva Stadiums can be official tests is bloody ridiculous.

But realistically Ireland is very small. Driving Limerick (Munster), Galway (Connacht) or Belfast (Ulster) to Dublin is probably less than 2 hours nowadays. Places like Cork or Donegal might be a bit more but really its not like it really puts anyone out that much.

Its a very different situation to being in South Africa where Cape Town to Pretoria would take a 14 hour journey without any stops. Same goes for a country like Argentina. Or how in New Zealand where Auckland to Christchurch would take again at least 15 hours and are even on separate islands. In Italy the majority of the rugby fans live 4-5 hours from Rome (in Venice, Padua, Parma, Treviso, Rovigo etc) so it only makes sense to take it to where their market it.

The only real need there is for moving to another stadium is when we don't have demand to play at Aviva Stadium. So playing Samoa, Fiji, Canada, USA, Tonga etc will have a much better atmosphere in Ravenhill, Thomond and possibly even a revamped Musgrave Park or Sportsgrounds.

Notch wrote:

profitius wrote:Well if you think that fair enough. One of them is being talked about for the Lions the other isn't.

You can't be serious...

POM is in fact being talked about for a Lions spot. They were talking about it on sky sports by English commentators, on RTE, Guscot he was the most underrated player of the 6 nations, he has been Munsters best player in the HEC this season too.

So he's in with the other 30 or 40 players being talked up who won't go. I've seen people in the media put it to Iain Henderson and Andrew Trimble that they might be Lions (you know how it goes, leading questions about the tour etc.)

They won't go, and given they've done little to nothing of note in an Ireland jersey this year they don't really deserve to go. O'Mahony has a better shot than those two but he doesn't have much more of a claim. He's looked like good solid journeyman pro at test level. Let's not deride him for being a good rugby player, which he certainly is, but at the same time it's not unfair to point out he's not a top class player in the international bracket. We desperately miss Ferris and Leamy.

He has the ability to be a top international player. The nearest thing to it is the HEC and in his first 2 seasons with Munster he has been MOTM or near MOTM in every HEC game he has played! He played a different role under Kidney and got criticised for doing what he was told to do.

Last week POC got all the attention because of the impact he brings but POM also bring an impact that most non Munster fans don't see yet.

Julian Bonnaire would be a more accurate player to compare to POM and ironically they're on oppositie sides at the weekend.