606v2 picks the Irish RWC 22: STARTING OUTHALF

First of all wanted to say thanks to everyone who has contributed over the past few days the debates have been pretty good for the most part. We have had nearly 1000 votes and nearly 600 comments and a lot of people have contributed to what has been a really good couple of days debating. It's been great to hear so many opinions (even ones I have disagreed with) and to get a feel for what everyone thinks of certain players. There were a number of very tight calls between Hayes and Buckley, O'Leary and Murray and McFadden and Fitzgerald so it's been interesting to see people's opinions being tested against those of others.

In this series gets the same great reaction and that we hear some more great debates that were started or were not touched on in the previous series. Calls like; should Jennings be on the bench, the backrow selections, the fullback selection, should Stringer be selected on the bench are all going to be very interesting and am looking forward to hearing everyones opinions.


The idea of this series is to establish the first choice front row, second row, backrow, halfbacks, centres, back3, forwards subs and backs subs. These debates I may leave a little longer than the previous series as more can be said about them. The idea is to chose the best 22 that we have be it on form, experience, partnerships, balance, fitness whatever.

Perhaps think of this as the team you want to line out against Australia

IN THE SERIES PLEASE LOOK AT THE PLAYERS WHO HAVE BEEN/YOU THINK WILL BE PICKED LATER IN THE SERIES, AS TO CREATE BALANCE IN THE TEAM
eg: Playing Flannery would mean needing a work horse somewhere else in the pack as Best does a lot of the donkey work.

IF A PLAYER IS IN OUR SQUAD PLEASE TAKE FOR GRANTED THAT THEY CAME THROUGH THE WARM UPS AND THUS HAVE SOME FORM (IF NOT A LOT) AND ARE SOMEWHAT FIT. THIS IS OBVIOUSLY A HYPOTHETICAL SITUATION.

We are going to use the squad that we (the 606v2 community) have chosen.

Healy, Ross, Buckley, Court
Best, Cronin, Flannery
O'Connell, O'Callaghan, Cullen, Ryan
Ferris, O'Brien, Wallace, Jennings, Heaslip
Reddan, Stringer, O'Leary*
Sexton, O'Gara
O'Driscoll, Darcy, Wallace
Bowe, Earls, Trimble, Kearney, Jones, McFadden

*O'Leary just beat Murray yesterday evening in the poll by one vote.

So far the team is

Healy-Best-Ross
O'Connell-O'Callaghan
Ferris-Heaslip-Wallace
Reddan-

Enjoy

SEXTON: Has had a fairly good year and is growing more and more as the months pass. Good defender at 10 and phyiscal enough to take the ball to the line. Good range of passing and varies the game well. By bringing it to the line he doesn't allow defenders to clog the midfield too much. Good range of kicking and good accuracy too from hand and floor although not O'Gara-esque (yet!). Links well with Darcy/BOD and also the Irish backrow.
O'GARA: Great tactician and reader of the game. Has one of the best ranges of kicks in the world be it tactical kicks for touch or cross field kicks. Good infront of the posts also. Quite a poor defender and requires his 12 and/or 7 to not be too far away from him. Fantastic passer of the ball but too often he stays deep and doesn't threaten the line leaving the defence free to target runners in the midfield and close down space.
WALLACE: Definitely more a 12 than a 10 but has good distribution skills and vision. His defence is much improved as is his ability to make half breaks with his step and fend and he looks for offloads. Kicking from hand is good for a 12 but probably not good enough for a 10 and lacks game management skills too. Has had 0 time at 10 with Reddan at 9 and is not a world class goal kicker.


Remember...

a) think of balance of the whole team
b) assume if they are in the squad they have some form and some fitness (not necessarily full fitness or good form)
c) play nice and no provincial stuff, attack the arguement not the person making it
d) to place your votes
e) back up your points with examples, clips etc if possible

Cheers
Pete

I went Sexton.

I think against Australia it is vital we keep the ball and to keep the ball we need to keep moving forward even if it's just a little at a time. I think sexton's ability to attack the gain line and draw in defenders will be critical here.

Also his defence will be heavily relied upon. The thought of our 12 and/or 7 having one eye on ROG's channel is unacceptable against Australia due to how dangerous they are. If our 12/7 are thinking about ROG then they aren't thinking about their own defensive duties 100%

Kiwi-
If we could get this up on the main page even for half a day that would be great.

Sexton for me. Like you say we need to keep the ball in hand so Sexton is the man for the job.

O'Gara has had a very good season, he's mixing his game up well and had some standout performances including the Magners final, against Scotland in the 6N and in his cameos against SA and England. On the negative side he has struggled to get the Munster backline moving at times and had a terrible game against Wales. I can see him perhaps starting against Italy though.

Sexton had some mediocre performances too, most notably against SA, France and Italy however he has been colossul at times particularly in the HEC final and against England. In my opinion Sexton is Irelands most important player and how he performs will determine how far we go in the WC. At his best he can tear the best defences apart but he can have off days day.

Wallace will be emergency cover only and hopefully we won't see him with the 10 shirt on his back.

I think his bad days against Italy and France were down to the 9 playing that day but I won't get into that.

I agree he has become more dependable than lets say a year ago but he can still have off days too and we are beyond blessed to have ROG who can come on.

I've gone for Sexton. He's obviously the best 10 we have to start a game with. Power, pace, goal kicking ability, and familiarity with the 8, 9 and 12 around him.

The reason I have "start" in bold there is because the best player we have to finish a game is O'Gara. I'd actually stick my neck out and say that he's probably the best in the world in that position at coming off the bench when his team are either just ahead or just behind on the scoreboard (gonna get some stick for this one). Hear me out though...

I watched the Ireland v England 6 Nations game from earlier this year again the other night. Sexton was excellent in that game. His kicking, both from hand and from the kicking tee were excellent. His linking with the backline was excellent. And the quick tap penalty for Bowe's try was both daring and extremely well executed. His defence was also very solid and the big English centres could make very little headway through our midfield. So this is why I believe he should start (let's face it, it's obvious).

O'Gara came on with 12 minutes to go. Now granted the result was never in doubt with the score at 24-8 but how many times have we seen teams with nothing left to lose getting a late try or even two to put a gloss on the scoreboard. What O'Gara does better than most is read a game from the bench. He requires no time at all to slot in seamlessly and impose himself on the game. Against England in that game there was no way England could possibly get near our tryline because O'Gara kept pinning them back with perfect kick after perfect kick. This was all despite the fact that England were starting to really put pressure on the out-of-position Court in the scrum.

As for games where we're slightly behind, I don't think anyone can possibly argue with me when I say that if there's one man you'd want on the pitch when you're looking for a drop goal it's O'Gara. He's saved our bacon time and again with a late drop goal.

So what's my point I hear you ask. My point is that even though I've gone for Sexton it's not as clear cut as others may think. I believe that O'Gara's role as "super-sub" will be a massive weapon in Ireland's arsenal. I genuinely believe that we have one of the best combos out of any team in the world with those two. Both are vital to a successful Irish world cup campaign.

pete (buachaill on eirne) wrote:I think his bad days against Italy and France were down to the 9 playing that day but I won't get into that.

I think that was a big factor yes as was the packs performance against SA but I don't want to get it to that again.

@

Any chance of getting this on the main board for the day?

Yeah I agree with you MMC. We are truely blessed, you could say it's his style or the fact he is fresh or that he is jsut a good player but an example of this not being the case would be England.

If Flood comes off after 60/70 Wilkinson does not make anywhere near the same impact.

The only thing I would say about ROG on the bench in a negative light is that it would be nice if he was versatile. It was badly exposed in the 2nd Lions test that certain eventualities weren't covered by the bench.

Wallace can play at 12 it would be nice to have ROG be able to play another position too even to a very small degree but I guess no one is perfect. Possibly even at 9?

This is all obviously if there is a mini injury crisis in the middle of a game

pete (buachaill on eirne) wrote:The only thing I would say about ROG on the bench in a negative light is that it would be nice if he was versatile. It was badly exposed in the 2nd Lions test that certain eventualities weren't covered by the bench.

......

This is all obviously if there is a mini injury crisis in the middle of a game

I can't really agree with that pete. I accept what you're saying. When you think of the composition of your standard bench though it's full of specialists. Hookers that can only play hooker, scrumhalfs for scrumhalf, and an outhalf for outhalf.

The bench positions with any sort of versatility are prop for both sides, a lock who can play backrow, a backrow sub who can play more than one backrow position and finally the final outside back who wears 22 (or 23 depending).

That final bench spot is vital to get right. That way, barring a crisis to the scale of what you're referring to, between versatile guys like Bowe and Earls, and the player wearing 22 we should be able to cover for all eventualities.

That is what I am saying though I mean it as in a mini injury crisis.

One of the things the French are quite good at is they split their bench 5-2 and put an entire front row in the forwards and then for the 2 back spots, they have 1 outside back and 1 player who can play 9 and 10 (Michalak, Ellisalde, etc)

just would be nice to have that option as such, I don't loose sleep over it though

Unfortunately there's only one player I can think of (off the top) of my head that isn't French who can play 9 and 10 effectively and that's Pienaar. They're a rare breed mo chara. I agree though, it would be a nice option to have for sure.

Once again I must congratulate you on these articles. It's too bad about what befell the scrumhalf and backrow articles with the provincial bull manure, which is why I didn't participate in the "debate", but there's little you can do about that.

I'm surprised that no one within Irish rugby has ever suggested the possibility of O'Gara at 10 and Sexton at 12? Sexton has the size and skills to play 2nd 5/8 for sure and NZ, Australia and England have had pretty good success with playing two fly halves together. Wales also have used Jones and Hook.

I'm not suggesting we do this but I do think it's an option and one I'm surprised we have never explored.

On a related note, I feel strongly that if ROG is on the bench, Wallace shouldn't be and the final bench spot should go to an outside back. If we go with Wallace then ROG should be left out as like Pete says he only covers fly half.

If push comes to shove pete, rog can go outhalve and sexton could cover 12/15 pretty well i'd say, in a jam like so don't worry too much

Yeah true, from a personal point of view I really have to stop getting sucked into it, certain things jsut end up boiling by blood a bit. They were always going to be heated those articles, I expect the back3 article to be the same after a certain amount of reasonable and well thought out debate

tbh the guy (if on form) who is the perfect sub like that is Giteau he plays 9-10-12-13.

I hate to say it but for us we have TOL who can take a stab in the dark at 10 and centre but probably do quite an accomplished job on the wing

i agree with your second point rodders 100%. Let an outside back take the 22 shirt. Sexton has played 12 before for Leinster I think when Madigan came on at one point for BOD. I think. I think.

Obviously voted for Sexton.

I've never really understood why in the past we've had Wallace and Trimble not in the starting XV and Wallace gets the 22 shirt ahead of Trimble... or whoever. I think they view Wallace as someone who can play fullback. Which is very risky imo.

I think they'll pick the bench with reference to a 10 and a 15 in the outside backs.

Notch wrote:Obviously voted for Sexton.

I've never really understood why in the past we've had Wallace and Trimble not in the starting XV and Wallace gets the 22 shirt ahead of Trimble... or whoever. I think they view Wallace as someone who can play fullback. Which is very risky imo.

I think they'll pick the bench with reference to a 10 and a 15 in the outside backs.

Agreed.
I wouldn't be surprised with a line up of Trimble, Earls, Bowe with Kearney on the bench against Australia (DK may swap Earls and Kearney).

MMC wrote:

Notch wrote:Obviously voted for Sexton.

I've never really understood why in the past we've had Wallace and Trimble not in the starting XV and Wallace gets the 22 shirt ahead of Trimble... or whoever. I think they view Wallace as someone who can play fullback. Which is very risky imo.

I think they'll pick the bench with reference to a 10 and a 15 in the outside backs.

Agreed.
I wouldn't be surprised with a line up of Trimble, Earls, Bowe with Kearney on the bench against Australia (DK may swap Earls and Kearney).

Yeah that's what I was thinking he would do too.

If we lost against Australia and ended up in a 1/4 final against SA do you think DK would possibly go with ROG for his game management skills (fight fire with fire) or go with Sexton to up the tempo and get the Boks into a loose game (fight fire with water)???

Notch wrote:
I've never really understood why in the past we've had Wallace and Trimble not in the starting XV and Wallace gets the 22 shirt ahead of Trimble... or whoever.

I have a theory...it's because Irish coaches don't have a clue how to select and utilise the bench. EOS didn't and neither does Kidney. We are obsessed with the outdated view that rugby is a XV man game whereas other sides realise the importance of the bench in terms of adjusting the game plan and providing impact.

In my view this is what seperates us from being a good side and a top one. We have the depth across most positions we just have not idea how to use it. All the top sides utilise a 22 players and we try and compete with 16.

A good coach/ manager should be able to read the way a game is going and make substitutions, no matter how early. The phrase "fiddling while rome burns" comes to mind at times.

No matter what is happening on the pitch Kidney will do his 64 minute fly half, 68 minute Scrum half, 72 minute hooker and 76 minute prop rotations. Sometimes he gets a bit adventurous though and thows Cullen and Wallace on for a minute and a half.

Rodders, I'd nearly suggest that the players don't appreciate how to be a bench player. Les Kiss spoke at great lenght about how mature ROG is about being on the bench, assessing the game continiously and establishing his job when/if he comes on.

I agree the Irish coaching team haven't used their bench well but maybe there's a reason.

I can remember that Kiss came to my brothers school after the Grand Slam and when asked how it was we won one of his main points was the use of scrumhalves off the bench. He was very admant that starting O'Leary to keep it steady and then bringing on Stringer to open the game up was a huge factor in winning in 09.

PS: I do agree with you rodders just wanted to point that out. Think our backrow sub will have to be used much earlier now due to just the amount of impact he will have. Will give us an early 2nd half boost and means that our backrow can go flat out 100% when they are on

Notch wrote:Obviously voted for Sexton.

I've never really understood why in the past we've had Wallace and Trimble not in the starting XV and Wallace gets the 22 shirt ahead of Trimble... or whoever. I think they view Wallace as someone who can play fullback. Which is very risky imo.

I think they'll pick the bench with reference to a 10 and a 15 in the outside backs.

It has to be rog and an outside back on the bench. Wallace starts or misses out on the 22.
I picked sexton and he has to start because at this stage he is a much better option than
rog at this stage. Also it means wallace can concentrate soley on being a backrow.

Stag that wasn't always the case with ROG though. There were rumours after the 2003 WC that he threatened to stop playing for Ireland if EOS kept subbing him for Humphreys. Clearly he's matured a bit but there is something very predetermined about the rotation between him and Sexton which is very poor coaching in my opinion. The coaches should be making the substitutions based on what is happening on the pitch and not based on a prearranged agreement to keep one or two high profile bench players happy.

I think we're far too concerned with keeping certain individual players happy instead of focusing on what is best for the team.

pete (buachaill on eirne) wrote:

MMC wrote:

Notch wrote:Obviously voted for Sexton.

I've never really understood why in the past we've had Wallace and Trimble not in the starting XV and Wallace gets the 22 shirt ahead of Trimble... or whoever. I think they view Wallace as someone who can play fullback. Which is very risky imo.

I think they'll pick the bench with reference to a 10 and a 15 in the outside backs.

Agreed.
I wouldn't be surprised with a line up of Trimble, Earls, Bowe with Kearney on the bench against Australia (DK may swap Earls and Kearney).

Yeah that's what I was thinking he would do too.

If we lost against Australia and ended up in a 1/4 final against SA do you think DK would possibly go with ROG for his game management skills (fight fire with fire) or go with Sexton to up the tempo and get the Boks into a loose game (fight fire with water)???

It's hard to know, but I think he'd probably make that call on form shown in the tournament up until then. I'm sure they'll both see gametime.

I wouldn't have thought so really Rodders. I mean the management of Sexton and O'Gara has been excellent in my opinion.

Sexton as the starting outhalf,no doubt about it. He offers a running threat,can get our backline moving,he is a decent tackler and can kick for territory aswell. ROG is probably the man to close out a game as he has done it time and time again. In the clutch,he would be the man to nail that drop goal or penalty.

pete (buachaill on eirne) wrote:
If we lost against Australia and ended up in a 1/4 final against SA do you think DK would possibly go with ROG for his game management skills (fight fire with fire) or go with Sexton to up the tempo and get the Boks into a loose game (fight fire with water)???

Thats an interesting one. I think ROG should have came on earlier in the last meeting as we tried to play too expansively in wet conditions and our set piece was a shambles.

This time though we should go with Sexton and try and keep the ball in hand, although we must establish a forward platform first.

ROG is totally wrong I think for two reasons. We won't win a kicking dual against SA and their line out is far superior to ours. I think starting with ROG would play directly into their hands.

I think that in those horrific wet contidtions (I am not talking about rain, I am talking about a storm basically) th likes of ROG, TOL and Kearney have a lot of merit due to their "steadiness" as such. They would mean we'd be able to play a more forward orientated game and be good in defensive duties (ROG aside)

If we play SA I'd defintely have Kearney starting.

I think most of us would, whether we like him or not, he would seem like the right man for the job.

Only 8 votes so far. This is really being lost in the subsections. I can appreciate what the mods are trying to do in an effort to clear up the board but we voted to get rid of subsections for this exact reason. People aren't seeing these articles. What a shame...

pete (buachaill on eirne) wrote:I think that in those horrific wet contidtions (I am not talking about rain, I am talking about a storm basically) th likes of ROG, TOL and Kearney have a lot of merit due to their "steadiness" as such. They would mean we'd be able to play a more forward orientated game and be good in defensive duties (ROG aside)

I agree but I would still start with Sexton and Reddan in all the big games.

I'd have Felix Jones at the back instead of Kearney.

Yeah sucks, really does and they were getting hundreds (literally) of votes and comments a week and a bit ago.

i can understand their reasoning in the cluttering of the boards but this is the polar opposite and is becoming boring really if we don't have more people (and therefore more opinions to consider)

I agree with the sub sections though. Its not hard to click on them if you want to see it. And we can't have one rule for some.

pete (buachaill on eirne) wrote:Yeah sucks, really does and they were getting hundreds (literally) of votes and comments a week and a bit ago.

i can understand their reasoning in the cluttering of the boards but this is the polar opposite and is becoming boring really if we don't have more people (and therefore more opinions to consider)

+1

I have to say, I (as I'm sure are many others) am not visiting these boards as much due to the vastly reduced amount of banter and debate since the subsections were reintroduced. Can we please have it back the way it was before? The way we voted for it to be?

Anyway, due to the most recently posted in articles always appearing at the top of the page the most popular articles will always appear at the top. Which is how it should be. Maybe we could have another poll just to see how others feel about this?

red_stag wrote:I agree with the sub sections though. Its not hard to click on them if you want to see it. And we can't have one rule for some.

It's not that at all Stag. It's the fact that people don't seem to know about it. Or just forget. It's an unfortunate thing about the internet - "If I can't find it, it doesn't exist."

It's true Stag I didn't realise that these were here for quite a while. It's not that obvious and it's easy to miss because these aren't on the main board.

If the main board was categorised too then perhaps more people would find these subsections?

https://www.606v2.com/t6268-rugby-section-redesign

But it's like- right there. At the top.

How come people can't see it?

pete (buachaill on eirne) wrote:I think that in those horrific wet contidtions (I am not talking about rain, I am talking about a storm basically) th likes of ROG, TOL and Kearney have a lot of merit due to their "steadiness" as such. They would mean we'd be able to play a more forward orientated game and be good in defensive duties (ROG aside)

Sexton is just as capable of rog at playing the conditions, if it is wet sexton will be able to cope. If rog start then it would make more sense to start tol to make up for rog's defence. Sexton had a brilliant game for leinster against munster, in 2008(i think), in awful conditions where he ran the show through tactical kicking.

MMC wrote:https://www.606v2.com/t6268-rugby-section-redesign

Bleeding Irish whingers!!!

MMC, I'll see your early June post and raise you this mid-July amendment: https://www.606v2.com/t9230p50-606v2-rugby-section-organisation-feedback-please

AsLongAsBut100ofUs wrote:

MMC wrote:https://www.606v2.com/t6268-rugby-section-redesign

Bleeding Irish whingers!!!

MMC, I'll see your early June post and raise you this mid-July amendment: https://www.606v2.com/t9230p50-606v2-rugby-section-organisation-feedback-please

Touché As. I did see that post when I did a search for "section". I decided to ignore it though and post that link instead as it best fitted my argument. I'd seen it done previously with statistics you see.

Which ejjit voted for Wallace at 10? Oh wait that was me, just trying to stir some lively debate. I'll change it to Sexy presently. He is without doubt the sensible choice, provided he brings his kicking boots. Centres and back 3 should be interesting. I suspect the preverbial waste will hit the fan, and I predict a lot of screaming and shouting.

WillyGilly wrote: Centres and back 3 should be interesting. I suspect the preverbial waste will hit the fan, and I predict a lot of screaming and shouting.

+1

pete (buachaill on eirne) wrote:

WillyGilly wrote: Centres and back 3 should be interesting. I suspect the preverbial waste will hit the fan, and I predict a lot of screaming and shouting.

+1

no really

everyone knows the team should be

healy
cronin
ross

cullen
poc

SOB
Jennings
heislip

redden
sexton

darcy
BOD

fitz
Ferg
Kearney

Anyone who says otherwise is just being provincially biased

I just threw up a little bit in my mouth there...

valjester wrote:

pete (buachaill on eirne) wrote:I think that in those horrific wet contidtions (I am not talking about rain, I am talking about a storm basically) th likes of ROG, TOL and Kearney have a lot of merit due to their "steadiness" as such. They would mean we'd be able to play a more forward orientated game and be good in defensive duties (ROG aside)

Sexton is just as capable of rog at playing the conditions, if it is wet sexton will be able to cope. If rog start then it would make more sense to start tol to make up for rog's defence. Sexton had a brilliant game for leinster against munster, in 2008(i think), in awful conditions where he ran the show through tactical kicking.

Is the game you are referring to the one in Musgrave when much to the amazement of all Munster supporters Munster kept throwing the ball around in a gale force win. I believe they were going through their "we need to change our style of game if we want to win more heineken Cups stage back then."

Thats a load of rubbish your pushing about O'leary needing to start if ROG does! A few stats for you to mull over:

During the 6Ns in the French game, Sexton played for 63 mins and made 6 tackles. O'Gara played for 17 mins and made exactly the same number of tackles (6). O'Leary made 4 tackles (missing 1), and Reddan (who came on about the same time as O'Gara made 3).

So to summarise, O'Gara made the same number of tackles in 17 mins against France as Sexton did in his 63 minutes against the same team (which put a lot more pressure on D'Arcy & BOD).

It should also be noted that Ireland scored 5 tries during the 6Ns with O'Gara at OH and 5 with Sexton even though Sexton had 80 mins more playing time than O'Gara.

I bet D'Arcy loves it when O'Gara starts. Takes a load of pressure off him.

D24tress wrote:

everyone knows the team should be

healy
cronin
ross

cullen
poc

SOB
Jennings
heislip

redden
sexton

darcy
BOD

fitz
Ferg
Kearney

Anyone who says otherwise is just being provincially biased

You left out Chris Henry and Darren Cave...

Sin é wrote:
Thats a load of rubbish your pushing about O'leary needing to start if ROG does! A few stats for you to mull over:

You're right it is Sin everyone knows ROG has it in his contract that he never has to play alongside O'Leary.....