swift4prez wrote: i wanted to know who got us the 7 yellows so i looked it up.

rodney vs cardiff away 13 sep
POD vs treviso away 4 oct
Locks vs leinster away 26 oct
KM vs leinster away 26 oct
mata vs glasgow home 2 november
F Murphy vs munster away 27 december

didnt white get a yellow for reacting to a tap on the back in some scrum? im missing someone.

interesting also that in the pro12, the team playing against us has recieved 7 yellow cards

Good to see there are no repeat offenders though oddly, at least to me, all three scrumhalves have contributed one card each. Quite a feat considering the amount of game time Murphy has had this season.

phatguerilla wrote: Yeah there were two yellows in that game away to Munster wasn't it? I think that's what you mean about White being tapped on the back.

your right, murphy got him at 43 mins and jerry cronin and white got yellow in the 49th mins

Yeah there were two yellows in that game away to Munster wasn't it? I think that's what you mean about White being tapped on the back.

i wanted to know who got us the 7 yellows so i looked it up.

rodney vs cardiff away 13 sep
POD vs treviso away 4 oct
Locks vs leinster away 26 oct
KM vs leinster away 26 oct
mata vs glasgow home 2 november
F Murphy vs munster away 27 december

didnt white get a yellow for reacting to a tap on the back in some scrum? im missing someone.

interesting also that in the pro12, the team playing against us has recieved 7 yellow cards

Home stretch?

Ulster 5
Connacht 7
Glasgow 8
Ospreys 8
Edinburgh, Treviso, Leinster 9
Blues 10
Zebre, Scarlets, Munster 11
Dragons 15

Amazed that Munster have managed to maintain their league position with more than a card every two games. However I feel they have made cheating a tactic to some extent, you can see it at every ruck and maul. Some will praise it, and it certainly has them in the right position atm.

Connacht are in a good position to still win this award which as previously stated gives some much need cash to the academy.

ETA luckily White's citing was from a Heineken cup game and doesn't affect this ranking.

ETA 2: The Welsh love a tip tackle.

I hadn't updated for a while but I didn't realise how long it had been. That's what happens when the internationals and heineken break the league up I guess.

Current table (not including second round of derbies)
Ulster 5
Ospreys 6
Connacht 7
Edinburgh 8 (5+1 citing)
Treviso 8 (same)
Leinster 8
Glasgow 8
Cardiff 9 (6+1)
Zebre 9
Dragons 10
Munster 10
Scarlets 11

Couple of thoughts;
Refs seem much more card happy this year compared to last. However there have been no red cards yet and only three citings so far. I don't think the citing system works as a legitimate means of discouraging foul behaviour, although its not helped that teams tend not to 'rat' on each other. The derby games all seem to cause multiple cards but almost zero citations.

Connacht could have been top of this table if it wasn't for last week. Likewise Ulster are lucky they didn't get two cards last week.

The table also seems to confirm what I suspected last week - Munster are a dirty team right now. However it also doesn't acknowledge smaller or niggly things that go unpunished. Unlike last year however this table seems to have little bearing on the league table and Munster must be (begrudgingly) congratulated on being able to maintain their almost unbeaten form while averaging almost a card per game.
Was it the game against Treviso that they lost and picked up four cards in?

Just under a quarter of the season has passed, here's the standings.

Connacht and Ulster 2.
Dragons and Ospreys 3.
Munster 4.
Edinburgh, Scarlets, Leinster and Glasgow 5.
Cardiff and Zebre 6.
Treviso 7.

Thoughts: I don't like how the rabo site lists Ulster as top of the league, I have fixed that here.

If this quarter represents an average then the winner could end up on more points than Ulster had last year. I would think any club on 5 or over is out of the running but still plenty of time for a player to pick up a citation and ruin it for any team.

Even though I think Glasgow will win the league this year they certainly won't win the fairplay league. Shows just how good they are that they can pick up 5 yellows in 5 games and remain unbeaten.

It really irks me that refs can sometimes appear to hand out cards at will and then other times hold back, even within the same game! Same with citations, Faletau above should have been cited.

I think its damaging to the league that the commission is not making a mark on issues like this, and if the clubs have a choice in whether they have an opponent cited after incidents like the above then they are damaging their own league. An Edinburgh back last year was cited and given a ban for a 'tip tackle' that was much less clear cut than the one above.
And not that I think Conn would have bet Ospreys anyways but it sounded like Faletau was one of their top players in the sportsground the following week.

Also Blues appear to have picked up a citation somewhere but I have no idea what for, anyone read about this? can't find anything in the rabo news section.

Should have been red and should have been cited! Full on drive into the ground there. Really dangerous!

After watching that clip a few cards could have being given out. Ospreys and Treviso were very lucky.

Edinburgh picked up a citation during the week and so drop to 4 points in the fair play league, and their hooker Aleki Lutui is suspended for two weeks.

www.rabodirectpro12.com/news/12922.php#.UkSkcj9Y2YM

Interestingly Tipuric got a yellow in the same game for a tip tackle but does not seem to have been cited, I thought the point was that the IRB etc were cracking down on this and players were supposed to be suspended for such incidents.



I don't mean to suggest that its a weekly occurence but the Welsh seem to play very close to the line with regards tip tackles and too frequently overstep it.

Lol I wish I could have seen that game, must look at the rabo youtube channel. This years fairplay league is already shaping up to be potentially much more open than last year.

Treviso and Blues picked up citations leaving them on 6 and 5 respectively - out of the running based on last year, and considering most of the season is still left to play.

Munster, Leinster and Zebre all have 4, good lads.

Glasgow, Ospreys and Scarlets are all on 2.

Edinburgh, Connacht and Dragons on 1, and Ulster still 0.

With only 3 games gone it is a major achievement by Treviso to equal Ulster's score from last year. We also know now by proxy that a proven citing is equal to 3 yellows. The fairplay league has basically split in two at this point and we're still in the top half which is nice. Ulster's next two games are Treviso and Ospreys I could see them slipping sooner rather than later. We'll also need to watch out for penalties in the scrum this weekend.

Fair balls to Munster for making up lost ground in this. 4 yellows in one game is quite the achievement.

Still just the one yellow for us but Ulster have 0 in spite of Tom Court last weekend.

I'm going to talk to myself on this thread a bit this season.... :whistle:

There have been no reds or citings yet so I'm just going to list teams in order of yellow cards from least to most;

Ulster 0
Munster 0
Edinburgh 1
Connacht 1
Ospreys 1
Dragons 1
Cardiff 2
Glasgow 2
Scarlets 2
Zebre 3
Treviso 3
Leinster 4

Couple of thoughts - Italian teams pulling away at the bottom not entirely surprising, whether its real or imagined they seem to have a reputation or sorts for cards and perhaps that feeds refs interpretation.
Leinster at the bottom is bad for them, think they play Glasgow next which will be a tough attritional game, as I said above Leinster may be out of the running by the end of October at this rate.
Munster had two easy games which must have contributed to their position, Ulster doing well for now. We're also in a good position that needs to be maintained.

I realise this is not an award you can target necessarily, but I think it is important to Connacht's season that we keep an eye on this and keep all cards and citings to a minimum. I don't think its a coincidence that Ulster won it last year and Leinster the year before and both got to the rabo final in each year - yes they had the squad etc but receiving cards mean giving up points and the best teams don't do that. Last year Ulster only got six cards, that's a terrific record and when you consider how often teams must have gotten carded playing them its got to be considered a factor in their success.

This year Leinster are off to a bad start with 3 cards already, they could be out of the running in just a couple more games. I think the season before last Connacht were there or thereabouts until the last game of the season against Glasgow and threw away any chance of winning this award through a number of cards and possibly a citing of McCarthy iirc. This award comes with a cheque for £10,000 which is intended for youth development and considering how well the academy has been functioning lately that money would be another boost.

Likewise while you don't aim to get your opponents carded it is imperative that Connacht are capable of capitalising when opponents receive yellow cards, its often been the case that pressure has not been brought to bear in a 10 minute window that could seal a match win for us.

So for the good of the academy and for our final position at the end of the season I think that its important Connacht aim to keep as many games cardless as possible. Not sure if there is much to debate in this topic, although I know some people would feel a lack of cards might signify a lack of fight in a team, but any thoughts would be appreciated.