swift4prez wrote: i thought last night was great.
it had its faults, dropping things, few injuries, too much running, getting caught out under pressure.
positive, we clicked a little better, spark there, if it keeps going it will be successfull and will work!!

^^^^^ oh wait, that should be in the clan event thread ^^^^^ :evil: :evil: :whistle: :evil: :evil:

Nice one Swifty, I borrowed your humour for the View from the Dail Bar. I had feck all else good to say :pinch:

plenty of recogniseable names in that game with McSharry getting a disallowed try...

wordinsport.com/index.php/ucd-triumph-as...ve-costly-for-belvo/

mary hinge wrote: The fact that we're six weeks into the season and Soioalo's work permit still hasn't been secured is scandalous. Real amateur hour stuff.

Exactly

Unless he has criminal convictions or something

The fact that we're six weeks into the season and Soioalo's work permit still hasn't been secured is scandalous. Real amateur hour stuff.

clanman wrote: If McSharry is fit i'd throw him in for the Sarries game, my backline is as follows..

McSharry came on as a second half sub for UCD this week, so he'll hardly be ready. Any news on Griffin's injury or So'oilao's permit?

If McSharry is fit i'd throw him in for the Sarries game, my backline is as follows..

9. Marmiom
10. Parks/Ronaldson
11. Healy
12. McSharry
13. Henshaw
14. Poolman
15. Carr

I've gone against what I've said previously by keeping Henshaw at 13 in order to play all our best backs.

Just watched the "highlights". Thank god I missed that game. I had been saying for weeks that the run from anywhere would bite us in the ass sooner or later... Serious change of game plan required.

Lam is a tactical mastermind. We now have Saracens exactly where we want them. Roll on Friday.

salmson wrote: Rodney did very well, fine at loosehead, and it was only when facing his third opponent of the night (the replacement loosehead for Treviso) that he started to wobble. Most props play less than an hour these days, and he was still looking for work in injury time.

Last night was maddening. we have probably the best setpiece platform we've ever had, but the decision making stinks. Some of the senior players - Dan, Gav, George - look to be over the hill.

I'm not sure they're over the hill. This game plan wouldn't have suited either Dan or Gav 5 years ago either. George is too young to be over the hill. He's just hopelessly out of form.

I fully agree that decision making stinks but I fully blame Lam for that. It's his game plan to run everything. As bad as we've been, it's all been in fairly good conditions. Imagine a wet and windy night.

Rodney did very well, fine at loosehead, and it was only when facing his third opponent of the night (the replacement loosehead for Treviso) that he started to wobble. Most props play less than an hour these days, and he was still looking for work in injury time.

Last night was maddening. we have probably the best setpiece platform we've ever had, but the decision making stinks. Some of the senior players - Dan, Gav, George - look to be over the hill.

What do we do v Sarries?

If Lam wants us to run from everywhere, then there's no point playing Parks.

I'd nearly start Marmion and Carty at 9 & 10, they have a good relationship from the 20's team. Of if Ronaldson is fit, go with him.

Muldowney did ok bar a silly peno when we had them under the cosh. Clarke and Heenan were our standout players. Muldoon played well when he came on.

Fitness permitting

Wilkinson
Henry
White
Muldowney
Clarke
Muldoon
Heenan
Naoupu (Not convinced but we need someone to compete with Joubert who is the top lineout taker in the Prem)

Marmion
Carty (What have we to lose? He looked bright yesterday, and if Lam doesn't shift the gameplan then there's little point in playing Parks)
Healy
Griffin
Henshaw
Poolman
Carr


Yes Carr at 15, an odd one but again, what have we to lose? He has experience there and they are our 3 best strike runners in the back 3. If we're going to run the ball then why not?
Carty can goalkick

Rael (who played well when introduced)
Rodney (bad and all as he was he's useful for carrying when he comes on)
Loughney
Browne
Fifita
POD
Parks
TOH

For me Rodney was probably the only positive.
Whether the first one was a knock on or not, we got what we deserved there. Second one looked a try to me, if it wasn't a try it had to be lost forward, so giving Treviso a scrum 5 is nuts.
Worrying that even after cutting back in field, there was still no support for Carr's break.

Considering Rodney had zero starts last season he did exceptionally well by his standards. Although the TH bound on his arm he managed to stay up most of the time and we were still competitive in the scrum and won at least one of theirs I think? And even when he moved to tighthead which he's clearly less comfortable playing he managed to hold it together until close to the end. There were a good few collapses in the last 20 minutes but they didn't appear to be 100% his fault.

Unfortunately its hard to imagine he can continue that level of performance and build on it but I think we'd all be very happy if he did.

i thought last night was great.
it had its faults, dropping things, few injuries, too much running, getting caught out under pressure.
positive, we clicked a little better, spark there, if it keeps going it will be successfull and will work!!

^^^^^ oh wait, that should be in the clan event thread ^^^^^ :evil: :evil: :whistle: :evil: :evil:

the running from our own 22 or even the try line is pure crazy, all we and good to do that on the half way line. last it backfired twice, duffy cover scrum half, did 360 and passed to poolman who was all alone and got carried over the try line. another time someone (murphy i think) passed to duffy (not his fault) and trviso scored.

i seen on the FB page for connacht that people are jumping on rodneys back, but i was very very surprised how good he did. our scrum was very strong at the start. he was still carrying the ball up to the 80th min. i know we didnt have any choice due to injuries but you dont see many props lasting 80mins anymore.

duffy was awful. hopefully henshaw comes back as a fullback, either that or TOH there.

For the life of me I don't get why we insist from trying to run everything when we don't have the players to do it - that has to be down to what the lads have been told and that comes from Lam. We had four great line out forwards starting last night but instead of working from a strong set piece and competing for there ball we try and run it from anywhere - brainless.

Lam seems to have one style of playing regardless of the players he has and that's not a good sign. Top coaches get the most out of what they have and Lam aint doing it by trying to turn us into the equivalent of the feckin Harlem Globetrotters!!!!! I'm dreading what might happen to us next week if we carry on like this

Trying to say anything positive feels very trite atm.

I think a lot of us felt like the first couple of games were almost pre-season like in many respects but thought things would come around but if anything its gotten worse as we've gone along. My preseason hope was no more nil losses - scoring 3 points or not scoring for 70 minutes in a game is barely any better. Yes the injury list is pretty huge atm but when is it not?

Considering Lam has talked about including the academy kids in training and the importance of using any kid who's performing in training, this shouldn't be considered the end of the world. If Healy was on the bench purely to make up the numbers and not as a viable sub then that is damning stuff tbh.

Apart from any of the mistakes, the missed opportunity, etc, the feeling that Connacht are making things harder for themselves than necessary is the worst of all. Consistently running things inside the 22 has become completely predictable already, is hugely dangerous and is likely a factor in the way the team tires badly as things go on.

I know no one could have reasonably predicted both tightheads going off in the first half, but considering next weeks opposition was there no suggestion of putting Cooney on the bench? Hindsight etc but still.

Saracens will be targetting a tbp and even realistically intending to build a decent point difference with the first game. Connacht don't exactly do form but even so there's no reason to think they won't manage to equal or beat Ospreys score easily.