RonanL wrote:

Evil_g wrote:

sea_point wrote: Nothing wrong with Keane's TV performance. He's a typical dry straight talking Kiwi, he isn't Pat Lam and the players are going to find this out soon.

I thought he made the interviewer's job unnecessarily difficult. He knew well that the interviewer was not suggesting that he himself had gotten on the wrong side of the referee. Pretending he did is not straight talking. He was similarly rude to Rob Murphy (who spends a lot of his own time promoting Connacht Rugby) in his first press conference without the excuse of it being a few minutes after a bitter defeat.

I don't think behaving like that is a good idea. He might think that the questions are innane....but he makes a living training grown men to run around a field after a piece of leather. He, and Connacht, needs the media.

Agree 100% with Evil_g. KK let himself and Connacht Rugby down with that interview in my opinion. Very unprofessional, and it made me think he's already rattled which isn't a good thing.

I am not condoing KK's interwiew but he did come out in defense of his team last week in the interview and I assume was seriously frustrated by the last few minutes.
What is more worrying is that our defense coach has had all preseason to work the the team and it looks to me we have no defense at all. A 4 and 1 overlap in the corner is schoolboy.

Evil_g wrote:

sea_point wrote: Nothing wrong with Keane's TV performance. He's a typical dry straight talking Kiwi, he isn't Pat Lam and the players are going to find this out soon.

I thought he made the interviewer's job unnecessarily difficult. He knew well that the interviewer was not suggesting that he himself had gotten on the wrong side of the referee. Pretending he did is not straight talking. He was similarly rude to Rob Murphy (who spends a lot of his own time promoting Connacht Rugby) in his first press conference without the excuse of it being a few minutes after a bitter defeat.

I don't think behaving like that is a good idea. He might think that the questions are innane....but he makes a living training grown men to run around a field after a piece of leather. He, and Connacht, needs the media.

Agree 100% with Evil_g. KK let himself and Connacht Rugby down with that interview in my opinion. Very unprofessional, and it made me think he's already rattled which isn't a good thing.

sea_point wrote: Nothing wrong with Keane's TV performance. He's a typical dry straight talking Kiwi, he isn't Pat Lam and the players are going to find this out soon.

I thought he made the interviewer's job unnecessarily difficult. He knew well that the interviewer was not suggesting that he himself had gotten on the wrong side of the referee. Pretending he did is not straight talking. He was similarly rude to Rob Murphy (who spends a lot of his own time promoting Connacht Rugby) in his first press conference without the excuse of it being a few minutes after a bitter defeat.

I don't think behaving like that is a good idea. He might think that the questions are innane....but he makes a living training grown men to run around a field after a piece of leather. He, and Connacht, needs the media.

Agree, it is still possible to still qualify but we would have to pull off a few away wins where we haven't before. After Saturdays result we need new leadership on the pitch too. I would say in KKs mind everything is on the table this morning.

Nothing wrong with Keane's TV performance. He's a typical dry straight talking Kiwi, he isn't Pat Lam and the players are going to find this out soon. He's put a lot of trust in the players this season, maybe forced by his late arrival. Expect changes, simplifying the game plan for next few games (less playing what's in front of them).Get the squad walking before they can run, may help the newer personell....

Pretty clear our season is realistically now about the ECC only....

Tough to take. Heartbreaking really.

Nothing wrong with Buckley's performance TBH. Solid to dominant in the scrum, 9/2 on tackles and carried when needed although it's not his forte. Stepped in at scrum half well several times too. Not as influential at the breakdown as you'd hope but it was still a solid performance.

Also just saw that Dillane was 19/0 on tackles.

It's now clear that 2015-6 was a glorious outlier and we're now finding our true level among the bottom third of the Pro14 again. Yesterday was painful to watch, and KK's "performance" on Sky Sports after the game was nearly as bad as the defending for the two Haleholo tries. This was a crucial game and losing it ensures (given our fixtures over the next few weeks) that we will really struggle to make top 7.
And this is frustrating given that really only Scarlets, Glasgow, and Leinster are head and shoulders above everyone else in this league. Munster and Ulster are really no great shakes, and Edinburgh, Cardiff, and Ospreys are a step down again: but we have just lost away to Dragons and at home to Cardiff FFS and that puts us down among the Dragons and the Italian sides!
Marmion, Aki, Farrell (when he came on), Leader, Heffernan, Butler, and Dillane in patches yesterday looked comfortable at this level. The rest - well the less said the better........................

The good: found some composure for our tries, defense in the first 20mins, leaders kicks with and against the wind.

The bad: discipline. Roux pinged twice for the same infringement just when we were about to turn over the ball or receive a clearing kick. Handling errors. Lack of composure in the dl1st half. Brainless obstruction that wasn't needed. We haven't learned a thing from previous games. Restarts are still a problem. The defensive narrowness at the end.

Shocking stuff from Connacht. How the hell did Halaholo walk through for the first try, and dont even talk about the winner. Desperate stuff.
Regarding Keane on tv, that doesnt look good. A bit of manners goes a long way

My God is more frightening than Roy Keane after a loss!

connachta wrote: The 2nd half was very plaesant to see. Both team were good.
We have a chance to be in semi final in ChallengeCup. If we escape from Toulouse until the final, Europe is ours next season.
Assumig the losing finalist qualifies if the winner is already in ChamponsCup with his domestic position...Hope it works that way (seems to from what I read...)

Hate to say it but I think Muldoon was the losing of the game!
But I'm still confident that they will turn the season around.
It's now timed for all to step up to the plate.
We need leaders to emerge other than John and Bundee.
Tiernan spoke earlier in the month about pat turned them into Robots ...,, maybe there is a reason he drove this policy of extremely structured play???

The 2nd half was very plaesant to see. Both team were good.
We have a chance to be in semi final in ChallengeCup. If we escape from Toulouse until the final, Europe is ours next season.
Assumig the losing finalist qualifies if the winner is already in ChamponsCup with his domestic position...Hope it works that way (seems to from what I read...)

Too many Pens given away, 13 pens and a player calling for a mark from a KO suggests a need to learn the laws of the game properly.

Some of those pens were just so frustrating silly to give away.

Game was effectively lost in the first half but the last try was bizarre to say the least. The ball was very slow, our line was in place yet they managed a 4 on 2 off first phase ball. Crazy stuff !

I hope the coaching sessions cover key strategies such as 'sticking it up your jumper for the last 120 seconds of a game your winning' or ' there's a time to do a Munster in a game with 2 minutes left' or how about ' stop getting turned over just after you've taken a lead' . Just a few ideas but they're a start

Bloody hell - laughable tonight!!

sligsup wrote:

Mark Mostyn wrote:

Wasrednowgreen wrote: Absolutely shameful to lose a game like that - up 5 points with two minutes to go. ALL of other provinces would never be turned over in front of their own posts with 2 minutes to go in such a winnable postion. It is simply unforgivable to lose such a game. Back to the old Connacht of not being able to close things out - terrible, after working so hard to get back in front.

There are NO EXCUSES for losing a game from such a winning position. None. Nada. Nothing being entertained. Total nonsense. Shameful.

That defeat ends our realistic interest in the PRO 14 in September. Stick a fork in us. Think its all about going through the motions now unfortunately. Furious!!!

With Ospreys and Cardiff being shite as well there's plenty to play for, need to improve fast though. Dawai and Carey in for Masterson and Bealham next week please.

You won't see Dawai next week as our with hamstring
Muldoon head doesn't seem right has had s poor start to the season.
Bundee and Marmion were immense
Stupid pens given away by Roux and McKeon twice
Deegan had a solid outing and leader more than capable

Defence coach and Carolan need to spend time On the training pitch to get them going !!!!

Agree on everything except Marmion, a lot of his passes were extremely loopy and the receivers were getting hit straight after receiving the ball.