In fairness to Poterbelly he was the one who said NOC would be heading back home, weeks before it was confirmed.

If he is half as good at picking a horse he is probably a very very rich man.

That said I am intrigued as to the source but I guess there are some serious confidentiality agreements at work here.

salmson wrote:

Porterbelly wrote: 1)you have someone very good on the inside

If it's 1 then maybe your source can tell us the following: since the B&I Cup games will be played on HEC w/ends, will they be arranged so that the Irish teams get home B&I games when they're away in the HEC?

If so then we'll have 7 of 8 weekends through December and January with home games:

Edinburgh
HEC/B&I
HEC/B&I
Munster
(Leinster away)
Dragons
HEC/B&I
HEC/B&I

Didn't hear anything about scheduling, but the news of our opponents in the group is gospel because it's straight from the horse's mouth

Porterbelly wrote: 1)you have someone very good on the inside

If it's 1 then maybe your source can tell us the following: since the B&I Cup games will be played on HEC w/ends, will they be arranged so that the Irish teams get home B&I games when they're away in the HEC?

If so then we'll have 7 of 8 weekends through December and January with home games:

Edinburgh
HEC/B&I
HEC/B&I
Munster
(Leinster away)
Dragons
HEC/B&I
HEC/B&I

swift4prez wrote:

Porterbelly wrote: We got Newcastle Falcons and 2 Welsh teams in the B & I Cup

Falcons are a great draw, top team in it

a week later and no one anywhere apart from you has heard of this draw.

either 1)you have someone very good on the inside
or 2) you made it up for god knows what reason.
or 3) someone completly took the piss out of you

1

Porterbelly wrote: We got Newcastle Falcons and 2 Welsh teams in the B & I Cup

Falcons are a great draw, top team in it

a week later and no one anywhere apart from you has heard of this draw.

either 1)you have someone very good on the inside
or 2) you made it up for god knows what reason.
or 3) someone completly took the piss out of you

Neath or Llanelli would be sweet.

Would love if one of the Welsh clubs was Neath. Proper club.

Newcastle is a fantastic draw. It'll really stretch our squad but thats a superb game to get. Even if they send over a 2nd string they are still a big club and we should be hoping to get a crowd into 4 figures for that game I'd hope. Hopefully they bounce straight back to the Premiership. Doesn't seem long ago since they were bringing a star studded team to the Sportsground for a Challenge Cup game. Looking back on that now, they had a good squad at that time.

We'll have to see who the Welsh teams are but they will be competitive too I'd imagine. No handy games which is perfect for what Connacht want this competition for.

Falcons vs Eagles! Love it!

And to think people though the renaming was a bad thing.

swift4prez wrote: link please

It's not online, heard it today

link please

We got Newcastle Falcons and 2 Welsh teams in the B & I Cup

Falcons are a great draw, top team in it

I'm almost sure there is 32 teams in it this year anyway with 8 groups of 4. Given all the publicity, Connacht would look stupid if they weren't in and with the additions we've made I'm sure we will be taking part in this competition.

if it's the table on irishrugby.ie then I don't think there's anything to worry about. Those are the pools from last year, I think they just copied them over for 2012/2013 as a placeholder. As far as I'm aware the pool draw for the B&I Cup hasn't taken place yet.

swift4prez wrote: Draw made for the pool but no Connacht to be seen in neither of the six groups

Ah that is really disappointing. Do you have a link at all to the groups?

Draw made for the pool but no Connacht to be seen in neither of the six groups