pinky wrote: They are wearing their France 2023 jerseys against the Boks. Not classy, France. Not classy.

Shouldn't be surprised really after that nonsense they came up with about being ignored in the Aviva or whatever.

They are wearing their France 2023 jerseys against the Boks. Not classy, France. Not classy.

EDIT: Karma's a b****

@Pinky need to add a smiley button beside the thank you!

A potential good model is Tallaght Stadium, owned by the Co Council, which has hosted Ireland A rugby international as well as soccer. I have been to two schools games there, great views, beautiful playing surface. It seats 6000 and that can be upped significantly with temporary seating (like RDS) or with terraces at the ends. Proper toilets, bars, conference suites etc. More importantly it has Category 4 status from UEFA which is very specific especially as regards media.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/UEFA_stadium_categories

I think the pitch can do Junior GAA matches, but is a bit short for Senior ones, but there is the space to extend there. I'd take one of these in Galway in a heartbeat.

salmson wrote:
Developing Eamon Deacy Park to 8K (for Utd and Connacht) and building a shared GAA/rugby facility of 25K on the site of the airport is one possibility, but I don't see the justification for building a bug stadium if it's only going to be filled (at best) half a dozen times a year.

For domestic sports yes, but you could have concerts and maybe host Women's & U21 Rugby Internationals (hell maybe footy too, minor Internationals/Womens & U21's..)..

I'm with Colum in pooling resources and having municipal stadiums in Ireland...

pinky wrote: The bid committee are having a go at Scotland and Wales for not voting for us, but the way I add it up, one of them did.
England + US + Canada = 5. We got 8. So my guess would have been the other 3 were Wales.
The other alternatives don't make much sense (North America + Georgia?)

Unbelievably disappointing result. That's it for Ireland, we'll never be in a place to compete in the future.They'll flog it off to USA & Argentina or Italy before we get a sniff..
Just shows how much Bull there was for NZ to get it in 2011..

For our bid, we were already miles ahead of where NZ were in terms of readiness.
We offered more ticket availability; more accommodation than required, closer proximity for the major rugby markets (so more returns on broadcasting revenue), better transport infrastructure and public transport.

People talking about lack of Broadband in stadiums as being an issue,are talking out of their hoops.
I work in telecoms and Ireland could easily provide the necessary infrastructure on a permanent or temporary basis for all stadiums, easily..

The decision was based entirely on cash in hand...pure and simple..
It's supposed to be a WORLD Cup, and that should refer to hosts too (not just a cosy little cartel getting all the benefits of histing)...

Me I'm done with RWC's, much as I loved doing France in 2007 (five games) World Rugby won't get another penny out of me...

I think if we want to put forward a better bid than we did this time around the onus would have to be on the GAA to develop their grounds which is unlikely; the IRFU and government simply can't foot the bill for the potential of a tournament. Municipal stadiums are great in theory but unfortunately unless an expanded GAA season can draw in regular large crowds then we can't gobuilding them, Pairc ui Caoimh and a new Casement would be a help but it even seems that World Rugby weren't impressed by the redeveloped Pairc ui Caoimh, there's been significant talk of the RDS being redeveloped too which would add another stadia of circa 20,000-25,000 that would be reasonably high standard. However, it appears that sort of size for some reason no longer appeals to RWC and World Rugby, so the likes of Ravenhill, Thomond and the RDS are no longer strong assets in a future bid, and they are the highest quality stadia we have outside of Croker and the Aviva. Overall it seems our chance is gone and any future bid may have to be alongside our Celtic neighbours in particular Scotland and if they're part of the bid at least they can't vote against it.

salmson wrote: The hurling team doesn't get to play at home because it's in the Leinster championship.

Two home games next season, including the Cats the day after the Pro14 final (where the recently regained trophy will be paraded at half time before a crushing defeat).
Not that that changes the substance of your argument significantly.

columoc wrote: That for example would mean on municipal stadium in Galway either a Green or Brown field site which can acter for all three main sporting groups.

That's never going to work. Terryland is perfect for Galway United (assuming they don't go under) & the Galway League - the pitch is the best in the country, they have more than enough capacity, and even if they somehow graduated to playing Europa League they have a seated capacity of 3300, They're good. That's no use to Connacht though given our crowd sizes.

Galway GAA have (at most) a couple of Championship games a season (the football recently went 3 years without a home match) with attendances in the region of 16-24K; so way to big for Connacht. The hurling team doesn't get to play at home because it's in the Leinster championship.

Developing Eamon Deacy Park to 8K (for Utd and Connacht) and building a shared GAA/rugby facility of 25K on the site of the airport is one possibility, but I don't see the justification for building a bug stadium if it's only going to be filled (at best) half a dozen times a year.

I think any future WC bid is done for now. It will become almost impossible for a small country to win it in the future (Qatar apart).

Reading yesterday that 2027 is likely to go to SH simply because the previous three will have been in NH. By 2031, almost certainly it will need to go to a development area such as USA. That means that it will be 2035 at which stage England or France would be back biding again.

It was a good shout and a fair effort. But the issue of infrastructure will not go away; and despite the craic and welcome, we do not have the stadiums. Even without a WC, we should now concentrate on investing to improve facilities for our fans.

I would like to see more municipal stadiums through the country which can cater for capacity, but also for media, which was a gap in all but 2-3 of our stadium proposals. This would mean an agreement between GAA, IRFU and even the FAI with the support of Govt. Modern playing surface technology can allow for heavier usage. That for example would mean on municipal stadium in Galway either a Green or Brown field site which can acter for all three main sporting groups.

What I've heard was:

England (3)
USA (1)
Canada (1)
North America. (2)
Oceania (1)

Oceania split their vote between us and South Africa in round 1. After we were eliminated they gave both their votes to the saffers.
As mentioned earlier England also split their vote in round 2, so the 2 votes gained by South Africa in round 2 were one from England and one from Oceania, France got the other 6.

Seems like if Wales and Scotland had both voted for us (I know they were free to vote as they pleased but still I would have thought we could depend on them) we would have had a Round 1 of France 15 Ireland 14 SA 10, Second round then would have been very interesting with NZ and the Oceania vote likely to have gone to us we would have needed just one of Argentina (who I believe the Irish bid had lobbied hard with and had promised to vote for them next time around in return) or Australia. I know a lot of ifs and buts in there but it really seems like the Evaluation turned people that may have voted for us off our bid, even so its seems that if we could have secured the votes of our neighbours we would have been in a strong position. All in all really disappointing especially as the indications are we won't be lining up a bid for 2027.

This is the IT's take: www.irishtimes.com/sport/rugby/internati...broke-down-1.3293110
More or less tallies with L'Equipe's (except for the Asia/Oceania split).

So if Wales had voted for Ireland, SA would have been eliminated in Round 1. Probably would have been too much ground to make up at 18-11 down, but you'd never know ...

Looks like Africa - who are based in the SARU offices - went for France in both rounds, and Europe - who are Paris based and formerly shared offices with FFR - voted for Ireland in the first round and SA in the second.

Daggers in backs all over the place.

Which means that England would have had to have split their votes in the first round! Provided no one else split there votes!

I thought Europe got 2 votes?