Neil F wrote:
Shan, as I think you know, I'm not on the "let's bash Keith Earls" train that a number on this board are (or at least were until the "let's bash Simon Zebo" train rolled into Platform 2, anyway). I also confess that you'll see Earls a lot more than I do, and will probably watch him in a different way but... Being a 100% team player is not something I've ever associated with Earls. 100% commitment, sure; a big of the X-factor, sure. But not being a team player seems to have been the biggest drawback of Earls' career in my opinion - I've never seen him act like he's part of a team. Whether this is a belief in his own capacity or a genuine limitation of either his rugby-playing mind or his technical passing ability, I'm not sure... Earls, to me, feels a lot like the whole Scotland team. Sure they can break the line but once they do, they have no bloody idea what to do afterwards. Earls' natural response in such situations seems to be to keep running away from support until he runs out of options.
I will not write Earls off - many, even some on this forum, had written Trimble off and look what he came back with. Of the options available, Earls probably has to start and he hope he proves me wrong. I always felt Earls had a huge amount to contribute to Ireland and I'd love to see him start realising the potential he had. Maybe this tour is a perfect chance to see the team-player you moot. I hope we do see that but I fear that it'll be more of the same from Earls.
Hi Neil- When I said 100% team players I meant 100% committed. Earls shows this in defence as much as anybody in the game and so does Trimble. Both look for work all the time and it is very rare anybody(I am only talking about those who actually know what they are looking at such as your good self) could level a charge against either for not putting everything they've got into a performance.
That Earls falls short sometimes in terms of his offensive play can be put down to a few factors, desperation to drive on his team when they are struggling to make the breakthrough, unacceptably poor coaching, unacceptable support runs from his team mates and sometimes just poor decision making or whiteline fever from Earls himself. He is nowhere near perfect and I have no desire to paint him as near that, which I'm sure you know anyway. However when I see Earls lining up at least I know that while he may make some errors and run up some blind alleys he won't go missing in the game and he won't shirk any required and sometimes mammoth defensive work which unfortuntely cannot always be said of everybody.
I do think what Earls needs more than anything is an extended and injury-free run in his best position and some direction from a good coaching team.
The actual perfect situation for me would be if we could somehow fit all of Bowe, Trimble and Earls on the same team but with all only playing on the wing. They are the three best wingers in Ireland in terms of the full package. Oh and I know we can only play two wingers at a time. What a pity.
It is a man's own mind, not his enemy or foe, that lures him to evil ways.