IRE V SA

[barney]

No scrum, no lineout, no intelligence, no leadership and no composure. I hate to think what would have happened had SA been able to send their first-choice 22. As it was, had ROG kicked that final conversion, a draw would have been a travesty.

Either Leo Cullen or Bob Casey has to come into that pack, with Court to start and Redden should be nowhere near an Ireland 22 ever again.

However, for as long as there is no pack leader on the pitch, it really doesn't matter how many other personnel changes we make. If we had had even an ounce of nous out there today it could have been a different story.

[darkside lightside]

that was......shocking... so, so bad - I hate watching my side lose, but if we get beaten by a good side who put in a good shift, then I'm prepared to suck it up, but when I watch a side play average to poor, but sleepwalk to victory, just because my side was absolutely abject, that hurts.... I seriously don't think SA had to work for a single point this evening...

for the first 30 we won pretty much all the contacts, I thought our back row were looking pretty decent, even if our set piece was squeaking a little and we had little possession, and created sod-all. but at half time those stats were shocking, SA hardly had to make a tackle, 10, fecking TEN errors, a shocking total under pretty modest pressure I would say.

Heaslip and Ferris were ok. Bowe and Fitz were ok. Sexton wasn't quite on song. (I'm really trying to find positives)

Kearney wasn't great. Healy wasn't great. Buckley was bad, MOD was bad, DOC was bad, Wallace was invisible.

Best was poor (sorry doing a few good things isn't enough when the lineout's falling apart like that). Darce and BOD (half-fit) were dire. Reddan was shocking.

Worst of all - epic fail for Kidney. Think of every single tight call - the big ones for me were prop, scrum-half, openside, second row - in the light of the performance, he got wrong. Even worse, he was stricken with (all too familiar) paralysis, sitting watching things go norks-up, without a single clue or ounce of bottle to change things. Why on earth did he not pull Best? Why did Leamy not get a second? Unfortunately I think we just have to accept we have EOS mark 2 at the helm, i.e. we can forget about any progress until he gets the heave-ho.

[Shan]

Best can only throw to his target,it is up to that target to make himself available,ie jumpers should jump,and catch the ball that touches their palm,he was great around the loose and made many tackles and also drove forwards with the ball as did Court.

This is the same stuff that is always thrown out whenever somebody questions Best's throwing. I'm not questioning his general play although today he was OK at best along with the rest. His throwing is not up to standard. Wouldn't matter if we Matfield in our team if the ball is overthrown or crooked.

Kidney should have shown some balls and thrown Cronin on. I don't know if Cronin is up to this level and neither does anybody else and with Kidney in charge we will never find out unless both Fla & Best cannot walk.

[bootlaced]

Best can only throw to his target,it is up to that target to make himself available,ie jumpers should jump,and catch the ball that touches their palm,he was great around the loose and made many tackles and also drove forwards with the ball as did Court.

This is the same stuff that is always thrown out whenever somebody questions Best's throwing. I'm not questioning his general play although today he was OK at best along with the rest. His throwing is not up to standard. Wouldn't matter if we Matfield in our team if the ball is overthrown or crooked.

Kidney should have shown some balls and thrown Cronin on. I don't know if Cronin is up to this level and neither does anybody else and with Kidney in charge we will never find out unless both Fla & Best cannot walk.

do like the way you use the phrase; 'thrown out'

[Shan]

Worst of all - epic fail for Kidney. Think of every single tight call - the big ones for me were prop, scrum-half, openside, second row - in the light of the performance, he got wrong. Even worse, he was stricken with (all too familiar) paralysis, sitting watching things go norks-up, without a single clue or ounce of bottle to change things. Why on earth did he not pull Best? Why did Leamy not get a second? Unfortunately I think we just have to accept we have EOS mark 2 at the helm, i.e. we can forget about any progress until he gets the heave-ho.

Agreed. I am more concerned by his refusal to make timely changes during the match than the initial selections. If somebody is failing in one of their primary functions they should be replaced as soon as is reasonable. All changes tonight should have been made at half time in my opinion.

I'd prefer to lose a game trying to win rather than lose it while trying not to lose.

[Shan]

do like the way you use the phrase; 'thrown out'

I try my best Bootlaced.

[darkside lightside]

Agreed. I am more concerned by his refusal to make timely changes during the match than the initial selections. If somebody is failing in one of their primary functions they should be replaced as soon as is reasonable. All changes tonight should have been made at half time in my opinion.

I'd prefer to lose a game trying to win rather than lose it while trying not to lose.

I agree - I would have maybe given the starting XV 5 mins in the second half, but given the sloppy way they started I would have pulled Best, Buckley, Reddan and MOD in short order, within 5 mins, and sprung Leamy for Wallace and Earls for either of BOD or Darce shortly after.. almost anything would have been better than what he did, sitting and watching things go wrong without the balls to try to change it.

[aarons]

that was......shocking... so, so bad - I hate watching my side lose, but if we get beaten by a good side who put in a good shift, then I'm prepared to suck it up, but when I watch a side play average to poor, but sleepwalk to victory, just because my side was absolutely abject, that hurts....

two bad weeks in a row then...

[Dublin4]

Just home.It was awful. The first half must rate among the worst matches in Irish rugby history. Redeemed a little by the last fifteen. What a lineout shambles. MOD to the abbatoir please. Sorry MOD but I am in bad form.
No atmosphere what with the huge gaps in the stadium. The IRFU deserve it for trying to rip off ordinary decent fans.
Awful.

[darkside lightside]

two bad weeks in a row then...

yep, and there was me hoping that a good ireland performance would be a good pick-me-up after Biarritz, Edinburgh & Munster I should have known better

[cables]

Ireland fell one place in the IRB rankings with England moving ahead of us.

[Jackie Brown]

MOD = pure tom kite but he has been for a long time
DOC = dung without POC
Reddan = I'd rather have Marshall
Best = poor why wasn't Cronin brought on?
D'Arcy = limited crash ball merchant
BOD = injured
Buckley = not international class, feck he's hardly even provincial class
Healey = overrated

Kidney, EOS mark2

[notj]

Best can only throw to his target,it is up to that target to make himself available,ie jumpers should jump,and catch the ball that touches their palm,he was great around the loose and made many tackles and also drove forwards with the ball as did Court.

This is the same stuff that is always thrown out whenever somebody questions Best's throwing. I'm not questioning his general play although today he was OK at best along with the rest. His throwing is not up to standard. Wouldn't matter if we Matfield in our team if the ball is overthrown or crooked.

Kidney should have shown some balls and thrown Cronin on. I don't know if Cronin is up to this level and neither does anybody else and with Kidney in charge we will never find out unless both Fla & Best cannot walk.

He's got a point to be fair, there were certainly a few malfunctioning lineouts that were his fault- at least one crooked throw, and he missed the jumpers a few times- but a lot of times we just got the call wrong, failed to get our jumpers in the air or otherwise messed it up without the thrower getting it wrong. You know if the other guys in the lineout get it wrong it can leave the hooker looking like the dick of the day but really it wasn't all down to him.

I would have liked to see Cronin on, but I wouldn't be overly concerned about Best starting again.

[againstthehead]

I'd say best was 30% at fault. Calls were attrocious, jumpers were cack and SA were very good. Still poor throwing overall though, but those around him made him look a lot worse than what he was

[notj]

Agree with that againstthehead. It's still not good enough from Best like, but it's not worth writing him off either. O'Driscoll was especially disappointing, not just in terms of his own jumping but also in terms of his decision making. I would like Cronin to get a chance against Samoa, fairly open for the NZ game. Cronin has a chance to take it now if he comes in and plays well.