Edinburgh v Ulster Saturday April 30th 7:35pm KO Premier Sports 2 / URC TV / Super Sport

[rumncoke]

Its not about mental toughness --it is a motivational thing -- the feeling the gods are with you --rather than against you -- that your masters of your own destiny --- But when you know you've won but the record is different --- those ideas get f-cked -- its a case of what's the f-cking point if the TMO can decide a match.

It is a fact of life not a very acceptable one -- but it hangs about like f-rt in a small room and lasts longer than want it to .

Then reality slowly returns --sometimes (not often) the toast falls butter side up

[horslips]

Its not about mental toughness

I my view more or less the same thing. In any case the outcome is as you describe

[Soda]

Season salvageable after all! And if we do the sharks, Leinster do the usual over Munster and Scarlets don’t fold to the stormers (unlikely) at home we could even sneak a home SF. The Leinster brigade (other than Timoney) are done.

If Marty is done we are in big trouble. Would give Jordi the benefit of the doubt as still recovering to match fitness I hope

Otoole is a good prop.

Not sure you can count O’Toole as Leinster Brigade
Moved down under as a nipper then Campbell then a product of our academy
He’s one of ours


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[justinr73]

I think it’s unrealistic and unreasonable to expect that they wouldn’t suffer some kind of hangover from the Toulouse tie.

Duane told the players after the game that it would take them varying levels of time to get over it. I certainly hadn’t come the Munster match.

They showed plenty of mental, and physical, strength at the death last night albeit Edinburgh’s earlier profligacy had kept us in it.

They’ve got some time now to recharge their batteries and go again.

As per Dave’s cliché, it’s cup finals from here on..

[Soda]

Tactics are very questionable. A few times this year we have gotten ahead and stoped playing at 60mins. We just kick it away for the last 20mins. That’s got to be coming from management.

On a completely unrelated topic to utterly useless, pointless box kicking away possession, I note Doak Snr is back in the fold


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[jean valjean]

Its not about mental toughness

I my view more or less the same thing. In any case the outcome is as you describe

We're probably spilting hairs but mental roughness aka resilience is a recognised trait and can be developed like any other skill such as passing a ball. Every player goes into a game with much the same level of motivation. Resilience determines how quickly it can be eroded by set backs such as conceding early points or getting a red card. Last night was a good step forward again following recent events and something the likes of hume, lowry etc will have learnt a lot from.

[Lurgan Lad]

I think in terms of mental toughness it isn't the event, it is how you use it that matters. As an example when Foley passed it felt like it actually elevated Munster's play as I guess they dedicated the season to him. I'm sure Toulouse was heart breaking, in any season games come thick and fast and hopefully the guys are using it as motivation to see where they individually and collectively need to get to.

[Dharper]

To be fair the last 10 showed the fight was there to eek a result out. The rain and wind picked up in 2nd half and Hume alluded to the ball being very slippy.
I think my major gripe with the boxkick was most were on bafelli who was excellent under them, and didn’t give RB a sniff of catching them…..for me it was very much job done, move on. Edinburgh will be kicking themselves they should’ve scored 2/3tries, and we’d have been done. Hopefully hendo and McCloskey can rehab, time to mentally and physically recharge. I’d like to think we have a score to settle re a saffer team at home in a few weeks.
As an aside I hate 4g pitches, although I guess with NH weather they are likely to spread.
What’s going on with John Andrew? Thought he was ok start of season and bigger than roberts who is obviously offski too.
Also felt reidys little cameo last week deserved a follow up performance personally.

[MightyRearranger]

Sorry tosay, but JC now seems to be spent. ......And unable to recognise that what he is doing is aimless predictable inaccurate box kicks are not working. Embrace must have been delighted to see him coming on. Maybe time to pack it in?

Take the win ,and fantastic legal defence.
One hopes that the team are being subjected to some good old fashioned " Fergie hair dryer" treatment at every opportunity.
This is still salvageable but next game starts from zero. Tonight is already water under the bridge.

Toughen up. Failure is not an option ........not least financially !!

Maybe we should start a breakaway league, 35 minutes each way. ??
We could be world class? Sound familiar?

No question Cooney is in poor form but to suggest he packs it in right now is a bit of a kneejerk reaction and disrespectful as he was instrumental in wins all of 4 months ago.

I am all for Doak starting next week but a bit premature to write Cooney off.

I'd echo this. Cooney has been out of sorts since coming back from his long lay-off and is currently a shadow of his former self, but his former self casts quite the shadow. He was arguably the form SH in Europe for a while a few years back and at times almost carried the team on his own. He's still young enough to have a good few seasons left and if anyone has done enough to have credit in the bank it's him. With him and Doak we potentially have two top quality operators in that position and it's been a long time since we could say that.

[big mervyn]

To turn it around, I'm sure Embra are as gutted by that as we were against Munster.

The result is everything and the effect on team moral going forward should be significant.

That regional shield thing is a right load of auld ballix though. None of the Welsh teams have earned the right to be anywhere near the Heineken Cup and teams that finished 7th and 8th in the league are now playing for 2 bits of worthless silverware.

[MightyRearranger]

Had no right to win that, but puts us in a decent position for the play-off which over the season we probably deserve. That said, you have to acknowledge the commitment to the defence towards the death there. Hopefully we can start to find a bit of form again for the playoffs.

Understand what you mean, but we gave ourselves the right to win that earlier in the match, and by defence at the end.

When I said we'd no right to win I was referring to the first 20 minutes or so. It was very similar to the game against Stormers where it took us an extra 20 minutes to get started. They could and should have been out of sight by half time and it was their errors rather than our good defence that meant they weren't.

[justinr73]

I wouldn’t mind the regional shield if it was determined solely by the results of the games between the four teams and had no impact upon European qualification.

[big mervyn]

I wouldn’t mind the regional shield if it was determined solely by the results of the games between the four teams and had no impact upon European qualification.

Agreed. That's what I originally thought it was. An interprovincial championship would have some merit. The current format is absolutely pointless

[UlsterNo9]

I wouldn’t mind the regional shield if it was determined solely by the results of the games between the four teams and had no impact upon European qualification.

Agreed. That's what I originally thought it was. An interprovincial championship would have some merit. The current format is absolutely pointless

Agree, I originally thought it was also Merv, I think it was acutally sold as that also, given the amount of changes there have been in the format in the season nothing would surprise.

https://www.unitedrugby.com/latest/news ... or-winners
It gets worse, theres a trophy for finishing top of your shield, non sensical in current format.

Am I right in saying Shield for Euro qualification will only be in place up until next season then it's a straight top 8 to qualify?

[UlsterNo9]

Anyone know what happened Henderson? Off in the first 5 minutes

Went off during the TMO decision for the Timoney yellow card.