The UAFC

Just saw Esportifs tweet (retweeted by Ulster rugby). About as blatant an advertisement for a player as you will ever see.

Should we have a genuine concern that he has a getout clause? Struggle to think that it would be failure to progress out of the group stages, but it could be quite reasonable for him to have insisted that he could be released if we are not in the SDC next year. After all he will want to be playing in Europe to be in the shop window for when his contract is up.

It may simply be advertising for the season after next. He certainly won't be staying at Ulster.

I genuinely feel for the guy, from his point of view he must be gutted to be here. As a player he literally couldn't do any more for the side.

On one side I feel like he is just here at the wrong time. Having said that, as terrible a season as this is, can you imagine where we would be without him?? Probably bottom 4...

Have we stopped paying him or something?

Presumably not, so there are about a million reasons why he shouldn't be (and no doubt isn't) gutted to be at Ulster (and why you shouldn't be shedding too many tears for him).

I'm also assuming that he had at least some idea that we wouldn't walking away with the league or challenging in Europe too strongly either...

I hate stats but here goes.

For Ulster in the Pro 12 Charles has gained the most meters, the most carries (2nd overall teams) the most offloads and leads the defenders beaten Pro 12 stat at 40 (next best is 35).

Interestingly Reidy leads the Pro 12 'Most tackles made' stat at 155 - next best is 146 and Ruan has passed the most 814 compared to the next at 607 - now that is a telling stat!!

Joe Schmo wrote:I hate stats but here goes.

For Ulster in the Pro 12 Charles has gained the most meters, the most carries (2nd overall teams) the most offloads and leads the defenders beaten Pro 12 stat at 40 (next best is 35).

Interestingly Reidy leads the Pro 12 'Most tackles made' stat at 155 - next best is 146 and Ruan has passed the most 814 compared to the next at 607 - now that is a telling stat!!

That may be something to do with the fact he is a scrum half, just saying

Much against the grain I checked out Twatter and wonder WTF are we talking about hear? Mountains & molehills come to mind. Imagine a PR & Rep company boosting their player to the sadsack social media. You could have named a clatter of players there who they are suggesting are worldbeaters, including young Stockcube.

Not like ye biy.

UlsterAreBrill wrote:

Joe Schmo wrote:I hate stats but here goes.

For Ulster in the Pro 12 Charles has gained the most meters, the most carries (2nd overall teams) the most offloads and leads the defenders beaten Pro 12 stat at 40 (next best is 35).

Interestingly Reidy leads the Pro 12 'Most tackles made' stat at 155 - next best is 146 and Ruan has passed the most 814 compared to the next at 607 - now that is a telling stat!!

That may be something to do with the fact he is a scrum half, just saying

I was going to be flippant and opine that Ruan is not the only 9 in the league .................however I will give more informed info.

You know the way Ulster struggle to breach gainlines? Well, they at least by and large understand how to recycle the ball therefore I think you can res assured that at least 500 of Ruan's passes will have come after 1 or zero metre rumbles, another 100 will have come from retreating attempted carries, when our ball carrier had his living jesus bate clean out of him.

It means only one person ever picks the ball up from the back of a ruck for us. How many times have our forwards picked and went from the base this season?

ruckover wrote:It means only one person ever picks the ball up from the back of a ruck for us. How many times have our forwards picked and went from the base this season?

Not enough

BaggyTrousers wrote:Much against the grain I checked out Twatter and wonder WTF are we talking about hear? Mountains & molehills come to mind. Imagine a PR & Rep company boosting their player to the sadsack social media. You could have named a clatter of players there who they are suggesting are worldbeaters, including young Stockcube.

Not like ye biy.

Yeah, fair, but it comes just as whispers are being whispered that Charles has precautions in place which give him the option of saying no thanks should we become a Parker Pen club. Now bedore the season that looked very unlikely, and I think even now the bookies would favour us being in the SDC, but we will have to manage a big turn around.

And justin, there are multiple other clubs out there who would match (or more likely better) any wage we are paying him, money alone is not going to be enough to keep him here if he gets the option to leave

We will hopefully never find out, as I think we will manage top 6, but it's a scary thought given that we would have lost even more games without him

Eggs wrote:

BaggyTrousers wrote:Much against the grain I checked out Twatter and wonder WTF are we talking about hear? Mountains & molehills come to mind. Imagine a PR & Rep company boosting their player to the sadsack social media. You could have named a clatter of players there who they are suggesting are worldbeaters, including young Stockcube.

Not like ye biy.

Yeah, fair, but it comes just as whispers are being whispered that Charles has precautions in place which give him the option of saying no thanks should we become a Parker Pen club. Now bedore the season that looked very unlikely, and I think even now the bookies would favour us being in the SDC, but we will have to manage a big turn around.

And justin, there are multiple other clubs out there who would match (or more likely better) any wage we are paying him, money alone is not going to be enough to keep him here if he gets the option to leave

We will hopefully never find out, as I think we will manage top 6, but it's a scary thought given that we would have lost even more games without him

While he is a class player, when on the wing, you couldn't begrudge him all that much for jumping ship if he could and we didn't qualify for the SDC next year. And there will be benefits if he does decide to leave, most notably the financial benefits and it also gives the likes of Lyttle and Stockdale more game time

However, we definitely wouldnt be in the position we would be without him. Swings and roundabouts and all that

ruckover wrote:It means only one person ever picks the ball up from the back of a ruck for us. How many times have our forwards picked and went from the base this season?

What are Conor Murrays stats? I doubt he has had to pass half the amount Ruan has as his forwards can take on the ball

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Russ wrote:

ruckover wrote:It means only one person ever picks the ball up from the back of a ruck for us. How many times have our forwards picked and went from the base this season?

What are Conor Murrays stats? I doubt he has had to pass half the amount Ruan has as his forwards can take on the ball

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Murray and Pienaar are completely different players.

I'm sure Murray will pass it a lot less as he box kicks the ball constantly. He's also much better than Pienaar at running it himself around the fringes of the rucks.

thecrouch wrote:

Russ wrote:

ruckover wrote:It means only one person ever picks the ball up from the back of a ruck for us. How many times have our forwards picked and went from the base this season?

What are Conor Murrays stats? I doubt he has had to pass half the amount Ruan has as his forwards can take on the ball

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Murray and Pienaar are completely different players.

I'm sure Murray will pass it a lot less as he box kicks the ball constantly. He's also much better than Pienaar at running it himself around the fringes of the rucks.

The point I am illustrating is that Munsters forwards take pressure off of Murray. Ours are so bad Pienaar has to take all responsibility

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I bet we won't need to worry about the small print on page 6 of CHARLES contract as we will do enough to quality for the SDC and he will see out his last year... in saying that the wage bill for him and the two new Bokkes isn't doing anything to reduce the debt albeit Ruan's will go some way towards offsetting some of the additional cost... at least he enjoyed his weekend in Paris...

Eggs wrote:

BaggyTrousers wrote:Much against the grain I checked out Twatter and wonder WTF are we talking about hear? Mountains & molehills come to mind. Imagine a PR & Rep company boosting their player to the sadsack social media. You could have named a clatter of players there who they are suggesting are worldbeaters, including young Stockcube.

Not like ye biy.

Yeah, fair, but it comes just as whispers are being whispered that Charles has precautions in place which give him the option of saying no thanks should we become a Parker Pen club. Now bedore the season that looked very unlikely, and I think even now the bookies would favour us being in the SDC, but we will have to manage a big turn around.

And justin, there are multiple other clubs out there who would match (or more likely better) any wage we are paying him, money alone is not going to be enough to keep him here if he gets the option to leave

We will hopefully never find out, as I think we will manage top 6, but it's a scary thought given that we would have lost even more games without him

He had his choice of those clubs when he signed for Ulster Eggs and he chose us (whether it was to join the God Squad, whether it because he fancied the uphill challenge of winning a trophy with Ulster or because he loves the rain or whatever).

I maintain that there's no reason for him to be gutted nor any reason to feel sorry for him.

Whether or not he has a get-out clause is another matter. If he has, and we don't qualify for the SDC, then he'd obviously be perfectly within his rights to exercise it.

It's a shame there isn't a clause in his contract that specifies that he has to play on the wing.

Just out of interest, which games are we saying he won for us besides the Exeter one?

He's got 6 tries (4 in a losing cause) plus the ones against Clermont and Cardiff when we scored 30 odd points and has been AWOL a similar number of times in defence.

For what it's worth, I reckon we're yet to see the best of Charles and he's going to have a field day during the 6N.