Leinster squad evolution

[leinsterforever]

With the departure of Cian Kelleher, I think Leinster will have to buy in some back-three talent for the season after next (assuming Kirchner and Nacewa are gone by then). My suggestions are that we pursue Patrick Osborne, and try to raid Ulster for Peter Nelson. Osborne could count as a 'project' player as far as I know, which might sweeten the deal with the Union and Nelson would be good competition for Rob Kearney, and could fill in at 13 if necessary.

Oh, and we should get Hagan back when Ross retires

[simonokeeffe]

We've had Hagan 3 times already, hes a bootycall not marriage material. Marty will come back, when is the question though.

Could always re sign Keleher in a year or two depends how long his deal is for. But we will need somebody. Is Fitzpatrick looking good?
Hudson will be free but fit?

This is not a go at you at all but I give this thread 2 more posts before it goes the way we think it will. Maybe we can move all discussions on it here in future

[blaker]

Far more importantly that X player or Y player, in my view, are the issues highlighted by Sexton in two separate sets of comments this week, fairly eviscerating the current attitude/approach when compared to his earlier stint here. Bit surprised these haven't gotten more traction here as they are fairly stark. It's not the usual "our attacking play just needs one pass to stick" type lines, it's pointed stuff. And coming from him, above all others, it must carry a lot of weight

[blaker]

double

[Kinger83]

Comments from Sexton..

“There’s plenty of stuff that can’t be fixed over a week, can’t be fixed over a few weeks – things wrong with the environment that need a long time to fix so we know that and we’re working towards that.

“I haven’t been here for the last two years so I can only speak about this season and the time before but I spoke last week about trying to get back to the level we were at and I still think we can get there but we’re a long way off.”

http://www.the42.ie/johnny-sexton-leins ... 1-May2016/

[Dave Cahill]

Far more importantly that X player or Y player, in my view, are the issues highlighted by Sexton in two separate sets of comments this week, fairly eviscerating the current attitude/approach when compared to his earlier stint here. Bit surprised these haven't gotten more traction here as they are fairly stark. It's not the usual "our attacking play just needs one pass to stick" type lines, it's pointed stuff. And coming from him, above all others, it must carry a lot of weight

I'm not surprised. A lot of people made a lot of noise last season about how all we needed to do was get rid of the coach and everything would be alright. Those of us who said hang on, theres a whole bunch of stuff wrong with Leinster on and off the pitch and getting rid of the coach won't make the slightest bit of difference if it isn't part of a holistic approach were shouted down. We were told that if we got rid of the coach we'd start playing better rugby, if we got rid of the coach we'd play more attractive rugby, if we got rid of the coach attendences would get better, if we got rid of the coach we'd be more successful. Well we got rid of the coach and we aren't playing better rugby, we aren't playing more attractive rugby, attendences have dropped, we had our worst European campaign in over a decade, our players look uninterested on those rare occasions they turn out for us and the union are redistributing our academy against our will.

MOC is Out - whats the excuse now?

[rosscarrick]

Far more importantly that X player or Y player, in my view, are the issues highlighted by Sexton in two separate sets of comments this week, fairly eviscerating the current attitude/approach when compared to his earlier stint here. Bit surprised these haven't gotten more traction here as they are fairly stark. It's not the usual "our attacking play just needs one pass to stick" type lines, it's pointed stuff. And coming from him, above all others, it must carry a lot of weight

I'm not surprised. A lot of people made a lot of noise last season about how all we needed to do was get rid of the coach and everything would be alright. Those of us who said hang on, theres a whole bunch of stuff wrong with Leinster on and off the pitch and getting rid of the coach won't make the slightest bit of difference if it isn't part of a holistic approach were shouted down. We were told that if we got rid of the coach we'd start playing better rugby, if we got rid of the coach we'd play more attractive rugby, if we got rid of the coach attendences would get better, if we got rid of the coach we'd be more successful. Well we got rid of the coach and we aren't playing better rugby, we aren't playing more attractive rugby, attendences have dropped, we had our worst European campaign in over a decade, our players look uninterested on those rare occasions they turn out for us and the union are redistributing our academy against our will.

MOC is Out - whats the excuse now?

Were people claiming MOC out would rid all problems??
Statistics aside - have you enjoyed the rugby more or less than the two previous years?
Ive enjoyed the RDS a lot more this season - of course more work needs to be done.

[simonokeeffe]

Far more importantly that X player or Y player, in my view, are the issues highlighted by Sexton in two separate sets of comments this week, fairly eviscerating the current attitude/approach when compared to his earlier stint here. Bit surprised these haven't gotten more traction here as they are fairly stark. It's not the usual "our attacking play just needs one pass to stick" type lines, it's pointed stuff. And coming from him, above all others, it must carry a lot of weight

Problem is he's said that throughout the season

Might be over optimistic here but having the internationals involved more and from much earlier in the (pre) season will help fix and drive that

[hugonaut]

Far more importantly that X player or Y player, in my view, are the issues highlighted by Sexton in two separate sets of comments this week, fairly eviscerating the current attitude/approach when compared to his earlier stint here. Bit surprised these haven't gotten more traction here as they are fairly stark. It's not the usual "our attacking play just needs one pass to stick" type lines, it's pointed stuff. And coming from him, above all others, it must carry a lot of weight

I'm not surprised. A lot of people made a lot of noise last season about how all we needed to do was get rid of the coach and everything would be alright. Those of us who said hang on, theres a whole bunch of stuff wrong with Leinster on and off the pitch and getting rid of the coach won't make the slightest bit of difference if it isn't part of a holistic approach were shouted down. We were told that if we got rid of the coach we'd start playing better rugby, if we got rid of the coach we'd play more attractive rugby, if we got rid of the coach attendences would get better, if we got rid of the coach we'd be more successful. Well we got rid of the coach and we aren't playing better rugby, we aren't playing more attractive rugby, attendences have dropped, we had our worst European campaign in over a decade, our players look uninterested on those rare occasions they turn out for us and the union are redistributing our academy against our will.

MOC is Out - whats the excuse now?

What do you think is wrong with Leinster's set-up [specifically]? And what do you think could be done to improve it?

[goreyguy]

Failure at both underage level and at academy/pro level in various areas from talent identification, talent development, coaching decisions, management decisions and player complacency/entitlement.

[blaker]

It's a two tier problem, failings in talent development/development at both underage level and at academy/pro level.

Allowing for valid concerns there, I would t imagine it is what JS is referring too beyond possibly having issues with the attitudes of some younger guys

[LeRouxIsPHat]

I've wanted us to sign a pacy back three player for probably about 3 years now. We won't be allowed to but we're crying out for it.

I'd like to see a few players just stick to one position, or at least move around less frequently. Jordi, Te'o, Isa, Luke Fitz come mind when I think of this season but there are others.

[curates_egg]

Far more importantly that X player or Y player, in my view, are the issues highlighted by Sexton in two separate sets of comments this week, fairly eviscerating the current attitude/approach when compared to his earlier stint here. Bit surprised these haven't gotten more traction here as they are fairly stark. It's not the usual "our attacking play just needs one pass to stick" type lines, it's pointed stuff. And coming from him, above all others, it must carry a lot of weight

Problem is he's said that throughout the season

Might be over optimistic here but having the internationals involved more and from much earlier in the (pre) season will help fix and drive that

Do you believe that? From what I saw, the problems started when they internationals came back.

[LeinsterLeader]

Failure at both underage level and at academy/pro level in various areas from talent identification, talent development, coaching decisions, management decisions and player complacency/entitlement.

Is that not just saying "the problem is........ everything"?

[Dave Cahill]

What do you think is wrong with Leinster's set-up [specifically]? And what do you think could be done to improve it?

Ultimately we lost too much staff in the same 12-18 month period and didn't replace them with similar or higher standard people. You just don't survive that kind of turnover in any field, sports, business - anywhere. In the space of that 12-18 month period, we lost our head coach, forwards coach, scrum coach, half of our skills coach, we lost a bunch of guys from the S&C team, Academy director. We lost our outhalf, our best ever foreign player, the greatest player this country has ever produced (and then add the usual injury overhead to that). We lost the the entire marketing team that 'built the brand' from 1,500 season tickets in donnybrook to Fever in the Aviva, we lost our Media Manager. We were also, I believe, complaiscent in 2012-13, I think that the chatter around the Irish job took Joes eye off the ball - leading (in part I hasten to add, only in part) to us falling into the Amlin and his signings weren't great either that year - leaving his successor with his hands tied and two of the least popular players ever to wear blue in situ.

None of this would be fatal in and off itself, but if you put it all together, and think how long it took to build a winning structure in Leinster in the first place, if you rip the guts out of it, then maybe its going to take a similar period to build that back. The only thing that will fix it - short of spending big on and off the field, is time.

[goreyguy]

What do you think is wrong with Leinster's set-up [specifically]? And what do you think could be done to improve it?

Ultimately we lost too much staff in the same 12-18 month period and didn't replace them with similar or higher standard people. You just don't survive that kind of turnover in any field, sports, business - anywhere. In the space of that 12-18 month period, we lost our head coach, forwards coach, scrum coach, half of our skills coach, we lost a bunch of guys from the S&C team, Academy director. We lost our outhalf, our best ever foreign player, the greatest player this country has ever produced (and then add the usual injury overhead to that). We lost the the entire marketing team that 'built the brand' from 1,500 season tickets in donnybrook to Fever in the Aviva, we lost our Media Manager. We were also, I believe, complaiscent in 2012-13, I think that the chatter around the Irish job took Joes eye off the ball - leading (in part I hasten to add, only in part) to us falling into the Amlin and his signings weren't great either that year - leaving his successor with his hands tied and two of the least popular players ever to wear blue in situ.

None of this would be fatal in and off itself, but if you put it all together, and think how long it took to build a winning structure in Leinster in the first place, if you rip the guts out of it, then maybe its going to take a similar period to build that back. The only thing that will fix it - short of spending big on and off the field, is time.

and good coaching, which we don't know if we have.

[goreyguy]

Failure at both underage level and at academy/pro level in various areas from talent identification, talent development, coaching decisions, management decisions and player complacency/entitlement.

Is that not just saying "the problem is........ everything"?

Not everything but a lot of areas need addressing/improvement.

[Dave Cahill]

and good coaching, which we don't know if we have.

We are where you wanted us.

[curates_egg]

I think our squad has evolved positively this year. Apart from trading up an out-half (albeit losing a decent quality outhalf for much of the season), we got Isa back and he has been one of our most consistent players.
Van Der Flier, Molony, Dooley, Ringrose, Leavy, McGrath and Mick Kearney are all newly established members of the squad who are already contributing arguably more than the incumbents. Treacy, Keller and Byrne have all gotten some exposure (and it is a pity to lose Kelleher).
As regards evolution for next season, we have Henshaw coming, so the main gaps are at 9 (McGrath is not at the required level yet, and Reddan is no longer), 10 (where we will have no back-up at the required standard) and an outside back (but I would question whether Byrne or Dardis would not be equally as likely to deliver as, say, Nelson).
I'm still holding out hope for a 9 (maybe vainly) but I think our squad has evolved well this year and there is an evolution path. It's not the strongest squad we've ever had but it's not the weakest and it is positively evolving.

My concern is less with the squad than with the coaching set-up. We need outside thinking (particularly in the backs). McQuilkin's influence has been so noticeable this season and is something we should be aiming to replicate in other facets.
As regards the "we are where you wanted us" - nobody wanted us coached by Leo and Dempsey. We wanted a coach who wasn't out of his depth and was able to get a grip of the situation. I still struggle to understand how other provinces have attracted coaches of the calibre they have attracted and we got Leo and Girve (given our province in terms of squad, facilities and finances is clearly in a better place than the others). I'm sure someone has more information but I would love to know the story there.

[LeinsterLeader]

Failure at both underage level and at academy/pro level in various areas from talent identification, talent development, coaching decisions, management decisions and player complacency/entitlement.

Is that not just saying "the problem is........ everything"?

Not everything but a lot of areas need addressing/improvement.

Okay GG, with that being said, heres one for ya'. Where do you think we don't need " addressing/improvement"?