Munster 2017 -2018

[blockhead]

Murray's "hands to the eye area" incident.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XNLwbtPMUt8
Could he be cited for that?
Forget about the dying swan impression that ensued.
Could be in a bit'o'bother!

[outcast eddie]

Or take it back a step and examine the administration there and its clusterfuckery. The ship is turning slowly but I have read here that there are some promising noises coming from Munsters academy.

Munster Academy to lessen numbers in major restructuring

https://www.independent.ie/sport/rugby/ ... 38168.html

[Laighin Break]

Murray's "hands to the eye area" incident.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XNLwbtPMUt8
Could he be cited for that?
Forget about the dying swan impression that ensued.
Could be in a bit'o'bother!

Nothing in that. Just two players getting to know each other

[dropkick]

Or take it back a step and examine the administration there and its clusterfuckery. The ship is turning slowly but I have read here that there are some promising noises coming from Munsters academy.

Munster Academy to lessen numbers in major restructuring

https://www.independent.ie/sport/rugby/ ... 38168.html

It might have something to do with the proposed U23 development league. For example have an elite few in the academy and use the U23 league to find late developers. That's my theory anyway.


This year's U20s have been poor but in general the academy is producing more players than it was and although not Leinster numbers, it is starting to produce players like Johnston, Nash, etc. In the sub academy Sean French (center/fullback) and Tom Ahern (lock) look like they'll make the streamlined academy next season. They're 2 players to keep an eye on.


So while I have been Munsters academy's biggest critic for a decade, they look like they're getting things right in the last few years. Ulster too look like they have turned a corner.

[dropkick]

Just on the Keatley criticism, I don't think it's personal from the majority of fans. He isn't of the required level though. He is ok at home but away from home he falls to pieces too often.


Of all the positions the 10 has to be able to handle the pressure the most. If he is missing touch, panicking, throwing bad passes and taking wrong decisions it cripples the backline and drains positive energy from the team.


Bill Johnston today signed a 2 year contract. I think he is a far superior player to Bleyendaal, Keatley or Hanrahan. His injury record might be a problem but maybe not. Hanrahan has been very disappointing this season.

[deco]

Just on the Keatley criticism, I don't think it's personal from the majority of fans. He isn't of the required level though. He is ok at home but away from home he falls to pieces too often.


Of all the positions the 10 has to be able to handle the pressure the most. If he is missing touch, panicking, throwing bad passes and taking wrong decisions it cripples the backline and drains positive energy from the team.

Oh that's okay then: he's useless and cripples the team. We'll boo him off the pitch, but it's not personal

Munster now have four(4) 10's, 2 from Munster & 2 bought in. No other province has that luxury but it won't stop the whinging down there.

[fourthirtythree]

Yeah, but Keatley didn't deliver slow ball. He wasn't Scannell biting in for the try, or Murray waving the player through, or Scannell coughing up (with the rest of the pack) the best attacking ball you should have had with missed lineouts in the oppostition 22 that absolutely destroyed Munster's confidence.

The lineout was a much bigger concern than Keatley on Sunday. Along with the back row being nullified.

So in the context of that match, selecting Keatley as the scapegoat really misses the point. And I haven't seen much vitriol aimed at him, but the assumption out there that he was a huge problem when you had much bigger ones...

It was a team failure rather than an individual one.

[Lar]

Yeah, but Keatley didn't deliver slow ball. He wasn't Scannell biting in for the try, or Murray waving the player through, or Scannell coughing up (with the rest of the pack) the best attacking ball you should have had with missed lineouts in the oppostition 22 that absolutely destroyed Munster's confidence.

The lineout was a much bigger concern than Keatley on Sunday. Along with the back row being nullified.

So in the context of that match, selecting Keatley as the scapegoat really misses the point. And I haven't seen much vitriol aimed at him, but the assumption out there that he was a huge problem when you had much bigger ones...

It was a team failure rather than an individual one.

Correct. That said the Munster pack lost the game on Sunday to a far greater extent than any errors in the backline.

[tomthefan]

Yeah, but Keatley didn't deliver slow ball. He wasn't Scannell biting in for the try, or Murray waving the player through, or Scannell coughing up (with the rest of the pack) the best attacking ball you should have had with missed lineouts in the oppostition 22 that absolutely destroyed Munster's confidence.

The lineout was a much bigger concern than Keatley on Sunday. Along with the back row being nullified.

So in the context of that match, selecting Keatley as the scapegoat really misses the point. And I haven't seen much vitriol aimed at him, but the assumption out there that he was a huge problem when you had much bigger ones...

It was a team failure rather than an individual one.

Keatley might not have been the only problem on Sunday but the general hope going into games I'd say is that he won't have a bad one. How often does anyone think that about the likes of a POM, CJ, Murray, Earls etc. At best he's a passenger, at worst he's holding the team back.

[dropkick]

Just on the Keatley criticism, I don't think it's personal from the majority of fans. He isn't of the required level though. He is ok at home but away from home he falls to pieces too often.


Of all the positions the 10 has to be able to handle the pressure the most. If he is missing touch, panicking, throwing bad passes and taking wrong decisions it cripples the backline and drains positive energy from the team.

Oh that's okay then: he's useless and cripples the team. We'll boo him off the pitch, but it's not personal

Munster now have four(4) 10's, 2 from Munster & 2 bought in. No other province has that luxury but it won't stop the whinging down there.

You do realise you're whinging about people whinging.


Look, if you want to focus on a small percentage of Munster fans booing Keatley then I could point to a small percentage of Leinster fans misbehaving. Not that I ever had or will but it's not hard to do if you want to go down that road.

[dropkick]

Yeah, but Keatley didn't deliver slow ball. He wasn't Scannell biting in for the try, or Murray waving the player through, or Scannell coughing up (with the rest of the pack) the best attacking ball you should have had with missed lineouts in the oppostition 22 that absolutely destroyed Munster's confidence.

The lineout was a much bigger concern than Keatley on Sunday. Along with the back row being nullified.

So in the context of that match, selecting Keatley as the scapegoat really misses the point. And I haven't seen much vitriol aimed at him, but the assumption out there that he was a huge problem when you had much bigger ones...

It was a team failure rather than an individual one.

Correct. That said the Munster pack lost the game on Sunday to a far greater extent than any errors in the backline.

I thought the pack were fine apart from 3 or 4 lineouts. Strangely they kept going to the back even though Racing were targeting that area.


The team had enough possession and territory to win. They were camped on the Racing line numerous times.

[CiaranIrl]

The scapegoating of Keatley is getting ridiculous now. Eddi O'Sullivan was at it on off the ball on Monday,vans Ruadhrai O'Connor is at it now in the Indo. He played no worse or better than the rest of the team. They were shite all over the place. Even Saint Murray had a mare.

[fourthirtythree]

Three or four lineouts in the opposition 22 is one or two more than had us tearing our hair out and declaring we would never win anything ever again without a change of hookers and saying what is it that they can throw down South?

Our lineout is working well right now, it has variation, though we often keep it simple. If we go into the final and perform in the lineouts like Munster did on Sunday, we will lose.

I didn't think your pack did well. CJ had too much work to do, POM was okay though this was a game that needed a hard carrying and hard tackling six to get you back into it and that's not his game (and the lineout was, as mentioned before, cat), and JOD isn't Cloete who I think might have made a difference. I don't know that your second row was all that either - ours is transformed from this time last year by the emergence of Ryan and the resurgance of Toner (he was dropped in the latter half of last year by both Ireland and Leinster, he had been fantastic for a couple of years before that but seemed to run out of steam entirely. He's back.) but had we last year's row out on Saturday I don't think we could have delivered. It's the kind of grunt that Brad Thorne delivered that you don't always see in execution but you really notice in impact that our pack was giving but Munster's wasn't.
Stander carried 21 times - that's monstrous, but he only got 27 metres as he was a marked man, his opposite number only carried 8 times but for 64 metres. Kilcoyne was the second best carrier in your pack with 7 for 18 metres, Scannell carried lots to no avail. I don't think that Kilcoyne, as nominally the second best close in carrier in that pack did enough. Whereas Scannell probably did too many but didn't deliver from touch (there were systems errors and mistakes but he threw a couple way over which Keatley athletically rescued you from).

In short I still don't see why Keatley is the whipping boy for a match your pack lost. The big losers for me, as an Ireland supporter, were the Scannells one of whom was on desperate form and the other showing why Schmidt doesn't seem to rate him (and I had always felt he was overlooked in the midfield).

[fourthirtythree]

Murray did have a mare, and him losing the head shows where the game was lost, Murray is normally so unflappable, so composed, has so much time on the ball that he doesn't have to do anything hail Mary, he just does the right thing at the right time and even he was frustrated and niggled.

Oh, and Ciaran, you're right obviously: Keatley is a scapegoat, not a whipping boy. Different thing. Sorry.

[tomthefan]

The scapegoating of Keatley is getting ridiculous now. Eddi O'Sullivan was at it on off the ball on Monday,vans Ruadhrai O'Connor is at it now in the Indo. He played no worse or better than the rest of the team. They were shite all over the place. Even Saint Murray had a mare.

Keatley is the Quarter Back but one who never seems to run the plays.

[JohnB]

The tendency of some Munster supporters, perhaps a small number on MFs, (though I remember Keatley being roundly booed by the ‘brave and faithful’ in the autumn of 2016 at Thomond Park before Anthony Foley’s tragic demise reminded them that there are more important things than rugby), to hold Keatley accountable for collective short comings or to make him the vessel for their dissatisfaction at collective shortcomings is distasteful. I think that RB, JC or CM would need to factor that tendency into any consideration of moving to Munster.

[tomthefan]

The tendency of some Munster supporters, perhaps a small number on MFs, (though I remember Keatley being roundly booed by the ‘brave and faithful’ in the autumn of 2016 at Thomond Park before Anthony Foley’s tragic demise reminded them that there are more important things than rugby), to hold Keatley accountable for collective short comings or to make him the vessel for their dissatisfaction at collective shortcomings is distasteful. I think that RB, JC or CM would need to factor that tendency into any consideration of moving to Munster.

Your memory of him being booed at Thomond Park is faulty, he was never "roundly" booed.
A few people booed that day but they were just that, a few, and even who the booing was directed at, isn't clear.
Keatley is now coming to the end of his SEVENTH season at Munster and he's never in that time looked better
than average. The fact that he's lasted this long is more down to injuries to
others than to his own form. Where at one time having people like Bleyendaal and Holland to look
forward to, was a cause for optimism, currently there is none. Bleyendaal looks like he could be crocked
while Hanrahan looks like he's gone backwards.
How long did ye give Matt O'Connor and were ye not distasteful at all in your criticisms before he left and since?

[enby]

Their silence on the failings of Hanrahan is matched only by their outpourings of delight when his return from his less than stellar spell with Northampton was announced.

[tomthefan]

Their silence on the failings of Hanrahan is matched only by their outpourings of delight when his return from his less than stellar spell with Northampton was announced.

I'd say that all happened in your head but if you actually did experience these outpourings I'd attribute them to the prospect of an improvement however slight.

[hugonaut]

The scapegoating of Keatley is getting ridiculous now. Eddi O'Sullivan was at it on off the ball on Monday,vans Ruadhrai O'Connor is at it now in the Indo. He played no worse or better than the rest of the team. They were shite all over the place. Even Saint Murray had a mare.

I thought that O'Connor's article was balanced enough. I think it was a legitimate criticism of Keatley's performance, and I am generally a well-wisher of his ... except when Leinster are playing Munster obviously. He didn't play well. He has built up a huge body of experience with Connacht and Munster – almost 250 games, almost 200 starts – and just turned 31 at the start of the month. He's in his prime as an outhalf with loads of experience but not yet at the last chance saloon, and shouldn't be that panicky.

On the other hand, I've read very little criticism of Peter O'Mahony [bar Tony Ward, funnily enough], who was another massive under-performer. That'd lead me to believe that Keatley is – again – having that scapegoat role pushed on him.

O'Mahony has the guts of 50 test caps and [famously] captained the Lions in the first test against the All Blacks. You'd expect more from him than from a guy who has picked up seven test caps, and only three starts, over ten seasons.

As captain, POM completely failed to get his team at the emotional pitch of the game; they never fired a shot, conceded three tries and lost the game in the first 21 minutes. This isn't the first time it has happened in a big game on his watch. Pretty much exactly the same thing happened against the Scarlets in last season's Pro12 final.

His tactical decision-making was very flawed, with repeated decisions to forgo easy kicks at goal in favour of longshot try attempts off mediocre set-pieces; his tackling was mediocre [a 66% success rate with three missed from nine attempts]; his carrying – as usual – was ineffectual, with 3m gained off 7 carries [an average carry of about 43cm/carry]; and his lineout work was a complete non-event - Munster's lineout was a huge flop and he couldn't exert any real pressure on Racing ball.

So to me it was a big underperformance from him as both a player and a captain – a double whammy. It was a big game and he never showed up. It happens, nobody can play their best rugby in every game. But if you're a critic and you go after Keatley and let O'Mahony off the hook, I think it diminishes your credibility. One is a popular thing to say, the other isn't. But I think they're both reasonable and legitimate.