Southern Kings Vs Leinster Nov 4th

[paddyor]

They seem to have improved this season. We’re going to the academy if none of the 5 with Ireland are released and it seems doubtful they will be for a trip to SA. Is connors back yet?

[cormac]

I just hope we've got the correct visas for our NZ players this year.

[leinsterforever]

Wonder how many players will be taken to SA. It was limited to 28 last season, but I think they might have bumped it up since then. Ulster took 30. But they had two games. 28 would probably be enough if there's only one match - the 23 plus a prop (Milne or Aungier), a hooker (Kelleher), a lock/backrower (Murphy or Dowling), an extra scrumhalf (HOS, or Patterson if McCarthy is phased out) and an extra outside back (I can see all of Frawley, Tom Daly, COB, JOB and Jack Kelly making the touring party if Ross Byrne is with Ireland and DK is still absent)

The Kings will be no pushovers. They gave the Scarlets a tough game by the looks of things

[hugonaut]

No idea where we stand on this with regards to selection.

The absence of Ferg and Dave Kearney is going to be sorely felt. We have 13 guys in the squad with over 100 Leinster appearances to their name. Only four of them aren't on international duty – Ferg [173 Leinster appearances], DK [125], Bent [109] and Reider [104] – and the first two are injured. That leaves us short on experience, particularly as we can't pick Fardy, JGP and Lowe together.

I think this is one where the pendulum swings towards JGP and Lowe for selection. We've got no RK, Larmour, Ferg, DK, Barry Daly in the back three, so we're legitimately short of personnel outside of Lowe, Tomane and AB+. We can field a second row corps of Molony, Kearney and Nagle without dipping into the academy.

The Kings leak tries: 32 conceded in 7 games, not too short of 5/game. Lowe will bag us tries and buckets of metres in this game, plus he has played in South Africa numerous times in his four years of Super Rugby. Tomane has the same experience. I had a brief look at the forecast for Port Elizabeth next weekend, and it's due to be c.20º, relatively dry. It's more likely to be a bit of a shoot-out rather than a slog, and Lowe is a gunslinger.

We need JGP at scrum-half for this game. His form is making him more and more important to our gameplan, especially in a team sans Sexton. Hughie isn't ready for the start and it doesn't make sense to invest the gametime in Nick McCarthy from the get-go at the cost of omitting JGP from the travelling party. McCarthy isn't going to be here next season, and he isn't a patch on JGP – so you'd lose out in this game, and get nothing for it in the long term.

Forwards [1-8]: Dooley, Tracy, Bent, Molony, M. Kearney, Doris [A], Penny [A], Deegan
Backs [9-15]: Gibson-Park, Reid, Tomane, C. O'Brien [A], O'Loughlin, A. Byrne, Lowe
Subs [16-23]: B. Byrne, E. Byrne, Abdaladze, Nagle, J. Murphy, O'Sullivan [A], Frawley [A], J. Kelly [A]

[LeRouxIsPHat]

I really don't get this notion of not investing in game time in McCarthy. Sorry for going on about it but if he's potentially going to be benching in Europe then why wouldn't we want to keep him sharp? It's not like we have an issue at 9 going forward, JGP and Luke are 26 and 25 respectively so it's not like when we had Boss and Reddan and were desperate to develop someone behind them. If there was nothing between HOS and McCarthy then fair enough the guy who's staying should get the nod more often than not, but if McCarthy is still third choice on merit and has the potential to play a big role at the business end of the season then he should get games.

That said, I think things are beginning to swing in JGP's favour for Europe. Lowe is nailed on for me but with Dev and Ryan being 80 minute men and Fardy not starting I think JGP should really be in the squad. That might change in the knockout games but I don't think we particularly need Fardy to beat Bath, Wasps, or Toulouse now that we have them at home. That still wouldn't change my opinion of McCarthy needing games though because we'd still be one injury away from needing him.

[hugonaut]

I really don't get this notion of not investing in game time in McCarthy. Sorry for going on about it but if he's potentially going to be benching in Europe then why wouldn't we want to keep him sharp? It's not like we have an issue at 9 going forward, JGP and Luke are 26 and 25 respectively so it's not like when we had Boss and Reddan and were desperate to develop someone behind them. If there was nothing between HOS and McCarthy then fair enough the guy who's staying should get the nod more often than not, but if McCarthy is still third choice on merit and has the potential to play a big role at the business end of the season then he should get games.

That said, I think things are beginning to swing in JGP's favour for Europe. Lowe is nailed on for me but with Dev and Ryan being 80 minute men and Fardy not starting I think JGP should really be in the squad. That might change in the knockout games but I don't think we particularly need Fardy to beat Bath, Wasps, or Toulouse now that we have them at home. That still wouldn't change my opinion of McCarthy needing games though because we'd still be one injury away from needing him.

Well, because we need help in the back three. We gave Lowe the week off for the Treviso game and had RK available for selection. We don't have a recognised FB available to us in the squad at the moment with RK, Larmour and DK all unavailable. Lowe is the obvious guy to slot in there, and that makes it a choice between JGP and Scott Fardy for the other spot.

I've a strong suspicion that this is going to be a loose game rather than a tight game. Weather conditions, opposition style, players available to us etc. point towards that conclusion. I think selecting JGP in those conditions is a better use of resources than Scott Fardy. Once you make that decision [Fardy or JGP], then the sub scrum-half position becomes easy - if you go with Fardy, you automatically bring Nick McCarthy as starter and Hughie as bench. If you go with JGP, what's the point of bringing Nick McCarthy on the bench?

It's against the Kings - they're last in the conference. Whether we play Hughie O'Sullivan or Nick McCarthy for 10mins at the end of it shouldn't be game changing. And 10 mins against the King isn't going to do very much for Nick McCarthy's performances for snippets of European matches. Flying 20 hours there and back to play 10 minutes against a sh*t team? McCarthy has accumulated a decent amount of experience off the bench already, whereas every minute is a big deal at HOS's career stage. There's more value in selecting O'Sullivan.

[cormac]

Anyone know the severity of Dave Kearney's injury? Was described as an "abductor strain" in last week's injury update. Wonder if there's a chance he'll be fit for this game?

[LeRouxIsPHat]

Well, because we need help in the back three. We gave Lowe the week off for the Treviso game and had RK available for selection. We don't have a recognised FB available to us in the squad at the moment with RK, Larmour and DK all unavailable. Lowe is the obvious guy to slot in there, and that makes it a choice between JGP and Scott Fardy for the other spot.

I've a strong suspicion that this is going to be a loose game rather than a tight game. Weather conditions, opposition style, players available to us etc. point towards that conclusion. I think selecting JGP in those conditions is a better use of resources than Scott Fardy. Once you make that decision [Fardy or JGP], then the sub scrum-half position becomes easy - if you go with Fardy, you automatically bring Nick McCarthy as starter and Hughie as bench. If you go with JGP, what's the point of bringing Nick McCarthy on the bench?

It's against the Kings - they're last in the conference. Whether we play Hughie O'Sullivan or Nick McCarthy for 10mins at the end of it shouldn't be game changing. And 10 mins against the King isn't going to do very much for Nick McCarthy's performances for snippets of European matches. Flying 20 hours there and back to play 10 minutes against a sh*t team? McCarthy has accumulated a decent amount of experience off the bench already, whereas every minute is a big deal at HOS's career stage. There's more value in selecting O'Sullivan.

Sorry if I wasn't clear but I was only talking about the choice between Nick and HOS for the bench next week, I was assuming that JGP will start.

The point of bringing Nick off the bench is just as I said, to keep him sharp. He missed the start of the season and hasn't exactly had loads of pitch time since his return so I don't see his time as being so much less valuable than if it was given to HOS, he needs it too IMO. HOS has had a couple of cameos already, I'd say he's ahead of where he should be in terms of minutes tbh, and I just don't see any great need for him to get that much game time in order to be ready to be third choice next season.

I think you're putting a really idealistic spin on things in regard to what's expected of our nines going forward. What if it's not ten minutes this weekend? What if JGP goes off after five minutes? What if Luke gets injured five minutes into the Bath away game on a horrible muddy pitch? What if we decide to give Nick the last half an hour this weekend? Your approach seems to be "break glass in case of emergency", I'm saying we should prepare for the emergency. It's not like it's unrealistic that we might need Nick for a big game, he's already likely to be in the squad for them.

[suisse]

For me, the solution to this is pretty clear. We go into the European games with McGrath and Park as our 9s and we make a call on Lowe or Fardy depending on the opposition. We need Lowe more than Fardy now because of other options and it means we are going in with our 2 better scrum halves.

Pick O'Sullivan to start or bench league games when McGrath is unavailable. McCarthy is down to 4th choice and he doesn't see more game time unless there's an injury. This isn't in spite. I'd rather have Park and McGrath for Europe anyway and we should be looking at O'Sullivan now for minutes ahead of departing player.

[curates_egg]

No idea where we stand on this with regards to selection.

...

Forwards [1-8]: Dooley, Tracy, Bent, Molony, M. Kearney, Doris [A], Penny [A], Deegan
Backs [9-15]: Gibson-Park, Reid, Tomane, C. O'Brien [A], O'Loughlin, A. Byrne, Lowe
Subs [16-23]: B. Byrne, E. Byrne, Abdaladze, Nagle, J. Murphy, O'Sullivan [A], Frawley [A], J. Kelly [A]

I'm not sure I buy the first line of your post. I would say you are close to spot on, given the Irish touring party announced (including Ross Byrne).
I wonder will one of Leavy or SOB be on the plane, since they will not be in Chicago. If not, it would have been an ideal game to have Fardy at 6, but I think the need elsewhere may be (even) greater.
It's a good development squad but, given Kings are playing a bit more cohesively this season and we are away, I wouldn't bank on it being a pushover.

[LeRouxIsPHat]

For me, the solution to this is pretty clear. We go into the European games with McGrath and Park as our 9s and we make a call on Lowe or Fardy depending on the opposition. We need Lowe more than Fardy now because of other options and it means we are going in with our 2 better scrum halves.

Pick O'Sullivan to start or bench league games when McGrath is unavailable. McCarthy is down to 4th choice and he doesn't see more game time unless there's an injury. This isn't in spite. I'd rather have Park and McGrath for Europe anyway and we should be looking at O'Sullivan now for minutes ahead of departing player.

That's ignoring the fact that Nick benched for the European games though, and ignoring the possibility of an injury. The idea that we might have an under-cooked third choice playing a big knockout game this season just so that our 4th choice could be fast tracked so that he's better equipped to be a less needed third choice next season is just something that I can't get my head around.

If the coaches decide that HOS is third choice soon then that's a different kettle of fish but it's not the case right now.

[suisse]

I get what you're saying but for me it should be McGrath and Park as our 9 and 20 with either Lowe or Fardy dropping out. There are 11 Pro 14 games between now and a potential "big knock out game" so a lot of time to work on O'Sullivan. But, anyway, despite all that, to be honest, I am not a big fan of McCarthy. I just don't rate him that highly. I'm far from McGrath's biggest fan, too. I think we have an issue down the line at 9 and we should be investing a lot of time in O'Sullivan to see if he is the player to eventually own that jersey.

[johng]

McFadden out for 4 months. Dave K back in training.

We have 13 players in Irish Squad v Italy. Another 6 that will not travel to SA cause they are with Ireland. (Sexton, O'Brien, Leavy, Rob K, Healy Henshaw) McFadden, Will Connors and Barry Daly defo out.

So if Dave K is fit to travel that's half our senior squad available. (22) We can only select 21 though because of the 3 furriner rule. Meaning that without further injury we will need 7 or 8 Academitians traveling in a squad of 28ish.

Dorris is on a senior contract btw.

[curates_egg]

Devastating news for McFadden. Not good to have such a bad tear on the hamstring so soon.

If Dave is fit (a big if), I would think he has to start this one instead of Lowe, as we arguably need Fardy and JGP more.

[BlueWheels]

The Indo has Dave K on the plane for the trip to Bokland. with Rob doubtful for the most of November

https://www.independent.ie/sport/rugby/ ... 74556.html

Gutted for Ferg, he has had shite luck with injuries lately.

[Leinsterlunatic]

I wonder if there's a possibility of picking up some AIL Players akin to Mick McGrath or Royce Burke Flynn?

[wixfjord]

Would be very interesting to see Jack Kelly benching for this one.

[mildlyinterested]

Leinster Rugby squad

Backs (12)

Adam Byrne (40 Leinster Rugby caps)
Tom Daly (10)
Ciarán Frawley (3)*
Jamison Gibson-Park (57)
Dave Kearney (125)
Hugo Keenan (2)*
Conor O’Brien (4)*
Jimmy O’Brien (0)*
Rory O’Loughlin (47)
Hugh O’Sullivan (2)*
Noel Reid (104)
Joe Tomane (8)

Forwards (15)

Vakh Abdaladze (2)
Michael Bent (109)
Bryan Byrne (29)
Ed Byrne (27)
Max Deegan (26)
Peter Dooley (51)
Caelan Doris (3)
Scott Fardy (28)
Mick Kearney (39)
Rónan Kelleher (0)*
Dan Leavy (57)
Ross Molony (68)
Josh Murphy (11)
Scott Penny (0)*
James Tracy (74)

[coolbawn]

All other things being equal, I imagine they would leave full-time students like Jack Kelly at home to study if possible ?

[cormac]

No James Lowe or Nick McCarthy, but Leavy has been released from the Ireland squad. I'm guessing that Kelleher and Penny will be the two forwards not to make the match-day squad, with Jimmy O'Brien and Keenan missing out in the backs.