What now for NH rugby?

[dunney77]

Bit of a disastrous World Cup for the NH so do people see a change of approach for this next cycle? I think we need to see a more running-based approach.

With teams suffering heavy injuries. Is this because our direct bossing approach encourages injuries as opposed to the expansive tactics of the SH? The breakdown has become a car crash event.

From an Irish perspective, I think the kick and chase tactic needs to give way to a more expansive game. We have arguably one of the best coaches for it but we are going to have to blood a hell of a lot of players now because not many will be at the next World Cup.

 

[OneFansOpinion]

I thin its just down to grass roots coaching.
Kids should play touch 20 minutes of every session. The structures coaches put in play are fine. But our players don't have the instinctive skill or support lines of the SH teams.
We also need to stop just filling out academies with the biggest players, and start filling them with the best footballers

 

[petite]

something is going on with the injuries it looks like te NH nations are having some troubles here. SH nations had some but not at the same extent. are they more fit?
or is it coincidence.

 

[TheOvalBall]

The situation in France for instance, needs to change. Top 2 French teams, have foreign players aplenty, and no room for other French players.

 

[TobesHodges]

I wouldn't have said disastrous, the NH Hemisphere just isn't as good as the Southern, it's hard to take but is the Fact.
Not to sure what's going to happen next, just need to hope that the grass roots systems that are in place now will pay off in 5-6 years + time..

 

[HowieLO6]

I thin its just down to grass roots coaching.
Kids should play touch 20 minutes of every session. The structures coaches put in play are fine. But our players don't have the instinctive skill or support lines of the SH teams.
We also need to stop just filling out academies with the biggest players, and start filling them with the best footballers

I'm not sure how the celtic u20s teams are performing, but the England setup is doing pretty well. No longer basing their game on a bruising battle of size, its produced some of the best young footballers out there, none of which are at all blessed in the size category.

I'd contest that plenty of players do have the ability, but the way that our professional game is played is not entirely conducive towards the game. Add to which the long season that the likes of Daly, Ford et al have been working through from a young age and you have a recipe for not progressing.

More to the point, kids already do 20 minutes of touch rugby (and more) during training. I'm not sure why this would drag us up to the quality of the ABs when a) its already in place and b) isn't exactly quantifiable in terms of noticeable improvement.

 

[sixesauldman]

Arguably the height of the NH season is January through to March, a long way from balmy September in Southern UK. Thus our top players and teams have skillsets and gameplans which best suit these conditions, if the RWC were held in NH Jan/Feb am sure we would see a better outcome. Given this would never be agreed upon by SH unions(for same reasons) would a re slotting of 6N to April/May put a greater emphasis on keeping ball alive and reward teams who nurtured such an ethos.

 

[merlinux]

Agree about the solution in france. Scale down the damn law on foreign players...
And Ideally you'd think the 6 rugby federations, would sit down and review calendars and priorities so that the national teams get some proper time together every year. That would means less matches in top 14 and co, and for sure it will never happens. We're dealing with corporate rules here.
So ultimately nothing will change, but the coaches.

edit: I dont think the style of play has anything to do with how successfull a team can be. England and SA have won 3 world cups and they arent known for their running style... The spirit, the skills, the fitness and freshness are.

 

[valley commando]

Bit of a disastrous World Cup for the NH so do people see a change of approach for this next cycle? I think we need to see a more running-based approach.

With teams suffering heavy injuries. Is this because our direct bossing approach encourages injuries as opposed to the expansive tactics of the SH? The breakdown has become a car crash event.

From an Irish perspective, I think the kick and chase tactic needs to give way to a more expansive game. We have arguably one of the best coaches for it but we are going to have to blood a hell of a lot of players now because not many will be at the next World Cup.

I wouldn't say it was a disaster as there are fine lines at this level.
Wales were blighted by injury and had we not lost so many players could easily have won the group and even the WC
Ireland started disastrously yesterday, had they not they could well have won and progressed to the semi, knock out rugby is so much harder when you end up chasing the game.
Scotland fair play yesterday was the one big game I felt they had in them ,so unlucky.
France had nowhere to go when they had to start chasing the game and will be better with a coach who picks on form players, so come 5 nations I would expect a big improvement.
Italy seem to be going through a transition at the moment with a lot of older players reaching the end, so will probably take a year or two to show any marked improvement.
Georgia deserve a place at the top table in Europe, vastly improved.
Romania fair play to them and their magnificent coach.
England certainly in media terms have learnt nothing from the debacle of 2011, in playing terms need to change coaches and captain and the stupid non English based player rule.

In terms of school reports i would award as follows -:

Wales B+
Ireland B
Scotland B-
France C-
Italy D
England C-
Georgia B
Romania C+

 

[Ragey Erasmus]

 

[martincho]

The situation in France for instance, needs to change. Top 2 French teams, have foreign players aplenty, and no room for other French players.

100% agree

 

[PacDuran]

Bit of a disastrous World Cup for the NH so do people see a change of approach for this next cycle? I think we need to see a more running-based approach.

With teams suffering heavy injuries. Is this because our direct bossing approach encourages injuries as opposed to the expansive tactics of the SH? The breakdown has become a car crash event.

From an Irish perspective, I think the kick and chase tactic needs to give way to a more expansive game. We have arguably one of the best coaches for it but we are going to have to blood a hell of a lot of players now because not many will be at the next World Cup.

Ban foreign players from domestic leagues.

 

[ncurd]

Ban foreign players from domestic leagues.

Legally way harder than it sounds all you effectively do is ban our antipodean friends and pacific islanders. You can do nothing about European or Kolpak players.

 

[valley commando]

Legally way harder than it sounds all you effectively do is ban our antipodean friends and pacific islanders. You can do nothing about European or Kolpak players.

You're right, anyway I don't agree with banning foreign players, first off the club owners wouldn't stand for it, however the limit on matchday squad players from outside the country would be a decent compromise, I'd advocate 6 non country players in a matchday 23, but this would have to be a European rule to encompass all of the European leagues.
I would be in favour of encouraging players to play in other leagues to broaden their experience and improve their game.
The stupid rule England employ re overseas players is just that, stupid. They are saying you can't play for England if you play outside of England, yet they allow clubs to employ a constant stream of non English players, keeping matchday squads to 23 would allow young talent to be given a chance, a chance currently being prevented by overload of foreign players.

 

[Canadian_Rugger]

Saying there are too many foreigners in the French League is a popular narrative with no factual basis. Between Top 14 and ProD2, France has over 30 professional teams between the two leagues.

Between these teams, there are over 1200 rugby players playing pro rugby in France. Even if only 50% of them are actual Frenchmen that's still 600+ French players to choose from, Wales, Ireland, Scotland and Italy probably have less pro players combined between them. France probably has the largest number of professional players in the World, if they can't pick a half decent national team then there is something else at play.

My personal opinion is the coaching at the National team level has been/is crap. PSA now and Mark Lievremont have, along with the FFR made an absolute mess of the National program, through inconsistent selection policy, political picks and marching out the same old tired gameplan game after game. The amount of foreigners playing rugby in the French Leagues is the least of the problems in France.

 

[Tony Manx]

Saying there are too many foreigners in the French League is a popular narrative with no factual basis. Between Top 14 and ProD2, France has over 30 professional teams between the two leagues.

Between these teams, there are over 1200 rugby players playing pro rugby in France. Even if only 50% of them are actual Frenchmen that's still 600+ French players to choose from, Wales, Ireland, Scotland and Italy probably have less pro players combined between them. France probably has the largest number of professional players in the World, if they can't pick a half decent national team then there is something else at play.

My personal opinion is the coaching at the National team level has been/is crap. PSA now and Mark Lievremont have, along with the FFR made an absolute mess of the National program, through inconsistent selection policy, political picks and marching out the same old tired gameplan game after game. The amount of foreigners playing rugby in the French Leagues is the least of the problems in France.

See it takes a Canadian to understand French rugby! Good post.....

You from Montreal perchance?!!

 

[Canadian_Rugger]

See it takes a Canadian to understand French rugby! Good post.....

You from Montreal perchance?!!

Lived there for a number of years. I'm part Acadien though, so I have some French blood in me

 

[TJAY]

Bloody typical.

A month of Rugby, and the rain turns up minutes before the last home nation is dumped out.

 

[Ospervat]

At the risk of oversimplifying I did a quick analysis of the pool results based on the top 4 NH sides vs 4 SH sides (17 Sept world rankings)

NH SH
TF - 50 87
TA. - 15 16
PF - 498 670
PA - 235 210
PD - 263 460

Interestingly the difference is 37 tries @ 5 pts = 185 pts. Add that to SH PF and you get 683 PF.
So basically NH can defend as well as any SH side they just can't score tries.

The breakdown looks like this:-

 

[Canadian_Rugger]

At the risk of oversimplifying I did a quick analysis of the pool results based on the top 4 NH sides vs 4 SH sides (17 Sept world rankings)

NH SH
TF - 50 87
TA. - 15 16
PF - 498 670
PA - 235 210
PD - 263 460

So basically NH can defend as well as any SH side they just can't score tries.

The breakdown looks like this:-
View attachment 4047

How do we solve this problem.

Quite easy actually, stop kicking away possession every five seconds and actually back yourselves to have a go with ball in hand. Rewatch the Argentina-Ireland match and look at how many times the Argentinian back three decided to have a go compared to the Irish back three. Argentina were also regularly running the ball from in their own half while Ireland were simply kicking away possession.


The Southern Hemisphere teams all back themselves with ball in hand. Australia, despite making a tonne of errors, still managed to score five tries. Now you can argue about the refereeing all you like but from a neutral perspective, the Aussies looked to play attacking rugby from the get go. The Scots scored a couple of opportunistic tries off Aussie mistakes but the team that actually went out and attacked won and rightfully so in my mind.