Womens' rugby Talk/Gossip/Rumours Thread

Yes. I do. You make a statement denigrating players and don't expect to have to back it up?

In that case, I'm free to call it BS and not back that up either.

the Scottish ladies turned professional the same time as the Irish ladies, The Italians and Welsh earlier in 2022.

I think I am right in saying the above, surely they should have done better against the Welsh and Italians and be able to test the Scots.

Forget about England and France as they have alot more resources, why can't they put up better showings against teams whose players are treated by their unions similarly to the Irish girls when it comes to resourcing.

The reason they lost the Italy match is not because of a lack of resources or money or support from the IRFU, it boils down to the simple fact that from 9 to 15 Ireland were poor , 9 and 10 especially were very poor. I have never seen ailsa Hughes play well for Ireland ever. Dannagh obrein is young and might become a decent player for Ireland as she matures but her fitness levels are poor and that Is down to her and no one else. She is at least 2 stone over weight for her height to offer any real threat on the pitch. She is simply too slow.

Most unions were same about underage. Theres been schools cups in each of the provinces since 1800s/early 1900s. Youths rugby was very hit and miss until much much later.

An iris team comprised of players from clubs alone wouldnt be as strong but it isnt a problem.

Girls private schools not playing rugby isnt a problem or an issue. It will take years for womens team to be successful again and for a lot of reasons.. not simply IRFU and issues around the high performance squad in the irish set up but the clubs system. how players are stockpiled in far too few clubs which affects the rest of the rugby the irish players play beyond the 5/6(when they get them...) internationals a year.

the whole structure of womens rugby needs a change. clubs and where the best players play week in week out. provinces and how many games ayear at that level players get and nationally.

Saw the last 10mins, Christ what an embarrassment. The 15 made a tackle that brought the English player over the line and you'd swear it was a match saving tackle in the last minute of the match judging by her and her teammates reaction, at that stage they were 30+ to 0 down. And all smiles shaking hands at the end of the match. Ffs. As the saying goes, show me a good loser and I'll show you a loser. If women's sport wants to be treated on par with men's, they need to be better than this dross

I think that’s a very unfair comment to make imo

When the men’s team went professional, they had a similar losing record in the late 90’s as the IRFU delayed the decision to turn pro for as long as possible. In four years 1996-1999 we won three games in the five nations in total. Now they have repeated the mistake again with the women’s team and I suspect if Italy hadn’t gone professional, the Irish ladies would still be amateurs.

Yes the Irish ladies were well beaten again but this time they faced a team well organised and fully professional for a long number of years.

They have a lot of hard work and equally hard decisions in front of them

• Missing that many tackles is a no no
• Giving away daft penalties repeatedly, changing bind in maul etc
• obsession with going for tries when a penalty would take the bare look off our score

Those three things are the easier things to get sorted.

The far harder ones are

• low numbers playing rugby, can we afford to have a separate 7’s squad, I know Olympics is important but straddling both is not doing the 15s game any favours
• player pool split between Ireland and UK so how often outside 6N do they train as a group
• english club scene seems to be where the Welsh and Scottish players are playing as the standard is higher, do we need to encourage more to move across if the opportunity arises.
• Picking 18 year olds for debuts in front row to start against professionals in Welsh game is risky at best….are we really that short of looseheads to throw a young player in like that
• we need to fix the lineout although picking a hooker who was mentioned I think in commentary last week, doesn’t throw for her club, is it helping. And the replacement hooker from the Welsh game is playing great as a number 8. Can Irish rugby afford to leave Cliodhna Moloney out of the squad

This is probably going to be a long road, but I will be cheering them on once more against Scotland.

Credit to the Irish girls for making a contest of it.

"Irish rugby was a shambles back then despite having Keith Wood, Paul Wallace, Denis Hickie, Eric Elwood, The Claw, Mick Galway, David Humphrey, Eric Miller etc. We had at the time, a far better calibre of player than is currently available to the women’s team."

That's the exact point I'm making though. I'm not talking about the setup or anything like that, I'm talking about the players. Unfortunately, when you get beyond the sideshow of all the controversy they have generated, they're just a seriously poor group of players, probably the worst Irish rugby team I have ever seen, in either the men's or women's game, amateur or professional.

The future improvement that will no doubt come about eventually will happen because most of these players will have been moved on and replaced with more capable ones.

we turned pro with others at same time as them but didnt get our processes right when the game went fully open and a lot of players went to england first. we got things right later in 90s and got vast vast majority home

Havent seen game today as was working but i dont think its an obsession with going for tries more not having enough good kickers for place kicks. you see far less penalty kicks at goal in womens game anyway.

The numbers playing are low but increasing year on year. we have a good strong 7s team and shouldnt lose them. Its something world rugby should be doing and ensuring the 7s world series events dont clash with womens 6 nations or other major 15s competitions as players can play both and its different to mens games.

We cant afford to have more of our players playing in England as it affects us long term if we dont keep players here domestically. welsh/scottish can as its far easier for them to do so. I wouldnt look to recommend more travelling over. build our own domestic competitions better. get games against english sides in a pro competition and french sides and we will do better.

The mens team of the 1990s were horrific. we lost 11 in a row at one stage in the early 90s. the 90s was a very grim decade bar a few one off performances. so yes they were as bad as that and in many ways the mens team then were worse

the leaflets were connected with irish womens supporters twitter account afaik.

I think we shouldnt have to focus on 7s. we should be able to have players do both. world rugby shouldnt be getting the 7s and main 15s tournaments clashing

We do need celtic challenge to expand and then we need more clubs playing AIL and get our top players spread out across more clubs to get AIL more competitive which would strengthen that hugely which prepares players better for interpros which needs expansion as well.

We cant just export all our players to england as that doesnt help us long term. look at mens rugby. back when mens rugby went pro many of our players went to england initially but the best thing for us was getting many of them back playing here. get the systems and structures right here and get them playing games against english and french club sides then on top of a high quality set up here and we will do ok but we have to get our domestic structure in order

It is commendable to grow the Irish domestic game but that just lengthens the time it will take to raise the standard. Playing in an insular league won’t improve standards and thought processes quickly and relying on the Celtic challenge against third and fourth choice Welsh and Scottish players is not really going to add much in the short term. We could throw money at the domestic game and entice new players and start academies and try and get a bigger playing pool. But that requires money and the IRFU have never struck me as an organisation that likes spending money.

Playing against English club teams would be good but they would be glorified friendlies with all the caveats that come with non competitive games.

The men’s game benefitted from European club competition and that was a bigger help than the Celtic League and its many many successors ever brought. But I don’t see a women’s club competition being rolled out any time soon as I don’t think any of them are breaking even.

Re the penalties thing, I know that goal kicking is very much a lottery in the women’s game but to come off the field at the end of the match and see zero after your team’s name after 80 minutes can’t be good for morale. Instead of kicking for goal, we go for a lineout which was not going well and turning that into a lottery also.

The US women’s squad have 14 players in England but we should keep our players at home. Don’t worry about a talent drain to England because based on performances so far, not many would get offers.

After the 6N is over, I expect women’s rugby is drop out of sight and in 12 months we repeat the process again with similar outcomes. To improve requires change from the players, team management and the IRFU. Sadly, I think the status quo will remain.

If you don't think these players hurt badly at the shellackings, watch a couple of the post match interviews this tournament.

The reality is, when you're at rock bottom, the only way is up. And England beat Ireland by slightly less than the average that they beat all the other teams so far. That is a tiny chink of light in a grim, grim tournament for everyone involved so far, but its progress nonetheless.

The IRFU have decided to tear up the previous regime which was failing everyone and institute a professional 7s and 15s women's international setup where there will be no crossover and so the 15s lost Parsons, Mulhall and ALMC to name a few. All huge talents and big game finishers. Imagine Ireland men's being told they couldn't bring Hansen, Lowe, McCloskey and Keenan to the World Cup and just to get on with it?! That's the level of impact here.

And so the birthing process for women's professional rugby has been horrific, but judge them in 24 or 36 months. And judge the 7s on Olympic qualification.

And in the mean time, support the team, tell them they're backed, not jeered and tell the authorities that they must do better for them, to institute player management every bit as good as it is in the men's game.

It took a lot of balls for those girls to go out against that monster an England team yesterday, I'm glad to see them take heart when things go a bit better for them on the field, everyone here should too instead of the pathetic posts above.

You’re right when you say there is time to develop the domestic scene……it will take a long time as they won’t have any competitive games from teams outside Ireland other than third or fourth choice Scottish and Welsh players in the Celtic Challenge. Standards will improve gradually and expect to see a few more wooden spoons while we protect the Irish domestic players in their self contained little bubble.

The men’s teams improved with European competition and the Irish women don’t have that benchmark to test themselves against. And I don’t see any English or French clubs gunning for a European competition as the women’s games don’t draw the crowds or the tv coverage atm.

Encouraging players to go to England is not ideal, and you say it’s “hope for the best”. Are we not doing that by leaving them here ?. Not sure why you’re that concerned about the number of players going to England. Other than the ones already there, I think only another 2 possibly 3 have any real prospects of going, and if they develop quicker through more intense competition, what’s the harm in that.

There is a big gap between Ireland and the England and French teams……..but now we are allowing a gap to develop to the other three teams as well. And currently we don’t seem to have the interest to close the gap in any hurry. And qualifying foe World Cups will be a novelty pretty soon as well, but what the harm, the IRFU will have a domestic women’s game to control .

”long term developing our structures”…….that’s exactly what we don’t have, you either embrace professionalism quickly or you sit at the bottom of the 6N table for a long time. Repeated wooden spoons is not likely to encourage young girls to take up the sport, a sport that is not even played in their schools.

If Ireland didn’t play the 6N this year, we wouldn’t know how big the problem is. It’s only by outside repeated exposure to high level competition that will help grow the standards, both of our national team and our domestic leagues. Sitting at home slows the process.

Once we play Scotland, the focus on this will die down and the IRFU will pretend they have an interest in developing the women’s game, but in reality they don’t.

I have a lot of sympathy for the current players, yes, some are not good enough but like a lot of things in Ireland, we are late to the party as usual and now we want everything to go slowly slowly because we don’t like making tough decisions which will involve short term pain. And in 12, 24 and 36 months time we will repeat these discussions.

Developing the domestic game makes perfect sense…..if we had started it 10 years ago when the Fiona Coghlan’s, Lynn Cantwell’s and Paula Fiitzpatricks were winning trophies in the green jerseys. But the IRFU wasted that opportunity and going slowly slowly risks losing yet another generation who will view the national rugby team as also rans who get a lot of adverse comment.