Welcome to my 80+ column, a weekly post featuring final thoughts from the week of rugby just gone.  

WRAP OF A WRAP

Friday, June 12, 2012 is when Keego posted his first article on the old HarpinOnRugby.net website, titled “Keego on…Kidney & Kryptonite”.  Then on Friday, March 1, 2013 we got the first offering from Cian “RugbyKino” O’Muilleoir, titled “Stat of the Nation Address”.  For over 10 years they have both added their own brand of awesome content and it was great to have two “old school” contributors help me wrap the win over the Sharks for our latest pod.

If you missed it, check it out on Spotify here or on most major platforms.

HARPIN ON…LEINSTER’S SQUAD MANAGEMENT

For our bonus clip we harped on Leinster’s enviable headache of keeping a 60-strong squad of players happy, over the season as a whole and particularly over this period of weekly knockout fixtures.

One point I forgot to mention was the critical cultivation of what I call “switch hitting props”, a kind of crude adaptation of baseball terminology but I still like to use it.  Allowing the likes of Andrew Porter and Cian Healy to be match ready on both sides of the front row has played a major role in Leinster’s ability to react to injuries over the course of a match AND a season over the past couple of years.

If you’re playing the clip above maybe pop over and subscribe to the channel too?  That’s where we post our Preview Show as well as other content throughout the week.

JORDAN LARMOUR TRY TIK TOK

Might have been against 14 (or as Kino pointed out just before this TikTok clip, essentially 13 due to an injury to du Toit) but Harry Byrne’s crossfield kick to Larmour for our third try was still a joy to watch.

“WHY WE LOVE RUGBY” 🤢

I’m sorry but this really, really, REALLY bugs me.  Just to be clear, I don’t mean the sporting act itself, rather the fact that people try to make out that you only see things like this in rugby.  NOT. THE. CASE.   It really is very simple – first, there are examples of good sportsmanship in all sports but also, it’s not like rugby is perfectly clean all the time either.  The whole concept of “rugby values” never really sat well with me, partly because it’s not sport-specific but also there’s a tinge of elitism to it as well.

Can we not just say this was a nice thing to do and move on?

AVIVA FATIGUE

I’m calling it “Avivapalooza”, namely the festival of rugby at Irish HQ that goes way back to Ireland’s Grand Slam victory.  From March 18 until now there have been 8 weekends, with 5 of them having Leinster/Ireland at the Aviva, 1 at the RDS and the other two literally in the other half of the world.  All this with two and possibly three more to come over the next few weeks.  Is this me complaining?  Absolutely not.  Am I agreeing with those ABL factions on social media who claim the sport is rigged?  Also absolutely not – with the exception of the HCC final for which Ireland was due, home advantage is earned and Leinster have definitely done that on the pitch.  Still worth noting how often we’re going to the venue these days, though.  Reminds me of the 2012/13 season when a similar series of quirky happenings saw the RDS host 5 weeks of matches in a row.  Not the easiest to sell when you live in a house where you’re the only egg-chasing nut!!!! 

DOING THE DOUBLE

While I’m on the subject of Leinster’s knockout rugby fetish, I might as well take the excuse to bring up my constant bugbear over the structure of the European rugby season.  I have said for a long, long time that it needs an overhaul to an extent where the two major competitions that every club can win each season are played in separate blocks over the season.  

That way not only can a club be rewarded for being on form in the earlier half of the season, but also it would remove what I think is a ridiculous requirement for coaches to pick and choose which matches they want to prioritize over the course of a season.  The ideal should be for coaches to select their best available squad for every weekend and while I know this can’t ALWAYS be done, the status quo rules it out altogether and just because it has been normalised over decades doesn’t mean it shouldn’t be changed as far as I’m concerned.

I know Leicester, Wasps, Toulouse, Exeter and Sarries have all managed to “do the double” over the years (although one or two of the more recent ones do come with COVID/salary cap asterisks) but as things stand right now I have to wonder if Leinster are the only team that could possibly have the resources to come close to winning both if something doesn’t change.  I mean as much as that fact pleases me as a fan of the province, it certainly doesn’t when I look at it as a fan of the sport.

HCC FORMAT

There’s a lot in this Indo interview with the IRFU CEO but one sentence caught my eye on first read…I’ve mentioned the HCC format quite a bit on this column throughout the season, how it doesn’t bother me as much as it seems to bother a lot of fans, but it looks like we’re going to have it for the next campaign too which of course would mean more complaints.

“EPCR is so important to Irish Rugby and the provinces. Getting its structure right is critical,” he adds, stating that he is involved in a consultation process with EPCR to update the structures from 2024/’25.”

AI RUGBY : LEINSTER V SHARKS DRY RUN

My inner nerd loves doing it so whether you like it or not, this will become a regular Harpin’ feature.  On Friday once the team is announced I’ll be feeding the two matchday squads into ChatGPT using the prompt below to see what it comes up with. 

On our Preview Show the score will update throughout the pod and I’ll provide the actual receipts here in the 80+.   As you can see below, the AI felt Leinster would also win well, albeit with a few more tries from our guests.

INJURY REPORT

Some decent news this week, still makes for an interesting selection at the weekend though….

official report

Joe McCarthy came through the game at the weekend against Cell C Sharks with no issues after his recovery from an ankle injury.

Rónan Kelleher was involved in the wider match day squad at the weekend and will be available to train fully this week after his recovery from a shoulder injury.

Scott Penny has entered the Graduated Return to Play Protocols and will be further assessed as the week progresses.

Robbie Henshaw is expected to step up his rehabilitation from a minor quad issue this week and will be further assessed as the week progresses.

James Lowe is expected to step up his rehabilitation from a calf injury and will be further assessed as the week progresses.

Cian Healy picked up an ankle injury against Cell C Sharks and will be further assessed as the week progresses.

There are no further updates on:
Vakhtang Abdaladze (neck), Ed Byrne (tricep), Rhys Ruddock (hamstring), Johnny Sexton (groin), Jamie Osborne (knee), Martin Moloney (knee)

AIL UPDATE

We’ve been updating this segment all season so even though we covered the AIL final on the pod, I’d still like to offer congrats to all involved at Terenure College RFC for capping off a fine campaign with the championship.  It was a comprehensive win on the day for sure but overall after starting the league with a long unbeaten run it was no more than they deserve.

There were of course a host of other matches over the weekend as the promotion and relegation issues across the five AIL divisions were sorted out.  Shannon’s win over Highfield means they remain in the top flight with City of Armagh being the only newcomers next season.  Also congrats to my “alma mater” Blackrock College who beat MU Barnhall at Stradbrook to more them up to the second tier.

SEVENS UPDATE

The Sevens circuit kicks back into gear this weekend and for the women Toulouse is actually the final tournament of the series.  The way the standings look I very much doubt we can crack the top four but we should be anxiously looking over our shoulders at both Fiji and GB behind us so we’ll need a strong showing with Brazil, Australia and hosts France in our pool.

Meanwhile for the men it is the penultimate leg of the series with Twickers still to come the following weekend.  A shocker of a  Singapore leg has us down in 9th on the ladder, a big drop since our excellent silver in Dubai at the start of the season.  If we can click over the next two weeks however we can more up a place or two and we’re up against Samoa, Oz & Japan this weekend.

MLR UPDATE

Not going to be able to watch a game back this week, although that’s ok because as I said before I have adopted the New England Free Jacks as my team for this season and they were off for this round.

But even with the bye week they remain a healthy 9pts clear in the East, and they can extend that lead even further if they win next weekend against Old Glory.  Meanwhile out West the San Diego’s win in Utak means they also have a cushion with Seattle and Houston, who meet next weekend, also in the playoff positions for now.

HARPIN’ PREDICTION LEAGUE

Well.  All season 1st place in the HPL has switched back and forth between myself and RugbyKino, only for Mark Jackson to leap over both of us into top spot with just three matches left to predict!!!  Like I have always said I’m mostly happy not to be the cellar dweller this season (that honour was clinched by Keego literally months ago) but still to have come so close it’s a bit of a pain to drop to 3rd towards the end.  My biggest errors recently were forgetting one match altogether in the last round, and not believing in Munster wanting victory more than Glasgow in this one.

THE NEXT BATCH OF HARPIN’

It’s all about Munster now.  Things should be relatively normal for the coming week so be sure to stay tuned to all our usual corners of social media to keep up with our latest content.

 In the meantime, be sure to enjoy your rugby wherever you are.  JLP

Welcome to my 80+ column, a weekly post featuring final thoughts from the week of rugby just gone.  

WRAP OF A WRAP

Hopefully Mark Jackson will be able to return to our pod lineup soon, and we’re grateful to Conor Cronin for stepping in for him on Sunday to join Tom Coleman, and as ever they did a bang up job covering all the harpin’ points.  There were a couple of incidents that needed some video to help illustrate so I’ll deal with them further down the column, as well as the very selective interpretations from those who MIGHT have been using a little bias…

If you missed it, check it out here on Spotify or on most major platforms.

HARPIN ON…LEINSTER’S ⭐OF THE MATCH CONTENDERS

Disagreeing or at least debating the award of Player or Star of the Match awards (Sidebar – why are some people making such a big deal about the switch away from MotM? Get over it FFS) has been common this season which ain’t a bad position for any team to be in.  This match was certainly no exception so for the bonus clip we each selected a player and harped on their performance.  And even THAT wasn’t enough so there was an extra name thrown into our main TikTiok clip, see below.

If you’re playing the clip above maybe pop over and subscribe to the channel too?  That’s where we post our Preview Show as well as other content throughout the week.

JACK CONAN & JAMES RYAN TIK TOKS 

See above for the reason behind the Conan TikTok, but I also thought it was worth producing a 2nd from the Toulouse match because watching it with the naked eye I was blown away by James Ryan’s determined grab ahead of the JVDF try at the weekend.  It really did look like it had been turned over but he simply wasn’t having it.

THE WEEKLY ABL INQUEST

All day Sunday there was a heated discussion online about a supposed travesty that might have helped Leinster win…well, I suppose that could be said about pretty much ANY given Sunday over the past few seasons, but this time it was over the incidents involving Porter and Neti. When I was watching the match live I missed the Porter one, and while I did see the Neti hit on JVDF, I missed the very important context of the clash just before it, and after watching all the subsequent replays, I still missed it.

This continued online with sometimes still photos and more often slowed-down footage of the second clash somehow serving as “proof” that the incident shouldn’t have been a penalty. Thankfully someone ended up sharing the full incident which you can see below.

But I’d rather focus on the groupthink that is behind these campaigns for now. We started the season by talking about this ABL or “Anyone But Leinster” groupthink. To be clear, I don’t actually mind it, the only thing I’d want to do is acknowledge that it exists. A team that wins as often as Leinster do is bound to have haters, even or possibly especially Irish ones.

Generally their MO is to search for one or two gombeen Leinster fan comments (of which there will be some for sure, because being a gombeen has nothing to do with where you’re from) and make it out like that represents the whole province. Or in the case of Sunday, just make it look like there’s some grand conspiracy to help Leinster and/or Ireland win.

Sad, really.

THAT 5022 AND THE REACTION

I wouldn’t class this as an example of ABL, more someone trying to suit a narrative of online commentary in general.

But anyway I’ll include our exchange as well as my original tweet that sparked it. For full disclosure when Conor said on the pod that it shouldn’t have been a 5022 that was news to me so I went back to confirm it and just wanted to share that with my followers.

I mean, of COURSE it’s over analysis, but isn’t that what’s to be expected from a fansite????

GREG MCWILLIAMS

I’ve never met Greg, and all I’ve heard is that he’s a nice guy who apparently has been thrown under the bus. I really think his “I see them as my daughters” comment during the Six Nations campaign was incredibly tone deaf but overall to make it look like it was just his coaching that led to the results over the past month or so doesn’t exactly sit well.

As Tom pointed out on our pod, the fact that Cliodhna Moloney scored two tries and won PotM for Exeter in the Allianz Cup final on the very same day the test side was picking up the wooden spoon speak volumes.

For me this line in a recent article from Sinead Kissane says it all…

She was the only person in the player’s representative group after the explosive letter to the Government who didn’t retire from international rugby. Since then, she hasn’t had a look-in with the national squad.

Sinéad Kissane: Ireland hit rock bottom as Cliodhna Moloney snub comes back to bite Greg McWilliams’ side

…assuming this to be true, the question does need to be asked if there is a blackballing policy in place, and if so, then it surely must be a major contributory factor to all that is going on in Irish Women’s rugby.

And here we see what makes speaking out about these things very difficult. Because when you talk about the Moloneys and the Griffins who aren’t there, plus the likes of Parsons who are prioritised for the Sevens circuit, you end up throwing a good bit of shade at those who actually togged out for those five matches. Unless you’re Ewan McKenna of course, who chose simply to mock them to satisfy his Army of Incels followers.

I know I don’t follow the women’s game regularly but from my vantage point at least within the overall sport, it really does look like it’s not so much dinosaurs in the decision making positions, rather ostriches who don’t want to see what really needs to be done.

Just. Listen.

UPDATE – Just saw a report that rumours of his leaving the post were greatly exaggerated? Very strange to see a story linger in the news cycle for so long if it was that wrong. Anyway, whether he’s still the coach or not, the fundamental issues remain the same.

LONDON IRISH

Not sure where this story is heading but the point to be made is that it is hardly a surprise as it was clear when both Worcester and Wasps were in trouble that they weren’t the only ones.

It’s difficult enough to understand how 8th place in the Premiership can qualify for Europe when it only has 11 clubs without another one going under as well. Fingers crossed they are able to sort something out mostly for the sake of all those employed by the club.

AI RUGBY : LEINSTER V TOULOUSE DRY RUN

Been dabbling in AI in recent weeks, and this time I decided to ask ChatGPT on Friday to “play out” a match between Leinster and Toulouse using the selected teams. Below you see the prompt and how it played out, wasn’t a million miles off the actual result and I have to say I like the way it even had a try disallowed by the TMO!!!

INJURY REPORT

Good to see there are no new additions to the treatment table, but that doesn’t take away the headache of selection for the Sharks in the quarterfinal.  With the HCC final date secured we really have no choice but to take out a decent amount of cotton wool even if the Sharks will use that to motivate them in their quest to prove us wrong to underestimate them.

I definitely think Hugo Keenan and our two props should be left out altogether, but elsewhere we might need some first team back up in case we’re chasing the game in the final quarter.  

(note – the above team is purely from my imagination, it’s certainly not one of those quasi-leaked Thornley teams which are always 22 out of 23 correct)

MLR UPDATE

My plan to watch a game every week via The Rugby Network has been foiled for the past few rounds by that ol’ thing called “real life” but over the bank holiday weekend I was able to catch the Eastern Conference derby between the New England Free Jacks and the reigning MLR Champions (albeit rebranded) New York.

Before I describe what happened, just to note that I have chosen New England as my adopted team for this season.  I actually hail from the Bay Area but since they are yet to be represented I have to go for New England as I also have a good few relatives out there.  And luckily, they are doing pretty well this season so for the rest of the 2023 campaign I’ll be focusing on their matches, although they are on a bye week in round 12.

Anyway for this clash they were at home in Veteran’s Memorial Stadium which is in a town called Quincy on the outskirts of Boston.  The weather was awful throughout and the main camera angle was cursed with raindrops on the lens pretty much from start to finish.

Overall I enjoyed this match a lot more than I should have given the scoreline – at first it looked like the Free Jacks would romp to a big win as they went straight into the NY 22 from the kickoff and a sweet crossfield kick from outhalf Portroz to Balekana saw them 5-0 up after just 5m.

But from there thanks to a combination of stubborn NY defence, about a gagillion handling errors mostly forced by the conditions, and missed place kicks from Portroz, they really struggled to add to that lead.  In fact there was to be only one more score throughout as Portroz did manage one before halftime.

Even though the second half was scoreless the fact that it remained so close kept the interest up, especially when a deliberate knockon by the NE fullback gave the visitors the last ten minutes with an extra man but they just couldn’t manage it and the home side held on right to the final whistle to secure the four points and keep themselves top of the east.

More on the league next week, since my new team has a bye I might look west and focus on the leaders San Diego as they face the Utah Warriors.

HARPIN’ PREDICTION LEAGUE

The URC is back for the next couple of weekends with 6 of the remaining 7 matches being played which means the title could be won or lost before the final. As you can see Kino went back ahead in Rd 18 and we certainly can’t rule out Mark Jackson from contention either, will be very interesting to see how the quarterfinals pan out.

THE NEXT BATCH OF HARPIN’

Next up are the “Cell C Sharks” and I can confidently predict I will screw up saying that out loud at least once in both weekend pods. Keego will help me with the preview on Friday and will actually return for the wrap on Sunday along with Rugby Kino so be sure to subscribe to our pod feed to catch those as well as all our other online accounts where we post pretty much every day.

 In the meantime, be sure to enjoy your rugby wherever you are.  JLP