Category: 80+ column

80+ column : brilliance, begrudgery & blueprints

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

FANZO GUINNESS PINT PREDICTOR LEAGUE RESULT

Well, this got awkward…

“Back in the day” we used to hold competitions under a format I called “the unriggable raffle” where we got 100 entrants to earn a square on to a 10×10 grid and the winner would be determined by the final score of our feature rugby match of the weekend.  We only stopped doing them because the admin became too much but one thing you can say for sure was that I had no possible say in the winner.

Since those times we have had a few more conventional competitions and the latest one was in conjunction with the FANZO app which ran a prediction league for the Six Nations.  There were pints on offer for getting individual results right but you also won points on a league table so over the five weeks we were working towards an overall winner.

HOWEVER…to encourage people to join the league even after the Six Nations kicked off, we had an extra prize for Best Score In A Single Round and going into Super Saturday it looked like Andrew Byrne had posted an unassailable 67 in round 3.  As I was in town celebrating the Grand Slam a mate texted me to point out that I had gotten TWO of that Saturday’s winning margins bang on (including Ireland’s) which meant not only had I jumped to the bronze medal slot in the overall league, I also won the bonus prize with my score of 70!!!!!!!

Now the reason my mate was interested in letting me know was that he could also tell me that he actually jumped to second overall ahead of me!!!  And in a final twist to the whole thing the overall winner was actually fellow content creator Stephen “Master of None” Murphy, who also won his own Fanzo competition!!!

We plugged the competition with lines like “see if you can beat the experts”…I suppose with the exception of Ken, ye couldn’t ha ha ha….and just in case I need proof of my predictions here they are…

Seriously though, many thanks again to the FANZO crowd for getting involved it definitely added to the experience over the past couple of months.

CHARITY RAFFLE

Please get involved in the actual raffle below, an awesome prize for an extremely worthy cause.

WRAP OF A WRAP

Obviously it was an even greater pleasure to wrap last weekend’s match, and many thanks to Conor & Kino for being on hand to help me do so.  It was great to be able to say the words “Grand Slam” out loud on the pod again although shortly before recording I came up with a loophole for future years…once I make it clear that I’m actually talking about an elderly relative’s cooking, ie “Gran’s Lamb”, then I should be able to say it freely in future years.

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

HARPIN ON…SIMON EASTERBY & IRELAND’S DEFENCE

For the bonus clip this week we looked at what I consider to be the bedrock of Ireland’s success and wait until you get a load of the stat Kino highlights about tries conceded…it’s mind-blowing.

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.

IRELAND’S RWC CHANCES TIK TOK 

Two TikToks to share this week, first a great point made by Kino as he wrapped up his pod contributions…

@harpinonrugby

Our #IREvENG wrap is now available on major platforms #GuinnessSixNations #ShoulderToShoulder

♬ original sound – Harpinonrugby.com – Harpinonrugby.com

…and this other one I’ll just link to (click here) I vowed to break my “Grand Slam” embargo as soon as possible after full time if we won so what you see is a rather drunk me talking to my phone outside a pub on King’s Street Dublin between 7 and 7:30 Saturday evening…

STEWARD’S ENQUIRY

Much has been said about that Freddie Steward red card all over social media I know, including by yours truly on the pod, but I still have a few final points to make.

First, while I try to be open minded and take in views from the other side on decisions like this one, I now have a policy whereby should I hear something like “that was no way intentional” then I just stop reading or listening.  It’s not about intent.  It’s about duty of care.  And reckless can also be red.

Finally I’d like to show receipts from my views expressed on the pod.  When we see Twitter clips of the Steward/Keenan collision they always make it look like the two players’ starting positions were just feet apart, with the implication being that Steward had little or no time to react.

IMO this photo tells a different story.  Steward came from a good bit away and Keenan was always his man so he had a lot more time to prepare for the collision than many are letting on.  And again…to be very clear, that doesn’t mean he set out to clatter him in the head, I’m just saying he had more time to prepare better for contact. 

You could even argue that those saying he had little time to react are effectively saying he’s a shit full back because one of the most important roles they play is seeing all that is happening in front of them!

I mean, even if he WAS just “bracing for impact” like he claims, you can do that in many different ways and when you do it by turning your elbow you put yourself in a position to cause damage.  THIS is why the decision is red, in the hope that he, and others looking on, will change their behaviour in future.  But that objective becomes trickier when a host of commentators, including decorated former players like Matt Dawson, try to make it out like nothing was wrong about it.

UPDATE : the commission ruling has since dropped…

The player denied that he had committed an act of foul play worthy of a red card as described in Law 9.11. Having reviewed all the evidence, the Committee decided that: (i) head contact with an opposing player had occurred; (ii) there had been an act of foul play in breach of Law 9.11 in that the Player had been reckless in his actions and in his upright positioning as he approached and came into highly dangerous contact with the other player; and (iii) there were sufficient mitigating factors including the late change in the dynamics and positioning of the opposing player which should have resulted in the issue of a yellow card rather than a red card.

On that basis, the Committee did not uphold the red card and the player is free to play again immediately.

Guinness Six Nations press release

Obviously social media is going to be full of “I told you so’s” over the next few days but FWIW I still hold my own opinion expressed above and I’m really not sure what this outcome does to help the overall intent of these guidelines which I thought were designed to change behaviour. It also makes a mockery of Jaco Peyper’s on-field interpretation.

GRAND SLAM GROAN SLUMP

Can we not just have at least a couple of days to be happy about a double Grand Slam???????  I mean, is that too much to ask???

To be fair, I expected the taunts from outside of Ireland, like the “bet you still won’t get past the RWC quarterfinals”, so that isn’t included here.

But to see tweets from Irish fans, clearly still upset that so many from the 23 were from Leinster no matter what the achievements of the team, drudging up the age old debates about provincial selections and “private schools” and such was really really disheartening. 

I mean, let’s be clear, those debates are worth having, but no matter what the composition of the team at the weekend, it was still Ireland, and they won the tournament comfortably which makes the selection process extremely difficult to argue against.

Even on the subject of supposed favouritism towards Leinster, which I already harped on last week’s version of this column, there is news of change going forward with the proposed Munster Centre of Excellence, so maybe if it’s balance we’re looking for we could also bring it to the discussion from the other side as well.

One area where I didn’t mind a spot of post-Grand Slam negativity was with women’s rugby.  Things in general are improving for the Irish team and I wish Nichola and all the squad the best of luck in their Six Nations campaign which kicks off next weekend. 

But there are still a host of issues which have yet to be addressed and one of these is that members of the heroic 2013 Grand Slam squad were unbelievably without tickets for Saturday’s decider despite their being celebrated during the week.  Also there was an article in the Indo by John Cronin outline many of the outstanding problems (here’s the link though it’s unfortunately behind a paywall) so clearly it’s a case of some things done, more still to do.

WORLD RUGBY BLUEPRINTS

An exclusive this morning in the Telegraph about World Rugby’s plans for the future, also behind a paywall, but above you see the main points.  Here’s what I thought about it.

WINS AS A TIEBREAKER 

Many congrats again to Richie Murphy and his Under 20s or “Wolfuppies” team that also won the Grand Slam with their own convincing win over England at the weekend, the similarities in that game in Cork and Saturday’s in Dublin were uncanny.

But on the competition overall I’d just like to find a tiny kernel of fault if I may…as you can see from the table below, the Italian Under 20s did an amazing job in finishing 3rd on the overall table and I have no doubt that it will do the sport there a world of good and we can hope that these underage squads will go on to serve their test performances well in the years to come.

However, as much as we Irish fans would much prefer to see Italy above England in any league table, I wonder if it’s fair that they got ahead of them here. All I’m saying is that when we’re using bonus points, while I get why points difference is an important tie breaker, I’m not so sure it should be the first on the list behind matches won. Sorry, but IMO England’s 3 wins should beat Italy’s 2 and I reckon we’d be shouting from the rooftops if an Irish team missed out this way, especially in the senior Six Nations where the financial difference between 3rd and 4th is great.

WORLD CUP DRAW

Here’s a pair of tweets I agree with, despite the fact that they contradict each other.  In the first one, a Leicester Tigers podster shares my view that we might be making too much of this “World Cup draw” situation.  Is it a fiasco? Yes.  Is there anything we can do about it before RWC2023?  No.

That said, it was interesting to see this mock up of how the RWC2023 draw would look had the rankings been based on current standings, although I do wonder if the draw would allow for three from the six nations to be in the same pool.

INJURY REPORT

Biggest downers from Saturday for Ireland but more immediately Leinster were the early withdrawals of Messrs Keenan & Sexton, and the injury reports do not look good although neither were ever going to feature in the the top of the table URC clash on Friday against the reigning champion Stormers.

It was however extremely good news that Tommy O’Brien and Ed Byrne are back available for selection and while I have a feeling there won’t be too many changes to Leinster’s 23 than the one from Edinburgh, they could feature on the bench…

POSSIBLE 23 FOR FRIDAY

Cosgrove, Larmour, Turner, Frawley, Kearney, H Byrne, McGrath

Milne, McKee, Ala’alatoa, Molony, Jenkins, Ruddock > CAPTAIN, Penny, Deegan

Barron, E Byrne, Clarkson, Deeny, Connors, N McCarthy, Tector, T O’Brien/Russell

(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)

INJURY UPDATE – AVAILABLE FOR SELECTION:

Tommy O’Brien: has returned to full training after recovering from an ACL injury

Ed Byrne: has returned to full training after recovering from a knee injury

INJURY UPDATE – FURTHER ASSESSMENT REQUIRED:

Garry Ringrose: will continue to follow the Graduated Return to Play Protocols with Leinster Rugby

Hugo Keenan: will continue to follow the Graduated Return to Play Protocols with Leinster Rugby

Caelan Doris: will continue to follow the Graduated Return to Play Protocols with Leinster Rugby

INJURY UPDATE – UNAVAILABLE FOR SELECTION:

Johnny Sexton: will have a scan today on a groin injury picked up in Saturday’s game against England

Jamie Osborne: Sustained a knee ligament injury in the game against Edinburgh and will be unavailable for a number of weeks

There are no further updates on:

Rónan Kelleher (shoulder), Joe McCarthy (ankle), Cormac Foley (hamstring), Martin Moloney (knee) and Charlie Ngatai (hamstring)

Meanwhile on the Stormers side of things I hear they could well be bringing a few Springboks to the RDS so that should make it a very interesting occasion indeed.

MLR UPDATE

This week I decided to check in on the Eastern Conference for once and no better match than the rivalry between the New York Ironworkers and the New England Free Jacks.

The Irish interest in the lineups wasn’t as strong as I thought it would be all I could see was the New England scrum half John Poland who played for Ire U20s and had a cap for Munster before moving stateside – on the New York side there was just their Aussie-born outhalf Sam Windsor who has 8 Ulster caps from the 2015-16 season.

It was played at the Memorial Stadium at Mount Vernon in New York – I winced at the sight of both gridiron and soccer lines on the pitch but in the end it wasn’t too bad.

Overall although New York led a couple of times including as late as 55m, the visitors were always in control as their halfbacks Poland and Jayson Potroz always seemed to have a score in them and once they got back the lead going into the final quarter there was only to be one winner and they will be more than happy with a 5-0 points split away from home, especially as the teams went into the game level at the top of the conference.

More on the league next week.

ROUND 5

NOLA 37-14 UTAH

ATL 10-35 SD

OGDC 29-3 TOR

CHI 24-22 DAL

NYI 18-33 NEFJ

ROUND 6

OGDC v NOLA

NEFJ V DAL

UTAH V TOR

HOU V ATL

CHI V SEA

HARPIN’ PREDICTION LEAGUE

Obviously there has been no change in the league since the last time I included it in this column but I thought I’d post the table again anyway as there are just three rounds left and it’s getting close at the top, if not so much at the bottom!!!

THE NEXT BATCH OF HARPIN’

The original plan was to have a bonus pod to look back over the Six Nations but I chose instead to give myself the week off; this has been an enjoyable period for content creating here at Harpin Manor of course but also very hectic admin wise so we could do with the few extra days without another pod to process. 

Then we turn our focus back to the URC and the visit of the Stormers with a preview show before, a wrap pod after and also all the other usual features in between so be sure to follow us on any or all of our social media platforms to keep up with it all.  In the meantime, be sure to enjoy your rugby wherever you are.  JLP

80+ column : Law tinkering, contract signing & injury reports

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

FANZO GUINNESS PINT PREDICTOR LEAGUE

First things first…a reminder of the prestigious Harpin Guinness Pint Predictor League.

Our leader in the “Best Score In One Round” category is still Andrew Byrne’s 67 in round three – I have a funny feeling that the big Welsh victory in Rome did for most people last weekend which meant nobody got near it. The prize will be a signed copy of Brian Moylett’s “The Book On How You Become A Pro Rugby Player”.   Meanwhile in the overall league, Jack Fogarty’s lead has been cut to just three points so that too is all to play for.

REMEMBER YOU CAN STILL JOIN THE LEAGUE AND WIN PRIZES  we’re accepting entrants right up to the final round so you can still beat Andrew’s Round 3 score, also every Six Nations match gives you the chance to win a free pint so by all means download the app and enter the league using the code HARPIN and see how you get on.

WRAP OF A WRAP

Because of the Sunday afternoon kickoff in Murrayfield we shifted our wrap recording to Monday night and as you can see we had to go with just one guest but I reckon between myself and Rich we did an ok job for what was quite an eventful match.  I normally let the guests describe the actual tries so it was something of a novelty to do it myself although being a creature of habit I’ll be happy to get back to normal next week!

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

HARPIN ON…A SHOT OF WHISKEY

For the latest bonus clip we tried to walk the tightrope between acknowledging the importance of Jamison Gibson-Park to this Irish setup and not putting down Conor Murray’s considerable achievements over the years, including this one.  Did we succeed?  Check out for yourself.

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.

ANDY FARRELL TIK TOK 

The theme of our win in Murrayfield was “triumph over adversity” and in his summary Rich nailed that.  Although the Schmidt era achieved a lot, and I mean, A LOT, the two RWC failures left behind a checklist of demands from fans that included a more attacking outlook, stronger depth and an ability to overcome match day hurdles.  I think we can safely say he has ticked those boxes so far and long may it continue.

@harpinonrugby

A day later than usual after the Sunday kickoff, check out our #SCOvIRE wrap in all the usual places.

♬ original sound – Harpinonrugby.com – Harpinonrugby.com

NEW BALL GATE

We spoke about it on the pod but I have to say I’m still struggling with what can be done to fix it.  We want the quick throw to speed up the game, and I can totally appreciate the requirement to use the same ball that went out of play.

All of which means that while it sounds simple to say “well, the Scots took the throw so we should be entitled to play on if they fuck it up”, it’s absolutely not that simple.  The hooker and the officials should all be clued in to which ball is being used, but in this case, nobody picked it up in time.  That we went on to get the ball down over the line is circumstantial.

What I’m saying is that I don’t think the try should have been allowed because technically, once the ball left Turner’s hands, none of the action was real.  They were playing with a dead ball.  HOWEVER, if the Laws can put the onus on the thrower, he could be penalised for trying to gain advantage from a quick throw illegally and thus a free kick or lineout can be awarded to the opposition, which would have been decent compensation.  Those are my two cents.

DON’T FORGET THE WOLFPUPPIES!!!

We’ve gotten used to the Under 20s playing on Fridays for the past while, and YE GODS they’ve been putting on a show for us averaging over 50pts per match. But whatever happens in the Aviva on Saturday evening, whether we’re celebrating or not, be sure to keep 5pm free on the Sunday to watch them playing their English counterparts as there are similar prizes on the line for them.

IN FOR A PENNY, IN FOR A BIG MAC

Tuesday saw some big announcements from Leinster Rugby, first that the above two players had put pen to paper, and also that Andrew Smith was moving to Connacht.  To some that might look like a mixed bag of news but I see it as all positive.

Of course I’d love to see every possible player staying at Leinster, who wouldn’t when you look at the amazing talent coming out of our Academy.  But it’s all about the big picture and we have to accept that if this player didn’t make a move, it would have been another one because even with our massive player pool (I make it 55 we’ve used this season so far) there has to be a line drawn somewhere and I wish Andrew all the best out west.

I know it pains a lot of Irish rugby fans that Leinster is producing so much talent, especially when so much of it is not only ready for provincial level but also for test in many cases.   But I’m not sure what it supposed to be done about it?  If (when?) the Leinster Schools system churns out another rake of prospects this season should they be denied the opportunity to play their way to the senior blue and green jerseys just for the sake of balance?

The way I see it is that there are top level athletes emerging all over the island.  But there are also many different sports competing for those athletes, with the GAA and soccer top amongst them as well as rugby and say what you like about the societal rights and wrongs of the private school system (which I definitely could, just not on these pages) the fact remains that the gravitational pull for these particular kids when they come of age is still strongest towards rugby, especially in Leinster.

And to suggest that rugby hasn’t done anything to encourage more from around the country to take up the sport is absurd.  Of course there will always be more ways to try to compete with the other codes but the fact remains they are trying to get these players too and we’re going to lose some times.

Sorry I know this was meant to be about Scott & Joe signing but I got a bit sidetracked…I was reminded of the bru ha ha surrounding Penny’s call up a few weeks ago so I needed to vent a bit more on it!!!

UPDATE : Spotted this article after I posted the above so I’ll share it since it’s relevant > Munster announce plans for Centre of Excellence in Limerick · The42

REC FINALS DAY/BONUS POD

At the time of writing I have a chat scheduled with Francisco Issac who spoke to us earlier in the season about the Super Cup; now we’re having him back on to tell us about Rugby Europe’s other feature competition, the RE Championship which was formerly known as Six Nations B but now has gotten a revamp in both name and format with the finals day to come on Sunday so I look forward to hearing all about it.

INJURY REPORT

Obviously a long list from the weekend, although the reports from Monday were definitely more encouraging than expected.  It was no surprise to see Garry Ringrose and Iain Henderson ruled out for a while, yet to at least see names like Doris, Sheehan and Kelleher still in the overall training squad gave us hope.  Congrats to Ross Molony and Tom Stewart for their call-ups, both were well deserved.

Here’s a 23 we could see on Saturday, with the most confusion over the hooker position of course so I have put my candidates in order of preference.

Keenan, Hansen, Henshaw, Aki, Lowe, Sexton, Gibson-Park

Porter, (DS/RK/RH), Furlong, Baird, Ryan, O’Mahony, JVDF, (Doris/Conan)

(RK/RH/TS), Healy, O’Toole, Treadwell, (Conan/Prendergast), Murray, Byrne, O’Brien.

(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)

UPDATE : Saw the above tweet after posting

AIL UPDATE

The Bateman Cup final took place at the weekend, which was impressive because as you can see by the above tweet, the hosts Terenure had to do a lot of rallying to get Lakelands Park ready after the snow during the week. 

In the end it was a comfortable enough victory for them as they ran out 71-13 winners over Buccaneers, which leads me to wonder if the competition could switch to a “proper” All Ireland knockout competition with all 50 AIL clubs joined by 14 qualifying junior clubs in an FA Cup style format with everyone going into the hat for each round, as opposed to the four provincial winners squaring off and trying to find a free weekend during the Six Nations. 

Maybe they could play it to a finish in the opening weeks of the season and do the provincial competitions in the spring when the wider rugby audience is distracted elsewhere?  This might generate a bit of a buzz on the club game in the early parts of the season.  Just a thought.

Anyway the AIL has another weekend off so we’ll have a closer look in the next 80+ column, where I also plan to feature the race at the top of Div 1B.

Men’s AIL

ROUND 16

MAR 25 (all 2:30pm)

Clontarf v Ballynahinch

Cork Con v Shannon

Dublin Univ v Lansdowne

Terenure v Garryowen

Young Munster v UCD

SEVENS UPDATE

For reasons I have yet to find on the internet, the 2022/23 World Series Sevens circuit is making two visits to Hong Kong, at least for the men.  

But anyway while the next round doesn’t take place until the end of March, the draws have been made for the pools so I can update you on that for now…

The Irish men, who nudged up one place to 9th after a final four appearance in Vancouver, got themselves a stinker of a pool draw with New Zealand, South Africa and Kenya all finding their way into the deathiest of pools of death with us.

Meanwhile the women, still fifth despite a poor outing in Canada by their standards, don’t have it too much easier with Fiji, Australia and Brazil on the horizon. 

MLR UPDATE

My choice of MLR action to watch via the free Rugby Network platform was easy this week, with the only two undefeated sides Seattle and Houston meeting at the Starfire Stadium.  

Just to clarify I’ll be following this competition for this column over the coming months not just to comment on the rugby itself, but also on the overall presentation to the US public in the hope that they’re doing all they can to introduce them to the joys of egg-chasing as best as they can.

But to go to the action on the pitch first, this was a very scrappy 80 minutes with Houston’s attempts to win the battle up front thanks to their towering South African number 8 Gideon van Wyk thwarted by poor lineouts & discipline, plus the home side’s own big no8 Ricky Hattingh plus a pacy back three especially full back Duncan Matthews.  In the end although the teams got two tries each it was a series of penalties from Seattle 10 AJ Alatimu that kept them in front for the most part as they ran out 24-12 winners to stay 100%.

Now to the presentation…first the venue – the good news is that there seemed to be a decent crowd – the Seattle Major League Soccer team averages over 30k but it makes sense to aim low so this is a ground shared with some amateur level soccer teams and it was nice to see a full stand even if it was just on one side of the 4k-capacity ground.  Bad news is the clearly visible soccer markings, I know this can’t be helped and at least it’s not the “gridiron” lines which can really get in the way of the action, but it’s still worth mentioning.

I’d also like to mention the water- or “hydration-break” as they call it.  A lot of fans this side of the pond seem to view it as hell on earth but tbh it doesn’t bother me as much and for the MLR in particular, it provides a decent quarter break that US fans will be well used to and it also allows broadcasters to take in a few ad bucks.

And speaking of ads, I know as viewers we tend to want less of them I reckon for a league like this it has to be good to see so many companies willing to hitch their wagon to the rugby product so again I don’t mind it as much when watching, especially when I remember that I’m not being charged for the privilege neither in replay nor live.

Finally on the officiating, while there were several TMO stoppages I still got the sense that the overall plan was to let the play flow as much as possible.  And that’s definitely a good thing for the most part, even if the skill levels for this comp might not be good enough for too many worldie free-flowing tries just yet.

More on the league next week.

ROUND 4

NEFJ 34-31 OGDC

CHI 26-27 TOR

SD 22-0 DAL

SEA 24-12 HOU

NOLA 31-5 RNYI

ROUND 5

NOLA V UTAH

ATL V SD

OGDC V TOR

CHI V DAL

NYI V NEFJ

THE NEXT BATCH OF HARPIN’

Like I said further up the page, we have a midweek bonus pod about the REC Grand final which should post on Thursday, then, of course, we will turn our attention fully to the big match in the Aviva with a preview show before, a wrap pod after and also all the other usual features in between so be sure to follow us on any or all of our social media platforms to keep up with it all.  In the meantime, be sure to enjoy your rugby wherever you are.  JLP

80+ column : Over-reacting to over-reacting

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

FANZO GUINNESS PINT PREDICTOR LEAGUE

First things first…a reminder of the prestigious Harpin Guinness Pint Predictor League.

Our leader in the “Best Score In One Round” category is Andrew Byrne’s 67, including a spot on prediction of Ireland’s 14-point win over Italy.  The prize will be a signed copy of Brian Moylett’s “The Book On How You Become A Pro Rugby Player”.  Jack Fogarty still leads the overall table with seven points to spare. 

REMEMBER YOU CAN STILL JOIN THE LEAGUE AND WIN PRIZES  we’re accepting entrants right up to the final round so you can still beat Andrew’s Round 3 score, also every Six Nations match gives you the chance to win a free pint so by all means download the app and enter the league using the code HARPIN and see how you get on.

WRAP OF A WRAP

Mark & Ciarán did their usual excellent job helping me wrap our latest feature match, I on the other hand had issues with my audio – when I heard it back it sounded like I was talking while being locked in a box.  Thankfully it didn’t take long to re-record my parts and the result turned out ok if I do say so myself.

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

HARPIN ON…DAVE KEARNEY

We’ve been mostly using these YouTube bonus clips as an opportunity to turn the spotlight on certain players who don’t always get the recognition and if anyone in the current Leinster squad deserves this it has to be Dave Kearney.  Thankfully his excellent finish in Edinburgh provided the platform for a decent bit of appreciation from our panel.

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.

LIAM TURNER TIK TOK 

Unlike the YouTube clips, I never go into our pod recordings knowing what I’m going to you for the brief TikTok promos, it’s one of those things where I’ll know where I hear it and sure enough once Mark said this about Liam Turner definitely knew it.

It might sound like feint praise to say of a player “he’s a definite candidate for our 23 jersey in Europe” but when you’re talking about a squad with the depth of Leinster’s back three talent, that’s some statement yet one I’m more than happy to make about Turner he has had an outstanding season.

On a more personal note we’re proud here at Harpin Manor to have passed 400 followers on TikTok we’re not exactly pushing it as our top platform, simply posting regular clips so we’re happy that the numbers continue to rise and will no doubt do something special if and when we reach 500.

@harpinonrugby

A clip from our latest wrap pod available on most major platforms #EDIvLEI #URC

♬ original sound – Harpinonrugby.com – Harpinonrugby.com

ARDIE AS NAILS – PART 1 (THE INCIDENT)

Ardie made a slit throat gesture to an opponent as he was leaving the field.

He publicly apologised at the earliest opportunity.

He has been cited.

That’s the above water part to this iceberg of a story.  If you hold your nose and plunge into the depths though there was a whole lot more. 

ARDIE AS NAILS – PART 2 (OVER-REACTION-FEST)

My initial thoughts were that if you made it publicly known that you were going to kill/injure someone out in the “real world” you wouldn’t or at least shouldn’t get away with it.  So once my mind went to a place where I wanted to suggest on twitter that I thought this wasn’t cool, you can see where I landed.

I guess I assumed that by using the words “straying towards” I would be making it obvious that no, I do not actually think that there should be criminal charges brought against the Hurricanes & All Black number 8.

Enter the “Game’s Gone Soft” crowd.  Or the “Woke Hunters” or whatever you want to call them.  You see, my “mistake” was that the words “criminal charges” became a beacon for those rage scrolling the second the incident appeared as a clip on social media because, of course, they were actively searching for a poster child.  I provided it for them.  Do I regret it?

You know what – ten, maybe even five years ago, I definitely would have.  I may even have gone so far as to remove the tweet.  

But now, fuck it.  I know what I meant.  And if I’m tailoring my opinions based on how I think a certain corner of the opinion spectrum (especially this one) is going to respond well then I may as not bother.  And since I’m a firm believer in sharing opinions, that only leaves one conclusion – leave it there, maybe add a tweet or two to explain what I meant (I even acknowledged that I probably did a bad job wording it but I still couldn’t change my view), and then let the backlash wash over me.

To summarise, we had people over-reacting to my over-reaction to Ardie’s initial over-reaction.   Or to put it another way, an average day in the bird house.

I know there are those who will take this as “proof” that “Twitter is a cess pit” but even after last Friday I still disagree.  If we defined every pursuit by it’s bad actors then the world itself would be a cess pit.  

TRAIL FOUND?

I always make it clear when I’m about to harp on Welsh rugby that I am very aware that I’m far outside the “bubble” and thus am unsure of the minute details and dramas going on between the regions, cities, clubs and personalities across the nation.

But being a URC/Six Nations fan I do claim to have a tangential interest and from where I’m sitting it looks as though they have reached a point where they are going to have to rely on outside investment to get out of this cavernous hole they find themselves in.

And once you have to put your eggs in that corporate basket, you have to accept that there are going to be some options available which will make “unthinkable” actions very thinkable.  Like merging one of the regions with a club that keeps on doing well in the RFU’s second tier while being denied entry into its first.

Does that mean it will definitely happen?  Of course not.  But my point is that if it does become possible they should definitely consider it, while if it doesn’t they need to get ready for another offer which may sound equally ludicrous at first.

Once rugby union went pro, the sport was always going to have to think outside the box, and to be fair, while it’s still far from perfect it’s still a better box for the most part IMO.

INJURY REPORT

Leinster tend not to issue a full report until the Monday before their next match so that would be March 20th.  But going from the Irish squad update it looks like Ciaran Frawley has been called up to camp while Scott Penny and Jamie Osborne have been held back for minor knocks so hopefully they are indeed minor.  Meanwhile we’re wondering whether or not the likes of Furlong, Gibson-Park, Sexton and Henshaw will be involved at Murrayfield next weekend.  

AIL UPDATE

It’s “as you were” at the top of Division 1A as both Tarf and Nure secured BP wins away to Shannon and UCD respectively.  Familiar names to Leinster fans among the tries include Ben Murphy and Jordan Coghlan. 

Meanwhile in the race for the top 4 it’s looking like we could have two Leinster v Munster semifinals as both Cork Con and Young Munster also won away from home although Ballynahinch’s win over freefalling Trinity (the only home win of the five) keeps them in contention.

Down at the bottom it’s looking like a three-way fight to void joining Garryowen with Lansdowne, UCD and Shannon all having tricky away assignments in round 16 on March 25.

Men’s AIL

ROUND 15

Ballynahinch 36-15 Dublin Univ

Garryowen 21-29 Cork Con

Lansdowne 10-15 Young Munster

Shannon 3-33 Clontarf

UCD 10-32 Terenure

ROUND 16

MAR 25 (all 2:30pm)

Clontarf v Ballynahinch

Cork Con v Shannon

Dublin Univ v Lansdowne

Terenure v Garryowen

Young Munster v UCD

SEVENS – VANCOUVER WRAP

Mixed fortune for the Irish squads in Canada – both started brightly with wins over the host nation and South American opposition but then they went their separate ways.  The women went on to lost all their remaining matches and although they remain a respectable 5th in the standings, a gap has appeared above them and they will be anxiously looking over their shoulders for the remaining rounds.

Although the men couldn’t avenge the Aussies in their final pool match, they still made the quarterfinals where a Zac Ward try deep in extra time got them past the USA and into the final four where they may have fallen to Argentina and again Australia but still the points were valuable and put us back into the top 8.

The circuit now moves on to Hong Kong at the end of March.

MAJOR LEAGUE RUGBY

My goal is to watch at least one MLR fixture each week, starting with Houston v San Diego from round 3 they’re all available for free on TheRugbyNetwork.com.

To be clear I won’t be following this competition merely to comment on the rugby.  My main interest is in watching how the sport is growing in the USA.  I reckon they have a decent model in the MLR to bring it forward but the league hasn’t been without its challenges especially last season when they lost the two Adam Gilchrist-owned teams (though considering the dumb nicknames they had they probably won’t be missed too much in the long run).

So with this in mind I checked out the replay of the Houston Sabercats v San Diego Legion, probably the biggest clash of Round 3 as both are expected to make the playoffs.  The familiar names were mostly on the San Diego side which features skipper Blair Cowen, Ma’a Nonu and Mikey Te’o.

The US presentation of the match was pretty much as expected, with a two-man team for commentary with the analyst seeing his role not only to provide “colour” but also to explain some of the more complicated rules, which is a good thing in my book.

One good feature of this match is that it was played on a pitch that wasn’t besmirched by lines from American football, something we do still see in quite a few MLR matches.

It seemed a decent crowd at Sabercats Stadium but it was the visitors who jumped out to an early 14-0 lead with Nonu heavily involved in both tries in the first 10 minutes.  Needless to say the defences won’t be up to the standards we’re used to in European rugby but still the general attacking play is to be admired at times.

Houston did manage to claw them back including an intercept try from winger Labuschagne which nudged them in front but a quick pair of San Diego tries created 26-17 advantage going into the last ten minutes.  This should have been enough to secure the win but a pair of yellow cards in succession to Sears-Juru & Poidevin gave the home side an opening and they sailed through it with two late converted tries including the winner from their big number 8 Gideon van Wyk to win the day.

Again, if you’re a rugby purist, don’t bother watching these matches.  But if you appreciate how the sport can benefit from the game growing, plus that it will take time for a league to establish rivalries and traditions of its own, then you can certainly enjoy keeping an eye on how things are going.

ROUND 3

DAL 10-35 SEA

ATL 29-16 NOLA

CHI 10-14 UTAH

RNYI 34-8 OGDC

HOU 31-26 SD

ROUND 4

NEFJ V OGDC

CHI V TOR

SD V DAL

SEA V HOU

NOLA V RNYI

HARPIN’ PREDICTION LEAGUE

I checked back in the records and after being in 1st place after the first couple of URC rounds I had dropped to 3rd by round 7, a whopping 9.5 points behind our resident stats expert RugbyKino, but as you can see I have clawed eight of those points back so I’ll be gunning to retrieve that top spot by the end.

This league is meant to be a race to avoid the bottom spot which rewards you by having to wear The Jersey Of Shame in a social media phot but it would appear Neil “No Picks Keego” Keegan wants that honour for himself so he’s welcome to it!!!

THE NEXT BATCH OF HARPIN’

The Six Nations is back on the menu and for a bonus pod during the week I will be the Leinster representative on an all-provincial panel giving an overview of the 2023 Six Nations as it stands.  Then we turn to our focus to Sunday’s “Triple Crown decider” in Murrayfield with a preview show before, a wrap pod after and also all the other usual features in between so be sure to follow us on any or all of our social media platforms to keep up with it all.  In the meantime, be sure to enjoy your rugby wherever you are.  JLP

80+ column : Anthems, Contracts, Updates

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

FANZO GUINNESS PINT PREDICTOR LEAGUE

First things first…the all important update in the prestigious Guinness Pint Predictor League.

We have a new leader in the “Best Score In One Round” category as Andrew Byrne’s 67, including a spot on prediction of Ireland’s 14-point win over Italy, put him in pole position.  The prize will be a signed copy of Brian Moylett’s “The Book On How You Become A Pro Rugby Player”.

As you can see despite being knocked off his perch Jack Fogarty still leads the overall table with seven points to spare. 

REMEMBER YOU CAN STILL JOIN THE LEAGUE AND WIN PRIZES we’re accepting entrants right up to the final round so you can still beat Andrew’s Round 3 score, also every Six Nations match gives you the chance to win a free pint so by all means download the app and enter the league using the code HARPIN and see how you get on.

WRAP OF A WRAP

Apart from a big mishap on my part where I got the seniors and U20s mixed up in my selection of Front Five articles, Sunday night’s recordings went well and Tom and Conor did their usual sterling work in describing the action. 

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

HARPIN ON…12 & 13 OPTIONS

For the bonus chat this week we looked at Ireland’s options as centre and looking back at it now we even missed some names like James Hume and Luke Marshall who have both of course done well when called upon. Still I think it’s important to acknowledge that when everyone is fit there is only one pairing for Ireland that ticks all boxes both with and without the ball and while we try to repress the bias when talking about Ireland, I wonder in this case if it’s actually better for Leinster fans to make that point. 

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.

HARPIN’ ON…CLOCK GONE RED

Here’s a bonus bonus clip if you will. After Tom described Italy’s interception try at the end of the first half I asked him about Ireland’s mindset in not killing the half after winning the lineout after the clock went red given the BP was in the bag. 

TOM O’TOOLE TIK TOK

Halfway through this you’ll see me writing something down, for the record it’s a note to myself reminding me to use Tom’s mention of O’Toole’s display for this week’s TikTok clip. As you can see I remembered! 

@harpinonrugby

A clip from our latest wrap pod subscribe on most major platforms #LEIvDRA

♬ original sound – Harpinonrugby.com

IRELAND’S TIME-DELAYED CALL

There has been a lot of light hearted indignation on social media about the Italian rendition of Ireland’s Call before the match, and to be honest while I wanted to join in, the fact that the issue was easily sidetracked into that annoying “debate” over whether or not that should be played at all for Irish rugby made me pause.   But this column is a much safer space for me to express my thoughts without all that nonsense. 

It should be a simple matter – each union should be able to decide on how their anthem is played.  Full stop.  I’m not even sure why it’s up for debate.  Even giving the Italian organisers the benefit of the doubt in that this wasn’t a case of intentional head-wrecking, they still shouldn’t be put in a position where an error can be made.

The anthem playing is a “formality” in every sense of the word.  First, it’s a reminder to the player of the extra prestige of playing test level rugby for their native or adopted country (another rabbit hole I’d want to avoid in this discussion) but more relevant is the way we’re not supposed to have the rendition of the anthem as a major talking point especially in something like the Six Nations!!!

You’d hope that regulations wouldn’t be needed for this, but that fiasco would seem to warrant them. 

LEO SIGNS

A friend texted me on Monday “Just drove past the Leinster HQ in UCD.. lots of press outside” and within an hour I had learned exactly why.  This had been rumoured for a while but the confirmation was obviously very welcome news.  With Stu leaving for Racing at the end of the campaign, this provides much needed continuity and I very much doubt there’s a single Leinster fan unhappy about it.

On Stu’s replacement, we’re hearing talk about Leon MacDonald, currently in charge of the Blues in Super Rugby and formally involved with Tasman, the Crusaders and the All Blacks so not a bad resumé at all, plus he has worked with Andrew Goodman.  But before I get deep into details like how he takes his coffee, I should point out that nothing is confirmed as yet although apparently this will be sorted over the coming weeks.

Last thing I’d say on it is that a senior coaching position at Leinster Rugby isn’t exactly a tough one to sell to the best coaches. 

RDS REDEVELOPMENT

“The funds are there. It’s just a case of going through the boring bit around plans and tenders, dates and project plans. All that boring stuff. That’s all happening now. It’s all systems go. I think we should have something really exciting in the next couple of months to show.”

Obviously COVID knocked back the planned redevelopment of the RDS a good bit so it’s good to see it’s still on track and every update on its progress is welcome.  I love going there but still this work is very badly needed.

SCHOOLS FINAL FOUR

After a replayed first round tie set things back a bit, we now finally know the semifinalists in this season’s Leinster Schools Senior Cup : St Michael’s College v Blackrock College, Newbridge College v Gonzaga College.

Both should be quality matches but the first one puts me in mind of the final from ten years ago which featured players like Garry Ringrose, Jeremy Loughman, Oliver Jager, Nick Timoney, Cian Kelleher, Ross Byrne, Nick McCarthy, Ross Molony, James Ryan, Josh Murphy & Max Deegan.  It was also the day I took this photo which got some decent reception about t’internet and (eventually!) inspired me to start the Harpin Instagram account.  

Very much looking forward to both semifinals next Monday & Tuesday.

INJURY REPORT

IRELAND

Biggest news is unfortunately Finlay Bealham’s injury and although his Championship is over his contribution to this campaign cannot be overstated.   

Even without the Leinster goggles it has to be good news that Messrs Sexton, Henshaw, Furlong, Gibson Park & Ringrose are all included in the “mini-camp” in the hope that all will be available to face Scotland and England.

On the players sent back to their provinces, well I don’t want to repeat myself from last week on the consternation from certain fans over supposed bias in these decisions, I’ll just say that with a full round of URC matches at a crucial portion of the campaign, I’d say the provinces will take all the personnel they can get.

LEINSTER

The news on Joe McCarthy was unfortunate but not surprising, hopefully he’ll be able to play some part at the business end of the season.

Speaking of which, nine points from Leinster’s final four matches will mathematically clinch 1st place, though with standards at the province as they are I doubt that’s a factor in team selection this coming weekend.  Word is they were considering our matches against Cardiff, Dragons, Edinburgh & Stormers as a block which would mostly see the same combinations so we can expect a similar lineup this coming weekend.

15 COSGRAVE 14 LARMOUR 13 TURNER 12 OSBORNE 11 KEARNEY 10 H BYRNE 9 MCGRATH

1 MILNE 2 MCKEE 3 ALA’ALATOA 4 MOLONY 5 JENKINS 6 RUDDOCK (C) 7 PENNY 8 DEEGAN

16 MCELROY 17 BOYLE 18 CLARKSON 19 CONNORS 20 DEENY 21 N MCCARTHY 22 TECTOR 23 RUSSELL

(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)

INJURY UPDATE – AVAILABLE FOR SELECTION:

Jason Jenkins: came through the game against Dragons Rugby with no issues following his return from injury

INJURY UPDATE – FURTHER ASSESSMENT REQUIRED:

Ciarán Frawley: will look to increase his training load this week as he continues his recovery from a knee injury

INJURY UPDATE – UNAVAILABLE FOR SELECTION:

Joe McCarthy: has had a procedure on an ankle injury and will be out of action for two months

There are no further updates on:

Charlie Ngatai (hamstring), Cormac Foley (hamstring), Ed Byrne (knee), Martin Moloney (knee) and Tommy O’Brien (knee)

AIL UPDATE

First of all congrats to the Combined Provinces XV for their clean sweep of wins in the inaugural Celtic Challenge, no doubt they gave the test coaching set up plenty to think about over the four matches, and the squad for the upcoming Six Nations was announced on Tuesday, albeit over the backdrop of the tragic news of the passing of Tom Tierney.

Back to the Men’s AIL, Jack Boyle, Alex Soroka & Ben Murphy were among the Leinster players bagging tries in another important round of 1A matches.  Tarf stayed on top with a good win at Trinity while Terenure stayed close to them by overcoming Lansdowne.  

Meanwhile down at the bottom Garryowen finally slipped through the trap door although the race to avoid joining them is really hotting up and for the remainder of the campaign I can’t see there being too many dead rubbers.

Men’s AIL

ROUND 14

Cork Con 29-34 UCD

Dublin Univ 21-38 Clontarf

Garryowen 16-26 Shannon

Terenure 43-24 Lansdowne

Young Munster 21-0 Ballynahinch

ROUND 15

MAR 4 (all 2:30pm)

Ballynahinch v Dublin Univ

Garryowen v Cork Con

Lansdowne v Young Munster

Shannon v Clontarf

UCD v Terenure

SEVENS – FROM LA TO VANCOUVER

Just the men’s World Series resumed last weekend and to say Ireland’s fortunes varied over the two days would be an understatement.  On Day One which was marred by torrential rain and several delays we won all our pool matches, including a win over the Blitzboks, to set up a quarterfinal against Australia, yet on the Sunday we just couldn’t stop shipping penalties and slipped to two defeats which meant we also slipped further down the series table to 9th after 6 of 11 rounds.

The circuit now moves to Vancouver, Canada where we get a chance for revenge over the Aussies in our pool and we also face Chile and our hosts.

Meanwhile the women return to action as well and with just three rounds to go we’ll be looking for another final four appearance to get us higher than our current fifth position.  

VANCOUVER 7S

IRELAND’S FIXTURES

FRI MAR 3

6:43PM WOMEN V CANADA

9:45PM MEN V CANADA

SAT MAR 4

12:58AM WOMEN V BRAZIL 

4:35AM MEN V CHILE

7:50PM WOMEN V USA

10:57PM MEN V AUSTRALIA

11:28PM WOMEN’S PLAYOFFS BEGIN

MON MAR 5

1:54AM MEN’S PLAYOFFS BEGIN

MAJOR LEAGUE RUGBY

Getting pressed for time as I type so I’ll just leave the results, table & fixtures in this section.  Hopefully I’ll have time to catch a game or two soon, they’re all available for free on TheRugbyNetwork.com.

ROUND 2

SEA 28-22 ATL

UTAH 33-25 DAL

HOU 35-14 NOLA

RNYI 39-3 TOR

SD 29-12 NEFJ

ROUND 3

DAL V SEA

ATL V NOLA

CHI V UTAH

RNYI V OGDC

HOU V SD

HARPIN’ PREDICTION LEAGUE

Kudos to Cian “RugbyKino” O’Muilleoir for reminding us all of the extra URC matches last weekend, I chose to reward him by being the only one to take a punt on Ulster winning in Durban, thus allowing me to narrow his lead down to just two and a half points!!!  We both got the Lions/Glasgow game wrong though, which has us both anxiously looking over our shoulders at Mark Jackson in 3rd so there are a few interesting weeks of Superbruing ahead for us.  Oh, and we’d also like to announce Keego’s new full official nickname of Neil “No Picks Keego” Keegan…

THE NEXT BATCH OF HARPIN’

Obviously we’ll be turning our attention to Leinster’s trip to Edinburgh next weekend and we’ll have an Opposition View pod during the week talking to Sandy Smith although it would be rude not to also ask him about the Scots whom Ireland play in the same city a week later.

Then we return to our URC focus with a preview show before, a wrap pod after and also all the other usual features in between so be sure to follow us on any or all of our social media platforms to keep up with it all.  In the meantime, be sure to enjoy your rugby wherever you are.  JLP

80+ column : Penny pushing, WRU SNAFU & MLR crowds

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

FANZO GUINNESS PINT PREDICTOR LEAGUE

First things first…the all important update in the prestigious Guinness Pint Predictor League.

After a week off the Six Nations returns so be sure to get your predictions done in time, seems like a pointless reminder but I’ve forgotten how many times I’ve forgotten over the years.

REMEMBER YOU CAN STILL JOIN THE LEAGUE AND WIN PRIZES we’re accepting entrants right up to the final round and you can still beat Jack Fogarty’s Round 2 score of 58 and also every Six Nations match gives you the chance to win a free pint so by all means download the app and enter the league using the code HARPIN and see how you get on.

The prize for the Best Score In One Round category is a signed copy of Brian Moylett’s “The Book On How You Become A Pro Rugby Player” [he was a guest on our bonus pod last week] so like I say there’s still plenty of time to throw your hat in the ring.

WRAP OF A WRAP

Some might say Leinster’s BP win over the Dragons last Saturday evening at the RDS was “run of the mill” but here at Harpin Manor we always find plenty to keep us going for a wrap pod and Tom “@LeinsterRoyalty” Coleman & Ciarán “@PostToPostSport” Duffy were on hand to get ‘er done.

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

HE SAID IT AGAIN!!!

Last week I brought back a strict rule on these pages, namely that in a year when Ireland wins the first two matches in the Six Nations, that two-word phrase which rhymes with “canned ham” is considered taboo on all Harpin platforms unless stated otherwise – Tom let one slip on the pod Sunday evening and was so amused by the look on my face that he kept doing it, with of course Ciarán joining in with a few of his own!  Thankfully I had editing privileges on my side which is why you hear a few buzzer sounds on the pod.

HARPIN’ ON…RHYS RUDDOCK

For this week’s bonus clip we looked at the career of Rhys Ruddock and his invaluable contributions to Leinster & Ireland rugby going back to 2009, or to put it another way, since Harpin On Rugby first came into being.

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.

HARRY BYRNE TIK TOK

In the pod I asked Tom for his take on Harry Byrne’s chance to shine with Leinster during this block of the season and as always he came up trumps.

@harpinonrugby

A clip from our latest wrap pod subscribe on most major platforms #LEIvDRA

♬ original sound – Harpinonrugby.com

PETER O’MAHONY SIGNS

Ireland Rugby Squad Training, IRFU High Performance Centre, Sport Ireland Campus, Blanchardstown, Dublin 21/2/2023Peter OMahonyMandatory Credit ©INPHO/Dan Sheridan

I’ve said it many a time on these pages but I’ve no problem saying it again, Peter O’Mahony is an absolutely crucial presence in the Irish rugby squad, on the pitch in play, on the pitch out of play, and in the dressing room.  Which means I’m delighted to see him sign an extension to his contract.

PENNY PUSHING

So with tongue firmly in cheek I posted the above tweet on Sunday.  Nothing in particular provoked it at the time it was just a general observation.  But on Monday we went from the general to the particular, with the announcement of Scott Penny’s addition to the Irish training camp causing a predictable response from the online provincial factions, mostly from Munster fans speaking up for John Hodnett, but also from Ulster fans who suggest Nick Timoney is more worthy of the call up.

Ireland Rugby Squad Training, IRFU High Performance Centre, Sport Ireland Campus, Blanchardstown, Dublin 21/2/2023Scott Penny Mandatory Credit ©INPHO/Ben Brady

This time, to be fair to the objectors, the bulk of them have gone out of their way to point out that they do consider Scott to be a quality player, which was nice of them.  But they then go on to paint this selection on the canvass of the “The IRFU is biased towards Leinster” narrative and this is what took most of the oxygen amongst the Irish rugby twitterati throughout Monday, so much so that Balls.ie were able to harvest a ton of clicks from it with an article entitled “Munster Fans Have Had A Lot To Say About Scott Penny’s Ireland Call-Up” (you’ll forgive me if I don’t include a link).

Apparently the mic-drop defence of the bias accusations is the fact that Scott Penny has only played 10 minutes of European rugby in his career to date.  This is true, and it is also a valid point.  But is it the only one?  Of course not, and I dare say a lot of the social media pot stirrers know this full well.

For one thing, while Heineken Cup is supposed to be a means of getting close to test standard, I’m not sure this applies as much now as it would have done five or more years ago.  As many of the same Penny doubters would have pointed out at the time, Leinster’s four European pool matches were “far too easy”.

But more importantly, I don’t see anyone talking about the Emerging Ireland tour from last October, where the Irish test coaching setup travelled with both Penny and Hodnett training day in day out and sharing the 7 role in our three matches.

And I also don’t see many people exploring the possibility that Penny being further down Leinster’s pecking order might be the feature rather than the bug.  

Call this “trolling” if you want, but the remaining rounds of the URC have match points up for grabs that are much more valuable to Ulster (who also have an extra match next weekend btw), Munster & Connacht so maybe, just maybe, having Penny hold the tackle bags rather than Messrs Timoney & Hodnett might actually make sense in this case.

But no, let’s just go with a single-issue framing that stokes the provincial feuding, I guess that’s better for clicks and impressions.

Like I always say – I’m ready for a rational discussion about the possibility of lopsided treatment of the provinces from the likes of Mr Nucifora, once it actually IS a rational discussion which looks at the full picture. 

WRU SNAFU

Can’t add much more to my sentiments in the above tweet, only to give a shout out to our friends at the Welsh Regional Rugby Appreciation Podcast who had a very rational and informative pod recently outlining in a level headed way the ins and outs of the current crisis.  They even referenced The West Wing which got extra points from me.  [also as I post I see they’ve just published another pod featuring an interview with Squidge]

INJURY REPORT

I already addressed the row over one addition to the Irish squad, but there were of course other announcements, like the call up of Joey Carbery which means it’s very possible we won’t see Sexton playing in Rome (on the IRFU page their training session includes two pics of Ross Byrne if that tells us anything, probably not).

Also it’s good to know Dan Sheehan & Cian Healy are back in the group and also the much less controversial additions are Caolin Blade, Gavin Coombes, Jordan Larmour, Jimmy O’Brien, Jamie Osborne, Cian Prendergast, Roman Salanoa, Jacob Stockdale and Kieran Treadwell.  Very happy to see all those names involved with of course in each case there are at least one or two others who just missed out.

AIL UPDATE

First a word on the Women’s Celtic Challenge, congrats to the Irish representatives Combined Provinces who made it three wins from three with a 19-0 whitewash of their Welsh counterparts at the Kingspan last weekend, and best of luck to them aiming for a perfect campaign when they travel to Scotland to play the Thistles.

Now to the Men’s AIL and there were some fascinating results in Div1A as Terenure were knocked off their perch at the top following a narrow 8-10 defeat to Ballynahinch who had Marcus Rea and Jake Flannery in their ranks.  Taking over at the top are Clontarf, who didn’t have things their own way either but with Mick Kearney and Alex Soroka in their pack they stayed ahead of Young Munster at Castle Avenue.

Down at the bottom UCD badly needed all five points against surely-doomed Garryowen and Ben Brownlee was amongst the tries in their 52-12 victory.

Pick of the matches in Round 14 would seem to be Cookies v Hinch as the race for the top four now seems wide open.

Men’s AIL

ROUND 13

Ballynahinch 10-8 Terenure

Clontarf 27-24 Young Munster

Lansdowne 25-19 Cork Con

Shannon 43-17 Dublin University

UCD 52-12 Garryowen

ROUND 14

Feb 25 (all 2:30pm)

Cork Con v UCD

Dublin Univ v Clontarf

Garryowen v Shannon

Terenure v Lansdowne

Young Munster v Ballynahinch

SEVENS ARE BACK

Even with the Six Nations and a bit of URC action to look forward to at the weekend, I’m always here for some World Series Sevens action as well, although whatever the reason may be for only the men taking part in the LA leg, it’s still a shame.

The Irish men will really need to push for a top four finish here if they are to move up the rankings and while they find themselves with the Blitboks in their pool, with good performances against Uruguay and Canada they can cement their place in the knockouts by then.  Best of luck to them.

LA SEVENS

SAT FEB 25

7:27PM – IRELAND V URUGUAY

10:40PM – IRELAND V CANADA

3:03AM (SUNDAY) – IRELAND V SOUTH AFRICA

SUN FEB 26

4:55PM – PLAYOFFS BEGIN

MAJOR LEAGUE RUGBY

I’m already keeping track of the AIL and Sevens in this column but since I am hopeful of pro rugby taking off in my nation of birth I guess I should probably show more of an interest in the MLR which kicked off last weekend.

Of course with last season’s shenanigans with the two Gilchrist owned teams having to withdraw making a mockery of the playoffs didn’t help, but there was definitely some positive news to kick off the 2023 season with a league record 11,423 tickets sold for the San Diego Legion v Utah Warriors match at Snapdragon Stadium in southern California.  I can think of a few URC grounds, maybe even Premiership ones two, that wouldn’t mind that kind of attendance.

I’ll be posting the results, table and next fixtures here throughout the season and will do my best to catch a game or two as they’re all available for free on TheRugbyNetwork.com.

ROUND 1

ATL 17-10 TOR

NOLA 12-36 NEFJ

OGDC 42-27 CHI

SD 33-17 UTAH

SEA 25-11 RNYI

DAL 12-33 HOU

ROUND 2

SEA V ATL

UTAH V DAL

HOU V NOLA

RNYI V TOR

SD V NEFJ

THE NEXT BATCH OF HARPIN’

It’s back to the Six Nations we turn and first in a bonus midweek pod I have an all-province panel to go over the two rounds so far with me, I wonder if the Scott Penny thing will come up???? 

Then of course we will turn our attention to Ireland’s match in Rome on Saturday which will be getting the usual Harpin treatment with a preview Friday featuring Keego, a wrap on Sunday plus a whole lot of other features in between.

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

80+ column : Competition update, troll’s tropes, taboo phrase

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

FANZO GUINNESS PINT PREDICTOR LEAGUE

First things first…the all important update in the prestigious Guinness Pint Predictor League.

As you can see an amazing round by Jack Fogarty including a perfect prediction of IREvFRA catapulted him into first place in both categories; ‘Overall score’ as you see in the graphic, and also ‘best one round score’.

REMEMBER YOU CAN STILL JOIN THE LEAGUE AND WIN PRIZES we’re accepting entrants right up to the final round and you can still beat Jack’s Round 2 score of 58 and also every Six Nations match gives you the chance to win a free pint so by all means download the app and enter the league using the code HARPIN and see how you get on.

And we can announce an extra prize for the Best Score In One Round category – a signed copy of Brian Moylett’s “The Book On How You Become A Pro Rugby Player” [he’ll be a guest on our bonus pod this week] so like I say there’s still plenty of time to throw your hat in the ring.

WRAP OF A WRAP

That was a real Six Nations classic at the Aviva on Saturday, and we thought it might take myself, Mark & Conor about six hours to record the wrap.  In the end it was more like an hour and a half so a lot had to end up on the cutting room floor although as you can see below I managed to salvage a couple of bonus YouTube clips.

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

ATONIO ATONIN’

Thankfully, Wayne Barnes’ decision that “I’m not starting at a high degree of danger” didn’t affect the result too much in the end, and pretty much everyone who saw the match was expecting news of Atonio’s citing on Monday, we’ll see how the hearing goes.

Unfortunately, the non-call brought two of my most hated tropes to the fore on the social media, the “go overboard slagging off the ref” and the one I pointed out here.

HARPIN’ ON…THE KICKING GAME

I got given out to on our YouTube channel for apparently copying a theme recently highlighted by Squidge, well as much I love his work I have to point out that I did not see that video and even if I had, I still wanted to let Mark, an actual head coach at Nat 2 level in the English system, a chance to harp on the topic in his own words.

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.

HARPIN’ ON…THE WORCESTER MESS

Mark also gave some decent background on the omnishambles at Worcester so I included the extra chat in a “bonus bonus clip”.

DORIS PASS TIK TOK

Couldn’t let Mark get all the social media airtime so Conor’s depiction of “That Doris pass” made for a perfect TikTok promo and seems to be getting decent engagement so far…

@harpinonrugby

A clip from our latest wrap pod available at http://www.anchor.fm/harpinonrugby and most major platforms #IREVFRA #GuinnessSixNations

♬ original sound – Harpinonrugby.com

THAT DUPONT TACKLE

I might get into trouble here as it’s going to look like I’m slagging off two world class players, but I can’t help wondering if we’re going a tad overboard gushing over Antoine Dupont’s holding up Mack Hansen around the try line at the Aviva?

Don’t get me wrong, it did show great strength but I don’t see anyone pointing out that Hansen had zero momentum when AD grabbed him plus, while the Connacht star would definitely kick my ass one on one, he’s not exactly our biggest player?  Would he have held up James Ryan the same way for example?

Again to be absolutely clear, I’m not saying the try denial wasn’t impressive, just that maybe the praise needs dialling down a few notches.   I’ll shut up now, it’s probably for the best.

TABOO WORDS FOR THE NEXT FEW WEEKS

This point is very simple, and shouldn’t need any explanation to long time readers, although according to this tweet by Ulster fan and occasional contributor Ian Frizzell the BelTel subeditors definitely need a crash course.

After two Irish wins to kickoff this season’s Six Nations, ALL MENTIONS of that two word phrase that rhymes with “bland jam” are OFF LIMITS whether spoken, typed or signed until further notice.  Please observe and pass it on to all around you.

INJURY REPORT

IRELAND

On top of the concerns we already had that Robbie, JGP, Tadhg & Dan would miss the remainder of the Six Nations, now the other Tadhg and even Sexton have become doubts.  All are presumptive starters but as we have seen so far the wider squad have earned themselves a ton of good faith so hopefully the supporters will buy in.

LEINSTER

Most encouraging bit of Leinster’s report was JJ moving out of the “no further updates” category we could really do with having him back when the knockout matches come around.  Given we’re also getting four back from Irish camp all in need of some game time I reckon we can put out a pretty decent lineup at the RDS on Saturday night…

J O’Brien, J Larmour, L Turner, B Brownlee, D Kearney, H Byrne, L McGrath

M Milne, J McKee, M Ala’alatoa, R Molony, J McCarthy, R Ruddock, W Connors, M Deegan

T McElroy,  M Hanan, T Clarkson, B Deeny, S Penny, N McCarthy, C Tector, R Russell

(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)

INJURY UPDATE – AVAILABLE FOR SELECTION:

Will Connors: came through the game against Cardiff Rugby with no issues following his return from injury

INJURY UPDATE – FURTHER ASSESSMENT REQUIRED:

Jason Jenkins: will look to increase his training load this week as he nears a return from a hamstring injury

INJURY UPDATE – UNAVAILABLE FOR SELECTION:

Cormac Foley: picked up a hamstring injury training last week and will be unavailable for selection

There are no further updates on:

Charlie Ngatai (hamstring), Ed Byrne (knee), Martin Moloney (knee), Ciarán Frawley (knee) and Tommy O’Brien (knee)

AIL UPDATE

First a word on the Women’s Celtic Challenge, the Irish Combined Provinces XV had a week off and resume their campaign with a match against the Welsh at the Kingspan on Saturday hoping to make it three wins from three, best of luck to them.

Next the men’s AIL is back with some interesting 1A matchups in round 13 as you can see.

Finally ICYMI our bonus pod last week was an interesting chat with Justin Middleton where he outlined his route to becoming the voice of the AIL and he also talks about what can be done to help promote the league to a wider audience.  Do check it out here.

Men’s AIL

Sat Feb 18

Ballynahinch v Terenure

Clontarf v Young Munster

Lansdowne v Cork Con

Shannon v Dublin University

UCD v Garryowen

THE NEXT BATCH OF HARPIN’

As I said earlier our bonus pod this week features an interview with Brian Moylett about his book.

Then of course we will turn our attention back to the URC with the rebranded Dragons coming to the RDS on Saturday and of course the match will be getting the usual Harpin treatment with a preview Friday featuring Keego, a wrap on Sunday plus a whole lot of other features in between.

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

80+ column : Predicting Prowess, Rank Rankings & Emoji Empathy

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

FANZO GUINNESS PINT PREDICTOR LEAGUE

To important admin business first, serious kudos to Christy O’Connor who finished top of the pile in the first round of our Guinness Pint Predictor League on the Fanzo app.

His forecasts of Ireland by 16, Scotland by 4 and France by 9 were closest of the lot so he not only won some free pints for himself but he’s also given him a shot at winning two league categories, namely Best Round Score and of course Overall Winner.

As for the added challenge of beating our Harpin panel of experts, well…let’s just say we’re all a little bit further down the ladder for now but as the saying goes it’s early doors and all that…

REMEMBER YOU CAN STILL JOIN THE LEAGUE we’re accepting entrants right up to the final round and you can still beat that one round score of 46 (top score overall on the app was 60) and also every Six Nations Match gives you the chance to win a free pint so by all means download the app and enter the league using the code HARPIN and see how you get on.

WRAP OF A WRAP

Rich Mifsud & RugbyKino helped me wrap the Welsh match and as ever did a bang up job going back over the eighty minutes and offered some excellent insights, as well as harpin’ on stories from beyond the Irish men’s senior bubble in our “Front Five” feature.

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

HARPIN’ ON…HUGO “MR DEPENDABLE” KEENAN

This week’s bonus clip was on Leinster & Ireland’s nailed on starting full back Hugo Keenan.  Often I disagree with the selection of Player of the match and for Saturday’s match at Cardiff there certainly could be a cae made for Caelan Doris but having said that Keenan is long overdue a prolonged discussion and like I say in the clip if we don’t make a point of having it, he could go his entire career with us taking his high standards for granted.

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.

ANDY FARRELL TIK TOK

I never go into my pod recording knowing what portion I’m going to use but the second Kino said this I knew I had my TikTok clip.

@harpinonrugby

Check out our latest wrap pod at anchor.fm/harpinonrugby and most major platforms #GuinnessSixNations #WALvIRE

♬ original sound – Harpinonrugby.com

A SHOWER OF RANKERS

A curious thing happened on Monday, well two curious things, the first being the new Bank Holiday but the second was a flood of posts in my rugby timeline pointing out that Scotland’s win over England moved them up the World Rugby rankings to ensure that all of the top five are now on the same side of the draw in RWC2023.

That, of course, is ludicrous, but maybe it is also ludicrous for us to keep going on about it because I very much doubt there is anything that can be done to change it.  The practice of holding the draw three years in advance (supposedly in part because it offers a bit of a competitive edge to that year’s November internationals???) has been going on for a few RWC cycles now so it’s nothing new.  

Obviously this “top 5” element is an extreme outcome but the thing is we have known about it for years and this was pointed out as a possible consequence long ago.  We’re just going to have to grin and bear this one and hope they fix things for 2027.

What could be done instead?  I’m not sure if holding the draw later is necessarily a solution because the rankings always change, but maybe they could drop the “fixed bracket” element of the quarterfinal makeup?  So keep the pool winners apart in the last 8 but have their seeding in the draw determined by the rankings at the time?

That of course leads this point towards the rabbit hole of reforming the entire World Cup format altogether so I’ll stray away from that for now, but it’s an interesting one to think about all the same.

THE SIX EMOJIS

Interesting tweet from Jay Long here on twitter Emoji etiquette.  He went on to get a good deal of negative reaction to pointing this out but I don’t see the problem with reminding folks of the make-up of the Irish rugby team.

As Jay points out, often people don’t mean anything by it, but I dare say the vast majority of times people use the tricolour it has no added meaning, and once they learn of this they’ll use the shamrock in future.

I also added that it’s critical to be sure to use the three-leaf emoji rather than the four otherwise you could find yourself in serious “trouble”!!!

INJURY REPORT

Obviously the news that Messrs JGP, Furlong & Healy will also be unavailable to play France was less than ideal news, yet still their standins all did extremely well in Cardiff and I see no reason why we can’t be confident going with the exact same 23 and in many ways the fact that all appear to be available makes this overall a decent injury report for Andy Farrell’s squad.  Plus, it was great news that Rónan Kelleher has resumed full training, and congrats to both Caolin Blade and Michael Milne for their call ups.

THE NEXT BATCH OF HARPIN’

Short but sweet 80+ column this week, on Wednesday we’ll be posting an interview with Justin Middleton about his career as a rugby commentator so far as well as a chat about the All Ireland league.

Then of course we will turn our attention back to the 6N starting with our massive clash with France getting the usual Harpin treatment with a preview Friday featuring Rugby Kino, a wrap on Sunday plus a whole lot of other features in between.

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

80+ column : 6N on-pitch anticipation, off-pitch frustration

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

SIX NATIONS COMPETITION

The countdown to “6Mas” gets closer to zero and this year we’re launching a prediction league in conjunction with the Fanzo app, if we get good engagement we’ll offer some prizes for the best players so you’ll really help us out by joining and/or sharing the above graphic with your rugby loving pals.

Here at Harpin Manor we’re running a separate league among our squad of Six Nations podsters, namely myself, Keego, Mark Jackson, Tom Coleman, Conor Cronin, Rich Mifsud & RugbyKino.  And don’t tell them I said this but none of them think any of you have a hope of beating them when it comes to forecasting so I guess you’ll just have to prove ‘em wrong won’t you 😜

WRAP OF A WRAP

Unfortunately Rich Mifsud had to sit our our wrap pod at the weekend due to illness and we hope we returns to fitness in time for next Sunday.  Thankfully RugbyKino was able to answer the call and along with Conor we got an excellent summary of what was expected to be a much closer contest at the RDS.

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

HARPIN’ ON…LEINSTER’S TAP N GO TRIES

For the pod I try to even out the portions of the match I get my guests to cover as best as I can, yet sadly I didn’t realise Kino had done a lot of preparation on Leinster’s success rate with short tap n go penalty options when I allocated our two tries against Cardiff to Conor.  But when we finished recording the main pod Kino still shared the information and unbeknownst to him the mic was still “hot” so I got it all and made it into a bonus clip for YouTube which you 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.

HARRY BYRNE TIK TOK

This week the TikTok spotlight turned to Harry Byrne, this was an important start for him and we thought he did realy well.

@harpinonrugby

Our #LEIvCAR wrap pod is now live at anchor.fm/harpinonrugby and most major platforms

♬ original sound – Harpinonrugby.com – Harpinonrugby.com

SIX NATIONS GOVERNANCE

Folks, what the hell is going on here???

I’m doing my best to keep myself from donning the tinfoil hat but it would appear that unions from all Six Nations are experiencing varying forms of governance issues in the weeks leading up to the game’s greatest championship kicking off, almost as if (a) we’d have difficulty focusing on everything at once and (b) once the rugby starts we’re expected to forget it anyway.

None of it is pretty, and yes I do mean all unions are involved. 

Recently we had the terrible allegations of systemic misogyny made against the WRU in a documentary, which of course simply sits atop a whole host of other issues there.   

Also last week there was further development in Bernard Laporte’s saga which doesn’t look like straying too far from the news cycle, something the FFR could do without in a RWC year.  

Although what happened in Italian rugby, namely the disgusting “secret Santa” present, was confined to one club, it was their biggest and surely warranted involvement by the union and the response has been extremely insufficient.  

Meanwhile in Scotland the SRU has fallen well short addressing the tragic death of Siobhan Cattigan.  

Then there was the RFU making an absolute hames of introducing new tackle laws at lower levels (in every sense), a problem with communication that by all accounts is nothing new over there.

As for Irish rugby?  Well perhaps on the surface there’s nothing in the front line news, yet while steps are being taken to improve the Women’s game with professional contracts and new competitions being announced, there is information being put out there by a particular twitter account that suggests a lot more needs to be done.

Each issue is vast and extremely difficult to summarize in an article like this one, but the reason I had a stab at it was to present the overall view from just outside the 6N bubble.

We love rugby on the pitch; I’m writing this article and you’re reading it so that goes without saying.  But knowing so much negativity is going on behind the scenes is certainly not acceptable, especially when the governance issues are so widespread.  No organisation is ever going to have everything perfect all the time, but what does seem to be a common thread in the above stories is that the failures are in areas where you’d expect to have set standards throughout the sport, something I would have thought a body like World Rugby was there to fix.

SEVENS

Another strong showing by the Irish women, this time reaching another semifinal after an impressive quarterfinal win over Fiji which put some distance between us and them in the overall series standings and keeps us within reach of the top four.

Meanwhile the men also reached the last eight but a couple of early mistakes against the Blitzbokke made a fightback impossible so we are continuing to struggle to match the excellent silver medal in Dubai.

Next on the circuit is Los Angeles for the men at the end of February, while both they and the women join them in Vancouver the following weekend.  Without researching I just have to say on the surface it does seem odd that LA can’t provide for a women’s leg in the series.

But that just brings me to the point I always like making when discussing the World Sevens Series…

AIL UPDATE

Before I harp on the Men’s AIL, a quick shout out to the Women’s Combined Provinces XV – clunky name I know,  but apparently it’s just for the one season as the new Celtic Challenge tournament is meant to expand from one team per nation to two next season.  Anyway – they opened their campaign with a 27-26 win away to their Welsh counterparts in the opening match.

Now to Division 1A and in Round 12 there was so much going on at both ends of the table it’s hard to know where to start.  I guess it’s best to “take it from the top” as league leaders Terenure suffered only their second defeat of the season, this one at home to rivals Clontarf and with Cork Con also winning, it means just three point separate the top three. Then there’s the race for that fourth semifinal berth as Young Munster scored a home win over Trinity to leap frog them.

But arguably the biggest result of the round was Garryowen finally kicking the duck egg out of their win column by beating Lansdowne, who in turn got dragged back into the relegation battle as UCD also did some leap-frogging, sneaking out of the bottom two at Shannon’s expense.

The clubs now get a couple of weekend’s off to let punters catch the Six Nations in their bars (seriously, if you can, do get down to your local clubs to watch if you can, it really helps them out) and they return to action with some big matchups as you can see below.

Men’s AIL

Cork Con 14-3 Ballynahinch

Garryowen 21-17 Lansdowne

UCD 22-19 Shannon

Young Munster 17-10 Dublin Univ

Terenure 24-29 Clontarf

Sat Feb 18

Ballynahinch v Terenure

Clontarf v Young Munster

Lansdowne v Cork Con

Shannon v Dublin University

UCD v Garryowen

THE NEXT BATCH OF HARPIN’

I’d like to say here “from now on we’re switching into FULL SIX NATIONS MODE for the next couple of months”, but of course I can’t say that because there’s a bit of URC thrown in there plus I have another couple of pods lined up on other topics for good measure.

But still, obvs the bulk of the coverage is going to be on the 6N starting with an overview pod which will record Wednesday evening, then the tournament opener in Cardiff will be getting the usual Harpin treatment with a preview Friday, wrap on Sunday plus a whole lot of other features in between.

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

80+ column : Irish Squad, tackle height, Schools Cup

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

WRAP OF A WRAP

Now I’m glad I didn’t bore you every other week in this column with my disaster stories travelling to and from the RDS/Aviva for home Leinster matches because last Saturday everything went absolutely swimmingly.  Short wait time for buses in both direction, no getting lost in the lower reaches of the Stadium which made me go the looooong way round to my seat because I turned left not right, no hitches of any sort which I thought wasn’t possible.  

Oh, and Leinster also won on top of it all, maybe with a hitch or two, but still with some cracking scores along the way.  And all of the last bit was brilliantly summed up by both Tom and Nathan on Sunday night’s pod.  If you missed it, check it out here or on most major platforms.

HARPIN’ ON…GARRY RINGROSE : LEADERSHIP & FORM

For our extended clip this week I thought it was the perfect opportunity to harp on Garry Ringrose who has really grown into the captaincy role this season and it definitely looks like one he could be taking over once Johnny Sexton hangs up the boots.

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.

JASON JENKINS TIK TOK

We have a core team of Sunday podsters but I’me very grateful to Nathan Johns for being able to step in the odd Sunday, he works for the Irish Times and covers a lot of Irish cricket including the recent T20 World Cup but as you can see in the TikTok below he also provides great rugby insight like this point about Leinster’s defensive maul.

@harpinonrugby

A clip from our latest wrap pod

♬ original sound – Harpinonrugby.com

THE OTHER PROVINCES

“All four provinces into the knockout phase” is the most important takeaway.  Sure there were some disappointing results along the way, and it’s not ideal that three must play away and also two of us have to play each other in the round of 16, but still progression is a major goal when the process starts and should be applauded.  I’m skirting close to the format debate here so I’ll save that for a later point.

IRISH SQUAD

I have to be honest, squad announcements are actually starting to get boring, if only because the reactions are so predictable.  With the list being announced during a pair of HCC weekends it’s not easy to remove the provincial goggles I suppose, but I’m not sure they’d be taken off under any circumstances.

Even when a coach has a record that suggests his choices can be trusted for the immediate future, still the accusations of bias over form get bandied about.  Really, really, boring.

Did the Carbery omission raise an eyebrow?  Of course it did, although with Ben Healy’s decision they did have to take Munster’s current situation into account – still not guaranteed HCC qualification for next season so the mid 6N URC matches will be vital – and also if it was down to himself and Crowley I dare say the latter would certainly benefit more from time with the test squad while Carbery can easily slot in later in the comp if required.

MY FINAL DEVIL’S ADVOCACY OF THE HCC FORMAT…

Yes, yes, I know I’ve harped on this a lot in recent weeks, but in my defence, so have most people on social media before during and after each of the four pool rounds so I reckon I’m entitled to another swing at pushing back just a bit.

Once again, to be clear…this is NOT my ideal format.  However, the things many people are complaining about seem to be things that won’t be necessarily solved by returning to 5 or 6 pools of four.

“You can win just one match and still qualify for the knockouts”

First, can we please all be clear that “knockouts” means something different in the two formats?  Here it’s getting you into the last 16, while “the old way” it was into the last 8.  And under that regime, I clearly remember teams going through having won just 3 of their 6 matches while others got nowhere despite having won 4.  And under this current system, sure, you can win 1 and progress like Ulster did however (a) they needed bonus points, all of which were hard earned, to just about get them into 8th spot, and (b), look at the task ahead of them in the Last 16.

Another mark against the old way of knockouts was that I hated the way you could meet a team in the quarterfinals that you already played twice in the pool phase.  Seems strange that everyone is going wild about the quirks about this current format while forgetting those from the last one.

Overall I still contend that simply switching back won’t make all things fine and dandy…if you really want to give the competition the elevated status it deserves then we can carve out a block of the season and play it in successive weeks so that all the coaches can have full access to all their squads from start to finish, which I always feel is the best way to run tournaments for our wonderful sport.

Right, that should be that when it comes to me going on about formats.  Until the draw for next year’s comp, of course…

TACKLE HEIGHT IN ENGLISH LOWER TIERS

And as the format debate recedes, another one takes its place.  This has mostly been on English social media of course given it’s an RFU ruling, but the change is bound to be observed by all other unions as well and besides, Johnny Sexton weighing in at the Six Nations Launch certainly got the Irish rugby world involved.

Like I always say about this issue of concussion and tackle height, the most important thing is the discussion.  First that there is one, but more importantly that it is being conducted by people acting in good faith.  Unfortunately I feel this RFU ruling for lower tier grades might be a few steps too far in the other direction, which gives the “ruining the game” brigade the opportunity to opine without the need for ridiculous superlatives like they usually do over this matter (although I have heard that some are saying they’ll quit the game altogether over this, which seems absurd).

One element of the pushback against this announcement that is concerning is that it appears the RFU didn’t do a whole lot of consultation with grass roots clubs before reaching this decision, which could mean they were more about preventing further litigation than they were actually helping the game.

But overall I feel we have to be ready to accept some changes to the laws that will make the game safer.  Yes, I get that tackling low can still lead to a head knock, but the guidelines also state that the player carrying is meant to stay upright so, at least in theory, it’s possible just as many penalties will go the other way.  The only way to know for sure is to test it in actual matches, although maybe running the test across the vast majority of clubs in England was a bit hasty.

DOWNLOAD THE FANZO APP

6Mas Day is just around the corner, and this year we’re partnering with the Fanzo App to run a prediction league throughout the Six Nations where you can win a free pint for yourself (regardless how others do, more info to come later).

Basically we’re offering a prize ourselves for the best predictors over the five weeks of the Six Nations, but also you can help us out here at Harpin Manor just by joining the league.  We’ll post more details on the site over the next week or so but feel free to join know if you like, just download the Fanzo app, click “Let’s Go” in the “Guinness Pint Predictor” tab, tap “Leagues”, then “Join or Create a League” and finally the code is “Harpin”.

WOMEN’S INTERPROS

Congrats to Munster on their title, and also to all in the Leinster squad for bouncing back from last week’s disappointment to post a convincing win in the final match against Ulster.  Again, it’s a shame they didn’t at least have a home and away schedule, something Tania Rosser herself pointed out on Twitter, especially when you consider that it’s conceivable that the senior Leinster Women’s team may not take to the field again until 2024!

But there is still a lot of top level rugby to look forward to, starting with this new Celtic Challenge competition, where Ireland Scotland and Wales each have one team for now but probably two next season and maybe eventually this can become something of a URC in its own right.  We named our squad for the competition and hopefully there will be some kind of broadcast coverage to see how they’re getting on ahead of the Women’s Six Nations.

SEVENS UPDATE

Both squads were involved in the Hamilton 7s last weekend, with the women faring best as their fourth place finish after a quarterfinal win over France means we remain in the top 4 on the overall standings.

Meanwhile the men also got out of their pool only to run smack back into the hosts New Zealand but a win in the placings playoffs scored a few axtra series points with a 6th placed finish leaving us 9th overall on the ladder, with a good bit of daylight between us and 10th meaning we can hopefully move our way up in the remaining rounds.

Next on the circuit is Sydney next weekend, I don’t see a schedule as I type this column so maybe check back in later in the week.

INJURY REPORT

“No new injury news” is always good news, although it would still be nice to see names moving out of that list down at the bottom.  Not easy to tell what kind of team we’ll have for the visit of Cardiff this coming weekend, although I’m thinking one or two might still be available despite being named to the Irish squad.

Cosgrove, Russell, Turner, Osborne, Kearney, H Byrne, McGrath.

Milne, McKee, Ala’alatoa, Molony, Deeny, Ruddock, Penny, Deegan.

Bench : Kelleher, Hanan, Clarkson, J McCarthy, Connors, Foley, R Byrne,  Brownlee

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

INJURY UPDATE – AVAILABLE FOR SELECTION:

Caelan Doris: rolled his ankle in the second half of the game against Racing 92 but is expected to join the Irish Rugby squad as planned this week

Josh van der Flier: suffered a dead leg in the second half against Racing 92 but is expected to join the Irish Rugby squad as planned this week

Joe McCarthy: came through the game against Racing 92 with no issues following his return from an ankle injury

Luke McGrath: came through the game against Racing 92 with no issues following his return from an ankle injury

INJURY UPDATE – UNAVAILABLE FOR SELECTION:

There was no new injury news from the game against Racing 92 at the weekend

There are no further updates on:

Johnny Sexton (cheek bone), Tadhg Furlong (calf), Charlie Ngatai (hamstring), Ed Byrne (knee), Jason Jenkins (hamstring), Robbie Henshaw (wrist), Martin Moloney (knee), Ciarán Frawley (knee) and Tommy O’Brien (knee)

AIL UPDATE

Some big matches in Round 11 of Division 1A which had some big results that left some big consequences.  Cork Con’s win at Tarf meant Nure extended their lead at the top to 6pts after beating Trinity, which in turn meant Ballynahinch have moved themselves to just two points off the top four.  Down at the bottom it looks like Garryowen are close to the trap door while Shannon and UCD are close for the second spot, which makes their meeting on Saturday a critical one.  Nure have another top four battle to come when they host Tarf at Lakelands which Cork Con will try to keep the pressure on although Hinch won’t make things easy for them.

Men’s AIL

Lansdowne 23-20 UCD

Clontarf 12-24 Cork Con

Trinity 7-12 Terenure

Hinch 24-7 Garryowen

Cookies 31-27 Shannon

Sat Jan 28

Cork Con v Ballynahinch

Garryowen v Lansdowne

UCD v Shannon

Young Munster v Dublin Univ

Terenure v Clontarf

SCHOOLS CUP TIME

It’s that time of year again with the kick off of the Leinster Schools Senior Cup where we get to watch the future stars of the game in action.  As I type I have received word of broadcast coverage of the first round so here are the details…

(everything in italics below is from Leinster Rugby)

Bank of Ireland Leinster Rugby Schools Senior Cup, First Round:

Sunday, 29 January

St Michael’s College v Belvedere College at 3pm in Energia Park (Streaming Available)

Monday, 30 January

Blackrock College v Presentation College, Bray at 3pm in Energia Park (Live on Premier Sports)

Tuesday, 31 January

Newbridge College v Kilkenny College at 3pm in Energia Park (Streaming Available)

Wednesday, 1 February

Terenure College v Clongowes Wood College at 3pm in Energia Park (Streaming Available)

Thursday, 2 February

St Mary’s College v Wesley College at 3pm in Energia Park (Streaming Available)

The streaming will be available on a subscription basis with each game costing €7.99 for the live and €8.99 for the VOD (video on demand) option.

There is also a five match bundle that can be purchased for €35.00 and the subscription can be purchased through the Videos on the Net platform, www.irishrugbylive.ie

Leinster Rugby can also confirm that similar to last season there will be no cash accepted at the turnstiles for games played at Energia Park.

All tickets can be purchased online at the following link HERE, with student and OAP tickets costing €6, and adult tickets costing €11.

THE NEXT BATCH OF HARPIN’

Next up it’s Cardiff Rugby…we’re planning a bonus pod recording for Wednesday where we’ll be chatting to hosts of a Welsh pod to get an “opposition view” not just for Saturday but also for the Six Nations opener, then it’s all the usual features like Rugby on TV, preview, wrap pod, etc, you know the drill.

Follow us and/or subscribe to all our social media channels to keep in touch and get involved in the conversation when the mood takes you.

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

80+ column : More format issues, Away fans, 7s return

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

WRAP OF A WRAP

Another strong performance by Leinster in Europe for us to wrap in the latest Sunday pod, and also another strong performance by both my guests Mark Jackson and Conor Cronin as they highlighted the positives but also acknowledged the things that we need to work on for the latter stages of the competition.

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

HARPIN’ ON…CIAN HEALY’S CAREER

For this week’s ‘bonus clip’ we harped on the career of Cian ‘Proper Church’ Healy who made his 100th appearance in Europe for Leinster, becoming only the 5th player in the history of the competition to do so.  The other four are also Irish as I say in the clip, which probably should come with the caveat that in the first years of the competition the provinces were nominated by the IRFU as opposed to qualifying as did the English and French clubs which is why they don’t have names as high up on the list, but it still counts as an honourable milestone in Healy’s career and as I also say in the clip, it’s not like he’s finished quite yet. 

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.

THE OTHER PROVINCES

Munster and Connacht both had good wins on Saturday, maybe one was a tad more comfortable than the other, but still good to see both on the way to the knockouts.

As for Ulster…they really can’t buy a bit of luck these days, can they.  How could Leinster fans in particular have anything but empathy for them as they were desperately trying to hold out La Rochelle in the dying minutes after what had been a torrential slog up to that point and they obviously considered themselves unlucky not to have been even further ahead by that point anyway.

Thing is though, they can still qualify for the knockouts with a decent win over Sale at the weekend, and maybe there’s a strong possibility their “reward” will be a trip to the Aviva in the last 16, but still a good performance against the Premiership outfit could well be the kick start they need for their season and I wish them all the best as we always want to see all four progressing beyond the pool stages whatever the format.

SPEAKING OF HCC FORMAT…

It’s still a bone of contention with many on HCC weekends; I have pushed back against the complaints before on these pages but I feel I must again.  Once more I agree it’s not ideal, but I do wonder if the flaws people keep finding in it are necessarily solved by going back to the way the tournament used to be run?

Like I said in the previous segment about Ulster, even though they have lost all three of their matches, the fact that they picked up some BPs along the way means that with a win over Sale at the Kingspan on Saturday they can move into the top 8 and reach the last 16.  Pretty much everyone giving out about the format says this “one win to qualify” thing is a negative, yet without it, this match against the Sharks could be a dead rubber so I’d argue it can at least be looked at from both directions.

When you compare this format to the previous one, the round of 16 is effectively replacing pool rounds 5 and 6 so I really don’t think it’s all that ridiculous for it to be easier to qualify.  And even if you do scrape through with one win, it means you probably have to travel to the home of a team that has won all four, which means you’re either going to go no further OR you have to produce one of the all time great results in the competition.

Also, while I presume all the competing clubs knew the rules from the outset, one or two are just coming to light this week when it comes to the general public.  

First we have a stipulation that if a South African team reaches the semifinals, they must give up home advantage even if they have earned it through the seeding from the pool stages.  Again this is far from ideal from a fairness perspective, but right from the moment I first heard they were joining the competition I wondered what the organisers were going to do to limit the amount of travel, and this appears to be it.

Clearly that does put the SA teams at a disadvantage, but I should also point out something about this season’s competition that does work in their favour.  With the Springboks not being involved in the Six Nations (yet?), this means that from the end of the pool stage to the knockouts they know none of their players are going to be involved in any test matches.  Sure, there may be a few URC rounds in that time, but at least there they have control.   The European clubs have none.

Just to be clear, I’m not pointing out the “no 6N thing” because I think it somehow cancels out the “no home SF” thing; on the contrary I reckon they are two wrongs which do not make a right.  Still, I don’t see anyone else making the point about the 6N so I felt I’d do it here.

I will always contend that the one format tweak that would come closest to a “silver bullet” to fix all the problems we keep pointing out would be to play the tournament from start to finish in successive weeks.  Or to put it another way, “It’s the calendar, stupid”.

YOU THOUGHT I WAS DONE WITH THE HCC FORMAT DIDN’T YOU…

…well, I’m not! 

Caolan Scully, who has appeared on the pod a few times, pointed out on Twitter a little quirk in the method the HCC uses to rank teams in the pool stages.  If two or more teams are tied on match points, points difference AND tries scored, the next thing to be looked at is apparently the amount of suspensions incurred by the clubs.

Granted, it’s HIGHLY unlikely this will ever actually need to be used, but it’s still a very curious thing to have as a possibility – imagine if two clubs vying for top 2/4/8 spots ended up tied on everything else while one of them was waiting on a citing during the week, meaning effectively the ruling from the commission would determine the final standings?

Unlikely or not, I would NOT want that to be even possible.  In fact, I’m not too wild about the next criterion down on the list either, namely the tossing of a coin.  My suggestion would be come up with a ranking system for all European clubs based on previous performance (similar to UEFA’s coefficient) and this ranking will force a separation between ALL clubs which means you can get a result no matter what the eventuality.

Apologies for the nerdery here, but I guess overthinking comes with the territory when you run a rugby website/podcast!!!

AWAY FANS

I see there’s a debate on the twitter machine about the possibility of ensuring all the away fans are together in a ground on match days.  

Personally, I think it’s a good idea overall, since in many cases they would have travelled quite a way to get there and also it gives the visiting team’s players somewhere to aim at after the final whistle to show their appreciation.  But that said, mixing isn’t the worst thing either and I’ve often had great chats during the match whether I’m for the hosts or the visitors.

What I want to point out here isn’t so much about the debate itself, rather the attitudes of some in the tweets on the topic.  “We don’t want this in our sport, it’s too much like football”.  You have no idea how much I dislike that narrative and I will always call it out when it rears its ugly head, and for this topic it was always going to.

The way I see it, if there’s anything that’s going to “ruin the values” of “our sport”, it’s outright snobbery.

JAMIE OSBORNE TIK TOK

For once I actually agreed with the TV broadcaster’s choice of Player (or ‘Star’ in HCC matches) of the Match, even it is was a previous holder of the Leinster 12 shirt who awarded it, there’s no doubt Jamie stood out as Conor explains in the TikTok below.

@harpinonrugby

A clip from our latest wrap pod

♬ original sound – Harpinonrugby.com

OWEN FARRELL 

This is another point that’s more about Twitter opinion than the topic itself.  Owen Farrell was cited for a tackle, although given both his history and his profile there was chatter and GIFs all over social media minutes after it actually happened.

All of which meant there was always going to be scrutiny over the decision, and what do you know, it turns out he was banned in such a way as to make him eligible for England’s Six Nations opener.

Which leads me to a simple question…are we REALLY that surprised?   And while he’s hardly a big hit with Irish fans (despite his aul fella doing so well with our test team) I reckon we have to remind ourselves of the biggest factor behind this particular decision, namely the fact that the top rugby unions all retain a great deal of control over their own affairs.

So maybe when we see the RFU orchestrating an advantage out of some adversity, we should ask ourselves if there are other areas of the game’s administration where the IRFU does as well?  Not to mention all the other unions?  If we’re not going to have a central administrative body that regulates the majority of systems in an attempt to create a level playing field, then these stories will continue to happen, it’s as simple as that.

EDDIE JONES

To be honest, nothing that happens with this guy surprises me anymore, and if anything his taking over of the Wallabies ahead of RWC2023 makes that side of the draw even more interesting.  Remember – we have NZL, FRA & RSA to contend with on our side, while it’s likely one from ENG WAL & AUS will reach the final, so to watch them go at it with new coaches plus a lot of recent history will make it worth getting some extra popcorn for sure.

WOMEN’S INTERPROS

Unfortunately Leinster fell short in what was always likely to be a decider in the Women’s interpros at the weekend, but it has to be said that Tania Rosser’s remit as coach was more about giving the squad game time at this level than it was results and she seems to be doing a bang up job so far by all accounts.

It may have taken them a while to get on the scoreboard in the opener against Connacht last week but given she has included so many different clubs in the wider squad there was bound to be a bedding in period and again I say this will benefit them in the long run.  Best wishes to them against Ulster in the final round this weekend.

As I said in the preview pod it was a real shame that their big match in Musgrave Park had to clash with the men’s Heineken Cup match on Saturday, I certainly don’t want to quibble about which was “more important”, simply because we really shouldn’t be forced into making a decision like that.  To be a little fair, given all four Irish men’s provinces were playing that day, some allowances had to be made – with the women not being full professionals (yet, hopefully) I’d say Saturday would be the best day over the weekend for everyone to be available.  Still, I’d hope the overlaps can be avoided in future.

THE SEVENS ARE BACK!

Sometimes I don’t need to add much to the headline to get my message across, apart from the fact that both men and women are in action for the next two weekends in New Zealand and Australia respectively.  Also it’s great to see Billy Dardis & Terry Kennedy back in the men’s squad.  Below you see the schedule for their pool matches in NZ, if possible be sure to watch them for free via the World Rugby site and tweet your full support to show we’re ready to host a leg here asap.

Friday, January 20 –

  • Ireland Men v Uruguay, 8.54pm Irish time
  • Ireland Women v Brazil, 9.38pm Irish time

Saturday, January 21 –

  • Ireland Men v USA, 12.44am Irish time
  • Ireland Women v Spain, 1.18am Irish time
  • Ireland Men v Japan, 3.50am Irish time
  • Ireland Women v USA, 4.12am Irish time

Saturday, January 21 –

  • Play-off matches.

INJURY REPORT

Always good to see no new injuries after a weekend, also the five returnees will all benefit the wider squad in many ways.  I’m particularly pleased to see Will Connors is close to a return and I really hope he gets a good healthy run he certainly deserves it.

Still, that’s a lot of quality languishing in the “no further report” column although reports are coming through as I type that Sexton took part in training on Monday and hopefully he’ll at least be recovered in time for the Six Nations.

Here’s a possible matchday squad for the Aviva next weekend, would like to see Tadhg F get a few minutes in his boots if possible…

15 Keenan 14 Larmour 13 Ringrose (c) 12 Osborne 11 O’Brien 10 R Byrne 9 Gibson-Park

1 Porter 2 Sheehan 3 Ala’alatoa 4 Molony 5 Ryan 6 Baird 7 van der Flier 8 Doris

16 Kelleher 17 Healy 18 Furlong 19 J McCarthy 20 Conan 21 McGrath 22 H Byrne 23 Turner

INJURY UPDATE: AVAILABLE FOR SELECTION:

Will Connors: is expected to train fully this week after recovering from a bicep injury

Thomas Clarkson: is expected to train fully this week after recovering from an arm injury

Max Deegan: is expected to train fully this week after recovering from an ankle injury

Luke McGrath: is expected to train fully this week after recovering from an ankle injury

Joe McCarthy: is expected to train fully this week after recovering from an ankle injury

INJURY UPDATE – UNAVAILABLE FOR SELECTION:

There was no new injury news from the game against Gloucester at the weekend

There are no further updates on:

Johnny Sexton (cheek bone), Tadhg Furlong (calf), Charlie Ngatai (hamstring), Ed Byrne (knee), Jason Jenkins (hamstring), Robbie Henshaw (wrist), Martin Moloney (knee), Ciarán Frawley (knee), Charlie Ryan (knee) and Tommy O’Brien (knee)

AIL UPDATE

The AIL has moved into the second half of its regular season, with some interesting results in Round 10.

Nure & Tarf both got wins over Munster opposition to keep themselves in the top 2, while Cork Con got the better of Trinity to move ahead of them into 3rd.  Meanwhile at the bottom Charlie Tector guided Lansdowne to a crucial win over Shannon which allowed them hop two places with Ballynahinch’s whitewash of the Students at “the Bowl” actually putting them into the playoff picture.

There are some big matches in Round 11 with the top four playing each other plus there’s bound to be a lot of Leinster involvement on the back pitch at the Aviva as Lansdowne face UCD in a relegation battle.

Men’s AIL

Garryowen 13-19 Clontarf

Cork Con 32-27 Dublin University

Shannon 24-34 Lansdowne

Terenure 21-11 Young Munster

UCD 0-24 Ballynahinch

Fri Jan 20

Lansdowne v UCD

Sat Jan 21

Ballynahinch v Garryowen

Clontarf v Cork Con

Dublin University v Terenure

Young Munster v Shannon

THE NEXT BATCH OF HARPIN’

Next up it’s Racing at the Aviva; we will of course be giving it the full Harpin treatment with a preview featuring Keego on Friday, a wrap with Tom Coleman & Nathan Johns on Sunday as well as all the usual features in between.  Follow us and/or subscribe to all our social media channels to keep in touch and get involved in the conversation when the mood takes you.

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