Celtic vs Top14 vs Jeff teams

So far it looks like the only Celtic League teams to lose were league propers Connacht and Airioni, the Mighty Leinster drew with Montpellier in France but otherwise all others played well and won their matches.

Treviso will play Saracens imminently - Should be a win to the Home side unless they have underestimated Treviso as many do...!


Top 14 teams best result being the Draw between Leinster and Montpellier though Toulouse play Gloucester at home this afternoon and should get a result.


The Jeff teams so far three loses one win. The win was top of the league Quins against historically one of the weakest Celtic League teams Connacht. Saracens should gain another win this afternoon.

OK apart from the obvious did at the Jeff how can we possibily be just about to beat Treviso after beating Connacht yesterday? we should get double points

Typo maesteg London Irish not Saracens

Think you'll find Quins beat Aironi and LI lost to Edinburgh. Well done Gunners.

I think the more salient fact is that only 3 of the home sides haven't won

Let's not open this can of worms. The English will just say that they're all too tired because they play in an infinitely superior league week in week out......

maesteg,

can you correct all the factual errors (getting teams/results wrong, mis-naming of leagues etc etc) in your OP. It makes it difficult to comment with all the mistakes.

Thanks!

SafeAsMilk wrote:maesteg,

can you correct all the factual errors (getting teams/results wrong, mis-naming of leagues etc etc) in your OP. It makes it difficult to comment with all the mistakes.

Thanks!

maesteg, disagree with SafeAsMilk, pls don't bother correcting the OP. As much as I'm delighted by the results, particularly of the two Scottish pro-districts, I can't see any reason to use them to bash the Jeff.

AsLongAsBut100ofUs wrote:As much as I'm delighted by the results, particularly of the two Scottish pro-districts, I can't see any reason to use them to bash the Jeff.

Quite. However, if it makes him happy let him go for it.

I was thinking along the same lines this morning. The Celts have to feel pretty good about themselves and the Aviva clubs have some soul searching to do:

Scotland? Scotland! You have got to be kidding, right? Great results. Hopeful signs for the future? For the clubs and country?

Wales, especially Llanelli. Played a lot of my formative Rugby there. Couldn't be happier. Rugby needs a strong Llanelli.
(Almost dated a girl from Llanelli, but she had a mustache)

Ireland had a good weekend too.
Munster showed there is more to that darned Thomond besides 15 players and 25,000 fans. Something that cannot be named...........
Ulster, a great win, too.
But Connacht. Connacht! They have the best looking jerseys in the competition, and played down right inspirational. That's exactly the kind of guts I hope my sons will always show when they play.

Oh my! England. Best team was Saints in defeat. Really says it all. UFB.

Maybe the worm turns next week? This is what makes this the best competition in the sport.

Dr Grey agree entirely. If we ignore the point scoring between leagues Heineken is the best comp on the planet. Great to see the Scots sides doing well for a change; even when we've been OK in the ex Magners we've been awful in the Heineken.
Looking forward to next weekend.

JS

doctor_grey wrote:the Aviva clubs have some soul searching to do

...

Oh my! England. Best team was Saints in defeat. Really says it all. UFB.

That's an interesting conclusion. You make it sound like all three losing home sides were English, rather than just one. Saints & Gloucester got LBPs away in two of the most difficult areans in European rugby and Saracens was the only side to get a WBP.

niwatts,
Its certainly fair that there are two ways to look at matches. But I think English clubs could have done better, and certainly came up worse than their Celtic Magners Pro Rabo Magners 12 cousins.

Quins were heavily favoured against Connacht and limped to a win. Fantastic effort by Connacht, though.
London Irish lose to at home Edinburgh
Bath lose to Glasgow
Leicester a pedestrian win against Aironi

On the better side:
Gloucester a fighting loss at Toulouse
Saints an even closer loss at Munster
Only Saracens hold form against Treviso.

I am not saying the English teams should beat everyone. Just the opposite. But, they need to figure out how to up their game for the next round. If Bath lose to Montpellier in the next round and London Irish lose at Cardiff, they are already done.

I think trying to draw conclusions about leagues from one set of results is fairly pointless. What I take from this weekend's results is what a fantastic competition this has become - all kinds of interesting match-ups of different styles and the vast majority of games genuinely competitive.

Good to see the Scottish teams winning big games.

BlueNote, I agree. I wasn't drawing conclusions whether one league is better than the other.

My point is that I agree with the OP that in general the English clubs were out performed by the Celtic clubs (except for those olde world Celts known as Treviso and Aironi). And that's only round one. This could all be flipped in round two. Or maybe not. This really has become a terrific competition.

Great round of the Heino and only one real hammering in all the games played.It really does get better year on year.

It's worth remembering that probably only Tigers, Saints and Sarries have a real chance of winning the HC this season, although Gloucester and Quins are both improving and good enough to beat anyone on their day. Bath and LI were the only really disappointing performances and results.

Away wins in the HEC are rare and to be treasured. An LBP away is a good result.

Leinster got two points away from home, but might have expected more.
Saints very nearly beat Munster, who for the first time are looking vulnerable at Thomond Park.
Toulouse also looked vulnerable and might have gone down to Gloucester but for Burgess.
Connacht denied Quins a try BP, but failed to get even an LBP themselves and were helped enormously by a ref who didn't penalise repeated dangerous play
Leicester should have picked up a TBP, but are out if sorts at the moment.
Sarries got the only TBP of the round.

No real surprises, and the worst performances have been narrow home wins by teams thatbshould have done better.

From my point of view, the only really big disappointment this weekend was London Irish vs. Edinburgh.

Every one of the English teams playing away either won or got a losing BP, which is what they would have been aiming for before the weekend. Plus, every game could have gone either way really. Northampton, Bath and Gloucester all really lost it at the death. Bath lost to an outrageous piece of (mis)fortune (depending upon which way you look at it!), Northampton lost to a drop goal after 40 phases (you just can’t plan for that sort of thing!) and Gloucester lost to a pass that could have been ruled forward on another day.

The artical is a WUM. Don't give it air.

Yep, the results of one round of fixtures are irrefutable proof of the Jeff's inferiority. Superb article.

Hilarious that Saracens pick up the only try bonus point.

After the way Treviso were built up before the match....

Didn't only London Irish of the English sides lose at home?

I agree with those posters who have called this the best club competition. Because my team plays Pro 12, then I have to be delighted at the performances. Rather than make pointless jibes at the Jeff I prefer to look on the results as proof that the Pro 12 is getting better and narrowing the gap. The interesting thing that no-one is picking up on is the vulnerability of the French both home and away. Before this competition started we were told that Toulouse and Clermont were the favourites along with Leinster. TBH I haven't seen anything in the first week to suggest it will be easy for any team.
I would suspect most of the groups, with the exception perhaps of the Leinster group, will go to the wire in terms of qualifying.

So those of you who want to have a pop at each others leagues go ahead. I will look forward to a few more weekends of this superb competition and hopefully a few twists and turns before the muddy waters clear at the end of January.

Rava wrote:So those of you who want to have a pop at each others leagues go ahead. I will look forward to a few more weekends of this superb competition and hopefully a few twists and turns before the muddy waters clear at the end of January.

+1

AsLongAsBut100ofUs wrote:

Rava wrote:So those of you who want to have a pop at each others leagues go ahead. I will look forward to a few more weekends of this superb competition and hopefully a few twists and turns before the muddy waters clear at the end of January.

+1

+1

Well said Rava.
Isn't it great having the Heino back.
Much better viewing than the World Cup and so many one-sided matches.
Great to see such high intensity and close games. Excellent stuff. Can't wait for Sunday to welcome Glasgow to the RDS !

Interesting to see the two sides to a preconcieved appreciation for a teams ability.

While polling people's thoughts for next weekends matches and reading comments here, people take little from the first round, shunning form as luck.

It is worthy to compare the leagues, it is a barrier of a sides current worth.

For example to watch the Celtic League you could either distinguish that it is of poor quality because good teams are losing to poor ones, or you could assume that those poor ones are improved and have made the league more competitive?

It is only when you have the opportunity to compare teams against other leagues that you develope an understanding of the level across the bar.

But Maesteg, you can't draw any conclusions after one round of matches. Well you can, but you'd be stupid if you did.

luckless_pedestrian wrote:But Maesteg, you can't draw any conclusions after one round of matches. Well you can, but you'd be stupid if you did.

Unless those conclusions turned out to be the right ones, in which case you would be prescient indeed.

Maesteg, that's some horrible English and mixed metaphors in your last post there. I really struggled to see what you were meaning. But I think you're saying that you can only judge the quality of a league as a whole by seeing how teams in that league compare to teams from other leagues.

There's a grain of truth in that, but you need to take it with a pinch of salt. For one thing, the domestic leagues have different priority for their members. The Jeff and Top 14 have relegation and only half the teams qualify for the HEC; teams have to play to win week-in week-out, so you see less champagne rugby and less resting of star players than in the Rabo.

Given that difference, it's much harder to judge the overall quality of the Rabo because the way teams play, and even the personnel, differ quite markedly between it and the HEC.

Secondly, it's daft to try to make a comparison based on one round of matches. Most of the results went to the home teams, and nearly all the matches were close. Hard to draw much of a conclusion on that basis.

Thirdly, why this constant comparing of leagues? It's not like "my league's better than your league" is that useful except as a tool for winding people up. Is your domestic league entertaining to watch, and is it producing good players for your international side? If the answer to both is "yes", then fine.

maestegmafia so far have the English sides really performed that badly?

Aren't 3 English sides currently top of their pools? Quins,Saracens and Leicester I believe.

Gloucester and Northampton are not in bad positions having picked up losing bonus points respectively.

It's the two Scottish sides who did the damage to London Irish and Bath. Not sure you and the Irish can hold onto their coat tails.

Poorfour wrote:Maesteg... some mixed metaphors in your last post there.

There's a grain of truth in that, but you need to take it with a pinch of salt.

That's brightened up my morning!

beshocked wrote:It's the two Scottish sides who did the damage to London Irish and Bath. Not sure you and the Irish can hold onto their coat tails.

Beshocked, I don't think lauding the Cardiff or Ulster win is in any way coat-tailing. I should also point out that the three English sides who "top" their group beat the three weakest sides in the Pro 12.
As I said earlier, lets wait a few weeks to see how things pan out.

beshocked wrote:
It's the two Scottish sides who did the damage to London Irish and Bath. Not sure you and the Irish can hold onto their coat tails.

Hilarious. Note sure the Irish provinces require any coat-tails to hang onto. Certainly not Munster & Leinster with their records.

Have to say, the quality in the Glasgow V Bath game was probably the poorest of what i saw over the weekend. Not too much to fear there for Leinster i don't think. Early days I know.

Last season the 1/4 finalists were made up of French 50%, English 25% and Irish 25% which gave the T14 clear bragging rights as the best League.

While Welsh and Scottish sides did very well in Round 1 it is far too early to say that we have seen a major shift.

Rava if I were you I would have another look at the Pro12 league table.

Treviso are 6th, Connacht 9th and Aironi 12th.

I think it's a little harsh to call them the 3 weakest. Aironi are obviously the worst but surely the others aren't.

Cardiff beating Racing Metro who are not English. Ulster beat Clermont who are not English either.

Treviso in particular were a side highly rated before their game. Maestegmafia even thought they might win.

I found this quite hard to read, sometimes it was like someone deciding how many words they can speak before taking a breath :-)

Anyway, on to the results - as people had said, one round does not make a swallow and a win is a two halfs - or something like that

Great wins for Glasgow and Edinburgh, but Bath must be scratching their head wondering how they lost that.

The leagues are all very close and there are too many games to go to start the bragging. Hopefully Glasgow can up theri game (they need to) and keep a little lucky charm to hand



A

Beshocked, I am well aware of the current standings in the Pro 12 which are slightly distorted by the results during the World Cup. However these three teams are seen as the weakest. I'm sure you are hardly considering Leicester as one of the weakest teams in the Premiership. I certainly am not.
My point about Cardiff and Ulster was to counter your silly point about Welsh/Irish supporters coat-tailing the Scottish success. I am well aware of who the opposition were and what country they are from.

Seen weakest by whom? Treviso lost as many players as everyone else surely? I count 12 in the Italian squad but I might be wrong?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Italy_national_rugby_union_team

A lot of Rabo 12 sides are at a similar level.

I brought up the Scottish success because there is always this talk about the Celtic teams and how great they are compared to top 14 sides and AP sides.

You are either joined to the hip with the Scots or not.

Also the bit about coat tails is meant as a joke. This is because generally the Welsh love to go on about Munster and Leinster's HC wins to show how great the Pro12 is.

I haven't done the Pro12 players missing from their respective clubs due to the world cup but surely it can't be as high as Treviso?

Leinster and some Russian club were missing the most with 15.

Ok Red Stag I have had a look. It's something like

Leinster - 15
Treviso - 12
Aironi - 12
Munster - 9
Glasgow - 8
Edinburgh - 7
Ospreys - 7
Scarlets - 7
Cardiff - 6
Ulster - 5
Newport Dragons - 5
Connacht - 0

Obviously I might be one or two off but not much.

No your point was well made. A dozen internationals is an excellent haul.

beshocked wrote:Also the bit about coat tails is meant as a joke. This is because generally the Welsh love to go on about Munster and Leinster's HC wins to show how great the Pro12 is.

Yeah, you would think they would talk about their own H Cup wins..... Oh wait.....


All this talk of which is 'better' is utterly subjective and depends on what aspect of the game you are talking about.
If it is penalties, drop goals and hairy Georgians then the Top 14 has it.
If it is running aimlessly into contact and swan-diving then the AP clearly has it.
If it is worst referees and funniest kick off times then it is the Rabo.
Simples.

H_B

beshocked wrote:Ok Red Stag I have had a look. It's something like

Leinster - 15
Treviso - 12
Aironi - 12
Munster - 9
Glasgow - 8
Edinburgh - 7
Ospreys - 7
Scarlets - 7
Cardiff - 6
Ulster - 5
Newport Dragons - 5
Connacht - 0

Obviously I might be one or two off but not much.

Ulster were missing 9: Best, Ferris, Wallace, Trimble, Court, Afoa, Pienaar, Muller and Danielli.

Scarlets had more than 7 away!

We had 9.

AsLongAsBut100ofUs wrote: H_B

HURLEY_BURLEY wrote:

luckless_pedestrian wrote:But Maesteg, you can't draw any conclusions after one round of matches. Well you can, but you'd be stupid if you did.

Unless those conclusions turned out to be the right ones, in which case you would be prescient indeed.

When it is the first round you can not predict but you can draw a certain amount of conclusions from this round especially with some of the results. Look at how poorly the Top 14 teams have done against teams for example like the Scarlets or Blues that have not yet set their domestic league alight this year or last, or shown HEC form last season.

I guess that having watched plenty of Celtic rugby and little of the Top 14, but basing my preconceptions on previous Top 14 teams reputations I presumed that the Welsh teams would struggle far more than they did. Cardiff Blues and the Scarlets were both very convincing wins, the Ospreys stuttered as they often do in the HEC but looked equal to their opposition while playing poorly, should they gain form, pull together in their next few games then I would see them doing well. I obviously being a fan and knowing their history see them most likely to make a balls up of it all.

Not sure if anyone has been championing Treviso to win against Saracens in England......

..I know I've only said they will be a very stern test against all of the sides at home and I imagine its their home games which will have a strong say in who qualifies. I think 1 of the other 3 teams will lose there without a LBP.

But my general thoughts:

Treviso,Aironi,Connaught are the 3 weakest sides from the Rabo in the Heineken cup IMO. Takes nothing away from the teams who beat them.

The only results I was surprised at were in the Blues and L.Irish games.

Also, agree with the majority here that its stupid to compare leagues after 1 round of fixtures, it followed the pattern that home victories were generally the norm in the Heineken.

Saracens/Blues/Edinburgh with the best starts. If Saracens can keep picking up the TBP when they have a chance, they'll definitely qualify one way or the other.