Ulster Rugby 2017-2018 Part 2

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Ulster Rugby

Final Table
               GP   Points
Leinster    21     70
Scarlets    21     70
Edinburgh 21     68
Ulster       21     62
Benetton   21     55
Dragons    21     20
Kings        21     11

Season Outcome: Playoff for Champions Cup Spot

Ulster are in the Champions Cup

D'oh!! Of course...

Pete330v2 wrote:I've just this minute been told of the replacement for Logan. Don't know if it's true and it's not from t'other forum for a change but I'm told it's from a reliable source and makes sense as well. So in the KOTH style I'll just say that I wondered if this ex-player used to be a low ranking policeman at some stage.

That's not even very crytic but it's too early for my brain to have kicked in properly. Consider yourselves Hay wained.

Not sure if that would be the right appointment, good rugby connections I'm sure but not so sure about if he has the business brain we need

No send off for Trimble???

Is it just me or has the ending of his career been weird? Smells like a falling out...

Don't thing so - Peel just doesn't like what he sees.

Don't know if that is he doesn't rate him or Trimbles form has fallen off a cliff

Quote from Pat McCarry on Twitter about Trimble

Just didn't click with a couple of the new coaches and what they were trying to implement

I feel like in seasons past, departing players are given a run out as a send off regardless. Am I wrong? Or maybe this game is just too important for these nicities? Bit unfortunate that a player of Trimbles standard doesn’t get the send off Bowe and Marshall got a few weeks back. Maybe Trimble himself just didn’t want the fuss?

David Humphreys started the last game in the 07/08 season, strolled around for about 5 minutes and then limped off. Despite the rapturous ovation, he was obviously unfit and it was an unedifying memory to finish a great career. Ulster lost that game to finish one from bottom of the League, but there was still prize money and a home reputation to repair. There is no room for amateur sentiment in the professional game.

Having asked around I am 100% convinced Logan is dead in the water.

The committees have lost all faith

Expect a departure by mid June at the latest.

The playing staff will privately celebrating - they cant wait to see the back of him.

Also as far as I can make out we have the following contracts to be confirmed

2018 - Possibly leaving/possibly given 1 year contract - Ah You, Cairns, Owens, Busby, Nelson, Lyttle
2019 - Doubt as to whether will see out last year - Browne, Ross
2019 - May have contract cancelled - VdeMerwe

Patterson, Simpson, Montgomery are away
Payne will retire, Henry may do so

I am assuming all the youngsters who are up this summer who have performed well will be retained.
That is normal and particularly essential this year

Hope Lyttle is given a year at least.

Genuinely folks - not sure I can bring myself to watch this today.

I’ll tell you one guy who will be hugely motivated and that’s Vlarke.

I'd say our lads will be hugely motivated, and their form has been on an upwards trajectory - I just don't have faith in a pack shorn of Henderson, Best, Deysel and Rea to do it.

Ross Kane and Piutau out now. Gilroy to start, Busby on bench. Tom O'Toole to start, Ah You on bench. We're toast.

only about 6,000 people there today, hopefully the Ulster management get that message.

Feel for Ludik. Might just have been in the mix for Ireland June tests.
Will this remaining team be able to get a win? Looking less and less likely...

Now Black's off. Can we finish this with 15 players ffs

So, from the starting team named on Friday, we've lost Black, Kane, Piutau and Ludik to injury, twenty minutes in.

Why was Ulster penalised at the scrum then? Thought they looked dominant.

Any good news? At all? A glimmer of hope maybe?

Great try there with a wonderful kick through from Luke Marshal to Gilroy to score. Really rate Gilroy and have never understood why Schmidt does not.

Cooney is such a good scrum half - and a top-class kicker. Surely he has to be considered for the Aussie tour ahead of the more pedestrian Marmion?

I would not call Marmion pedestrian but Cooney has certainly had a season that really should see him rewarded with an Ireland call up.

I know it is his time, but it really is sad to see Trimble retire. One of my all time favourites for Ulster and Ireland.

Another great try by Gilroy, on the spot again.

eirebilly wrote:I know it is his time, but it really is sad to see Trimble retire. One of my all time favourites for Ulster and Ireland.

You aren't alone there Billy

That's sad to see, hope that Luke Marshall gets over that okay, looks a bad injury

There's nothing like finishing the season on a bit of a high.

Well done Ulster. A spirited performance to finish off a troublesome season. Best of luck to Trimble and Bowe - great careers in the green shirt and for their clubs.

Great performance considering. Ospreys were total pish but you can't take that away from the lads, especially the young ones.

When we lost Piutau and Kane you thought the worst. 0-7 down and having lost Ludik and Black you thought it was confirmed but Cooney and Phillips steered them into it and after Ospreys put in a good 10 mins in the 2nd half and got nothing from it you knew we'd see it out.

A lot of good performances but special mention for Tom O'Toole. 1st match I saw him I knew he'd be something, and wasn't I right. 1 bad scrum at the start but he stabilised and was a beast around the park. Full 80 mins and was tackling everything that moved.

Also we need to continue to invest in McPhillips. Did exactly what he needed to do and imagine if he had a pack going forward with Coetzee?

It really does look like Ulster have been able to instil an us against the World attitude finally, some players really stepped up. O'Toole showed glimpses of what he could do, looked to be getting some momentum on a few occasions at scrum time. With some work he could really be something

On a side note, Mitrea was awful and just seemed to miss a lot

A big relief today.

Thought we were stufferd after beong stripped of Best Hendy and Piatau. Cooney should be on the bench for Ireland and Stockdale is class.

Biggest surprise of the day was Treadwell. He has been soft all year, but turned up today like he had something to prove. Hopefully he takes that into next season, as for all his endeavour AOC is a bit of a journeyman

We have a better spirit in the rugby side of things than we have had at any time since Muller left.
The against the world mentality is winning dividends
O'Toole will have learnt lots from that game
Treadwell had his best performance of the season.
AOC has been far more than a journeyman this year - that is unfair. Maybe not a starter in a top side but a darn good cover player.

Got told by someone that the Saffers buy into the club  and the community - from what I have seen I agree with that.
The Antipodeans are only interested in the bottom line and do not engage in the same way - honourably exception is Payne.
I'll shed no tears for Piatau or indeed Gibbes.
If you don't want to be here that your prerogative but to be honest people will not talk fondly of you in years to come.
For us to care about you, you have to care about us - you don't

geoff999rugby wrote:
O'Toole will have learnt lots from that game
Treadwell had his best performance of the season.
AOC has been far more than a journeyman this year - that is unfair. Maybe not a starter in a top side but a darn good cover player.

O'Toole you could almost see him trying to figure things out as he went which is great to see, he could have folded after the first few scrums but he came out fighting

toml wrote:as for all his endeavour AOC is a bit of a journeyman

AOC is definitely far from a journeyman, he's the kind of player every team needs, a 6.5 out of 10 on a bad day and sometimes an 8 and on a rare occasion a 9 but he brings a lot to the team and was solid today.

Of the two second rows today, Treadwell has the bigger upside but needs to sort himself out, he can still do better than he did today and can be a poor mans Henderson if he can get it together

Well done Ulster, deserved win...

We (Ospreys) where sh!te...

It's been a season to forget for many reasons but it's impossible to forget what John Cooney has contributed. The guy came along in the wake of Pienaar's disgusting treatment and has been outstanding in every match he's played. I know it's a bit of a job to get onto Schmidt's reckoning but surely he's done more than enough to prove he's second only to Connar Murray.
O'Toole is one very exciting prospect and I think we can rightly expect huge things from him. Timoney has been yet another exciting discovery this season. He'll learn a lot from Coetzee and Murphy next season.
Now for Logan to fall on his sword as the cherry on top.

Just watching the game on iPlayer. Gibbs refused to talk to the BBC before the game. That is some cowardly sh*t from him.
But i liked the way peel handled the interview

geoff999rugby wrote:We have a better spirit in the rugby side of things than we have had at any time since Muller left.
The against the world mentality is winning dividends
O'Toole will have learnt lots from that game
Treadwell had his best performance of the season.
AOC has been far more than a journeyman this year - that is unfair. Maybe not a starter in a top side but a darn good cover player.

Got told by someone that the Saffers buy into the club  and the community - from what I have seen I agree with that.
The Antipodeans are only interested in the bottom line and do not engage in the same way - honourably exception is Payne.
I'll shed no tears for Piatau or indeed Gibbes.
If you don't want to be here that your prerogative but to be honest people will not talk fondly of you in years to come.
For us to care about you, you have to care about us - you don't

100%. Wasn’t surprised to see Piutau not being available. What’s the odds on him being ok for the Barbarians match?

Well O'Toole is a bit of a machine.
Treadwell has now set a level I expect to see every game.
McPhillips gets better every single game.
Cooney well if he's not playing during the summer Joe is a f'kin idiot.
Sad to see some of the boys going but I see a lot of positive
And Busby although not spectacular his tackling was very good

Watching the game yesterday, I feared for Ulster after their start but they showed some great grit. Echo the calls for Cooney to be given at least a shot with Ireland on their summer tour, he has been very good and I feel his kicking would be a massive asset.

Stockdale just goes from strength to strength and I feel if he keeps this up, he will be one of the best wingers in the world. Ulster and Ireland will do well to tie him up and keep the French teams and their money at bay as you know he will be getting approached to play for the big dollar.

Reported by others on the other site Ross and Nelson are staying.

So that is two of my list above.
Ross has a contract so it was always probable, Nelson will have been given another 1 year contract.

On Stockdale one word of caution.
He has been outstanding but his kicking is aimless and simply not good enough.

On Cooney nobody, but nobody can convince me McGrath should be above him in the pecking order.
McGrath is a decent scrum half who doesn't let his Province or his country down but Cooney is playing at a
different level, in far more difficult circumstances.
In fact on form Cooney is the second best 9 in Ireland

Another post from the other place

Ruan offered to return for 18/19 as a player coach with the premise of only playing 10.
Turned down by Nucifora.

What I do think it illustrates is Pienaer will be a coach here when his playing days are over.
The poster is one of the more reliable ones and there have been rumours of something in the wind.
Take over from Peel as attack coach in 19-20 ? (Peel on a 2 year contract)
McFarland would be mad to turn that down

Cannot fathom why Nucifora would turn that down myself. Ruan coming back to Ulster as a mentor player/coach would be win win for Ulster and Ireland. He would help develop both Cooney and McPhillips (I credit a lot of Jacksons playing development to Ruan) greatly and it is a place he loves.

Crazy if he is blocking this...

geoff999rugby wrote:Another post from the other place

Ruan offered to return for 18/19 as a player coach with the premise of only playing 10.
Turned down by Nucifora.

What I do think it illustrates is Pienaer will be a coach here when his playing days are over.
The poster is one of the more reliable ones and there have been rumours of something in the wind.
Take over from Peel as attack coach in 19-20 ? (Peel on a 2 year contract)
McFarland would be made to turn that down

Did Nucifora mention an opening for an attack coach in Dublin to him by any chance?

I'd heard that one about Ruan but didn't believe it at the time.
We have to remember we're Ulster, the basket-case, the least important province so anything that would offer any long term benefit will always get shot down by Dublin. Nucifora wants to force a Munster or Leinster 10 on us and it's looking more and more like Keatley as time goes on. I hope I've heard wrong.

Anyway, now that we're going to be playing in Europe's top tier we'll be more attractive to any potential additions who may, or may not have been waiting in the wings.

Her is another point to ponder

According to my records we only have 11 players who have contracts beyond the summer 2019.

Next year is going to be one hell of a negotiation time for McFarland and Cunningham.

They are:
2021 - Herring, Henderson, Treadwell, Marshall
2020 - Reidy, Stockdale, Ludik, Addison, Andrew, Moore, Murphy

Pete330v2 wrote:Anyway, now that we're going to be playing in Europe's top tier we'll be more attractive to any potential additions who may, or may not have been waiting in the wings.

Been told that is the case - expecting a number of announcements in the next month or so - both ins and outs

Tremendous performance yesterday with so many front line performers missing and all the negativity around the club. That was the biggest game of the season and the players really fronted up.

Gilroy was at his very best and Cooney was superb again. Marshall had a huge game until his injury and the pack to a man stood up to an on paper superior Ospreys 8. For all the talk about ex-players and potential recruits McPhillip's has really impressed albeit is still learning.  

Unfortunately I get the impression that significant section of the Ulster faithful would have preferred the to have team lost so they could continue stomping around chanting Logan out and cry about how the IRFU is oppressing them.

Given all the difficulties and disruption this has been a good season and 1 or 2 more wins would have reached the KO stage of both competitions. With the new signings coming in the future looks bright.

Thanks for the memories Andy Trimble, deserved a better send off.

I wouldn't expect Murphy to stay beyond 2020, all indications are Leinster want him back and he wants to go back. Though things could change between now and then

Pete330v2 wrote:I'd heard that one about Ruan but didn't believe it at the time.
We have to remember we're Ulster, the basket-case, the least important province so anything that would offer any long term benefit will always get shot down by Dublin. Nucifora wants to force a Munster or Leinster 10 on us and it's looking more and more like Keatley as time goes on. I hope I've heard wrong.

Anyway, now that we're going to be playing in Europe's top tier we'll be more attractive to any potential additions who may, or may not have been waiting in the wings.

I doubt very much it would be Keatley, if Keatley were to leave Munster then it would to be either outside Ireland or Connacht.

For me, McPhillips could be very good if he were to receive proper mentoring which is why it staggers me that Nucifora would block a return to Ulster of Ruan.

On a side note, I may have to visit Ulster next season and pay up on our bet

rodders wrote:Tremendous performance yesterday with so many front line performers missing and all the negativity around the club. That was the biggest game of the season and the players really fronted up.

Gilroy was at his very best and Cooney was superb again. Marshall had a huge game until his injury and the pack to a man stood up to an on paper superior Ospreys 8. For all the talk about ex-players and potential recruits McPhillip's has really impressed albeit is still learning.  

Unfortunately I get the impression that significant section of the Ulster faithful would have preferred the to have team lost so they could continue stomping around chanting Logan out and cry about how the IRFU is oppressing them.

Given all the difficulties and disruption this has been a good season and 1 or 2 more wins would have reached the KO stage of both competitions. With the new signings coming in the future looks bright.

Thanks for the memories Andy Trimble, deserved a better send off.

Jesus Rodders it has in its hole been a good season. We were one loss away from missing out on Europe and we are lightyears away from the top table of Europe. That said I do agree there are green shoots with the likes of O'Toole coming through. Its the only reason I renewed in truth. I do believe with the right coach we are not a million miles away from being competitive but patience is now the watchword. we need to be patient while our young forwards develop