Rule change required for Euro Cup

Rule change required as the Pro 14 is too easy compared to the Aviva Prem and Top 14 as it allows teams to rest so many players for European and International games.

The Prem needs to have a world with the EuroCup organisers and make it harder for them.

The last thing this competition needs is an all Pro14 final.

It's not fair mummy!

On a serious note, there is nothing you can do to the Pro14 which is going to change the fact that the premiership flogs it's players. Perhaps ring fencing, but I don't think that'll work. Saracens are never in danger of relegation, but it doesn't mean they can rest players. Central contracts and a player management program like the one the IRFU use might make a difference.

The Ref robbed Sarries on a number of occasions too.

How many times was the scrum half blocked getting to the ball at the breakdown by a Leinster player sitting in the way!

TightHEAD wrote:The Ref robbed Sarries on a number of occasions too.

How many times was the scrum half blocked getting to the ball at the breakdown by a Leinster player sitting in the way!

Oh dear

The only thing the ref robbed Saracens of was a record drubbing by leinster

Doesn't matter. Would back any of the top 4 Pro 14 teams to win the Premiership this year. English teams at club and national level are not showing the smarts to adapt to in-game situations if it is not going for them. Saracens were in touch today only until Leinster stepped up at the ruck and began blowing the Sarries forwards off their non-weight-supporting feet.

Tight head your really not as good As you once were .Have a rest and come back recharged next season

2 joke SA, Welsh and Italian teams mean a nice rest period for key players in the pro 12, no wonder the players who left for the Top 14 like Sexton, JD2 couldn't wait to get back to the easy T14 life.

What a load of cr@p.

What the European final(s) need is only Pro14 teams. That way we should get exciting finals.

Only pity is that Scarlets will face Leinster in the semi, as I think that would be an awesome final.

Unless things change I think the English clubs should threaten to withdraw next year, it's simply not a level playing field with Unions like the Irfu and WRU funding teams.

Good Aprils Fool joke

Pathetic if serious.
Changes were made a few years ago to address a perceived inbalance.
Next year there will be no reserved places for Pro14 nations
Cheetahs, Cardiff, Treviso - joke teams ?? as good as the bottom of the Premership
Have you watch Saints, Quins, Worcester play this year
Dragons, Zebre are poor - but no worse than Irish.
Both will be better next year.
Kings are poor but then again better than London Welsh of a few years back.
First year in the competition and recruitment suggests they also will improve.

The bottom line is the English teams have come up short - just like the National team.
The answer is improve not look for excuses by blaming others

As for funding what are you on about
The 12 Celtic teams have a lower total salary bill than the Premership sides and are even further behind the French.

Amazing how people take TightHerd seriously.

Can't believe such obvious, low effort trolling gets serious responses.

My responses were aimed at addressing the underlying issues behind the rather shallow trolling.  

Things like the fact that England squad players have exponentially more accumulated game time than Celtic rivals.  I heard recently that Itoje played something like 5 games for Saracens before any Ireland squad players and been brought into their respective provincial squads last year.

There is a serious point behind the idea that things aren't balanced amongst Champions Cup sides.  Ireland looks after it's players incredibly well through the management programme and the Pro14 is ring fenced by default.  Counter intuitively, we don't have the funding of the AP or Top14.  So it's quite pleasing that we've done so well in that respect.

I'm on another board with a lot of England fans of various club persuasions.  They all think that the amount of game time England squad players are being subjected to is something that needs to be looked at but that the clubs are too strong for any real change to be effected.

Agree with Artful there. It's not any other nations fault that we flog our players into the ground and can't balance our club game/structure enough to be able to target Europe.

As soon as the game went pro the club's chased money in the form of more and more games. If that's now coming back to bite them in the arse and means no English clubs win the euro comp for a few seasons well so be it.

Love the way people think this is a wum.

I guess I’ll never understand how fans only want to watch their clubs best players for only a handful of games every year.

So glad the next generation of fans get to see the top players playing most weeks in the Aviva and that most teams barring the likes of London Irish/Welsh ( )and brizzle take the Aviva seriously.

In Ireland we rest players, in England its called rotation
Same thing

In England teams have to qualify to take part which means winning most weeks rather that just putting a team of XV out in the field and knowing you are already in.

TightHEAD wrote:In England teams have to qualify to take part which means winning most weeks rather that just putting a team of XV out in the field and knowing you are already in.

Except thats how it works in the Pro14

To be honest after a lions tour the 6 nations and euro cup are a bit devalued as English teams are worn out for supplying the bulk of touring players.

marty2086 wrote:

TightHEAD wrote:In England teams have to qualify to take part which means winning most weeks rather that just putting a team of XV out in the field and knowing you are already in.

Except thats how it works in the Pro14

Are you saying Italian teams and token saffer teams offer real competition, don’t even start me on the dragons!!!

TightHEAD wrote:

marty2086 wrote:

TightHEAD wrote:In England teams have to qualify to take part which means winning most weeks rather that just putting a team of XV out in the field and knowing you are already in.

Except thats how it works in the Pro14

Are you saying Italian teams and token saffer teams offer real competition, don’t even start me on the dragons!!!

So you haven't actually watched the league this season then, so do everyone a favour and bore off with this crap

Why would I want to, it’s a poor product in comparison to the AP!

So you haven't watched it but you can judge it without watching it, those are some great skills you have there and really shows you can't form an opinion of your own and just spouting whatever rubbish you hear from others

I used to watch it, but I’ve been left disappointed time and time again when I see the team sheets and realise the big name players are ‘resting’, better off watching the AP B-league at least it’s two teams trying to win.

TightHEAD wrote:I used to watch it, but I’ve been left disappointed time and time again when I see the team sheets and realise the big name players are ‘resting’, better off watching the AP B-league at least it’s two teams trying to win.

But I thought the changes which saw the Heineken Cup transition to the Champions Cup would stop Irish provinces from resting players in this way because they would have to compete for Champions Cup places??

Yet here you are still complaining about Union control which is aimed at keeping players in good playing health....

All the while the likes of Munster and Leinster make the Pro14 playoffs at a canter. We seem to have gone full circle, in spite of back to back English champions in the two previous, we are back to people such as yourself complaining that it's not fair that other unions can manage their resources how they see fit.

TightHEAD wrote:In England teams have to qualify to take part which means winning most weeks rather that just putting a team of XV out in the field and knowing you are already in.

In what the European Cup - nonsense

In case you haven't notice there is a high probability neither Ospreys or Ulster will qualify this year.
No team is guaranteed European Championship rugby in the Pro14

TightHEAD wrote:Why would I want to, it’s a poor product in comparison to the AP!

Now look, sonny, you’ve been warned about this before.

If you’re going to attempt to do a windup topic on 606v2, then it needs to be a good effort. One showing some insight, a little humor, at least a passing acquaintance with facts and the game of rugby, and above all, a sufficient degree of humility and awareness to know when to stop.

Your substandard comments and topics are seriously affecting the level of debate and engaging conversation that most of us enjoy on here. You come along, pretending to be a fan, but only attempt to sow discord rather than discourse, and, sadly you think it is humorous at some level. It isn’t. You fail to realize that all you generate is scorn and derision. It is lamentable. You must improve your efforts or else.

Notwithstanding that, I recognise that there is just an hour left of the Good Lord’s resurrection day, so I wish you Happy Easter and hope that you can turn over a new leaf tomorrow.

TightHEAD wrote:

marty2086 wrote:

TightHEAD wrote:In England teams have to qualify to take part which means winning most weeks rather that just putting a team of XV out in the field and knowing you are already in.

Except thats how it works in the Pro14

Are you saying Italian teams and token saffer teams offer real competition, don’t even start me on the dragons!!!

I'm telling you Treviso and Cheetahs are better teams than the lower reaches of the Aviva Premership
Next year Dragons recruitment suggest they will be as well
Things are looking up for Zebre and Kings as well - league is getting stronger year on year

Calm down fellas it’s just my opinion.

Why so defensive, if you are happy only seeing the best players play a few times a year then good luck to you, but for me I’d rather see the best players on a more regular basis in meaningful games, every game in the AP matters. Well apart front the London Irish shower!

TightHead is either a WUM, an idiotic or his brain is addled by watching the dross Irish, Worcester, Quins and Saints have dished up this year.

Ulster are not a good side at the moment but the Quins team we beat twice this year have to be one of the worst outfits I have seen this.
Dragons, Treviso, Kings, Zebre the teams he slags off all gave us far stiffer competition than what I can only describe as a gutless, pathetic Quins

Quins are not a happy club since Mike Brown took over the party planning committee!

I genuinely don't think he's a wum at this stage. I think he's very upset at a series of result in the last few weeks and is trying to disguise that discontent here and there with 'wumming'.

He is in a tiny minority both on this board and others. The vast majority of England fans I've conversed with have simply said, "we'll be back next season" which is exactly what we all said when Leinster struggled under O'Connor.

TightHead I give you a practical example.
A few years back we defeated Leicester in a 5th round European match.
This lead to outcries of we only won because we rested players.
I went back and looked at the number of games the starting XVs had played since the 4th round.
In the backs it was even but in the forwards Leicester had rested more players than Ulster in the intervening period.
But of course that was not resting players it was rotation and that is acceptable.

The difference in not as big as you think.
If you think it is please supply the figures.

Look at you, you have turned into football fans whereby only he European cup matters!!!!!

The domestic league is far more important to true fans who want to see the best players going head to head week in, week out, for me the EC gets in the way of the AP, I’d fully support a boycott until the competition is played on s level playing field.

TightHEAD wrote:Look at you, you have turned into football fans whereby only he European cup matters!!!!!

The domestic league is far more important to true fans who want to see the best players going head to head week in, week out, for me the EC gets in the way of the AP, I’d fully support a boycott until the competition is played on s level playing field.

You think you are being cunning and witty, in actual fact you are an embarrassment. I'm not going to continue to respond any further, I'm glad this board generally has much higher standards than the endless nonsense you've been spouting. Good bye.

Night sweetheart

Now I know Rail Guns and Scram Jets are basically military technologies so their advancement could be argued to be regrettable, but surely our realisation of Quantum computing is pretty much as exciting as it currently gets in this tired old world?
Still I guess there's still room for the good old fashioned Luddite.
What say you ThickHead, too many wheels?

I think the real tighthead has retired and this account is now being run by his 12 years old nephew.
It's the only logical conclusion

While the topic may or may not be a sum there some truth in what he is saying.

The rule changes made last time have made the Pro 14 stronger. The SRU has decided that they need to strong teams so it makes it harder for teams like Ulster. What we are seeing now is if you don't progress each season as a team you fall down the table.

The second point is that because of the rotation policy in place in the league you are forced to have a strong second team. So while names might not be recognised outside the league does not make them bad players just newer players. We are seeing changes in the WRU & SRU next highest level to get better players coming through.

Until this 6 Nations there were plenty of young players for all the Pro14 nations who would have been considered lesser players at the start of the season at their club by outsider but are now capped internationals

There always is truth in my teachings Brendan, they may not be popular but they are based on fact.

Rule changes will be coming, especially if Bath don't qualify as Bruce Craig will be angry and bitter, and wanting to upset some Celtic ass.

TightHEAD wrote:Look at you, you have turned into football fans whereby only he European cup matters!!!!!

The domestic league is far more important to true fans who want to see the best players going head to head week in, week out, for me the EC gets in the way of the AP, I’d fully support a boycott until the competition is played on s level playing field.

Only shows how out of touch you are

The Pro14 matters and matters a lot to fans of the teams.
Lets be honest the 3 SFs aside it is the only reaslistic chance of winning something for the rest of the teams.

Tell that to the empty seats!

Crowds going up ever year (look up the facts) - you really are a total tube

it very well may go up, but how much of that is that down to the popularity of the Pro 14 or is it down to the fact that the population inceases year on year?

And why start being abusive and throwing insults around?

Stay on topic

Abuse - simply your talking tripe.
You have come up with ANY facts to support your claims - not one

I leave you now as this thread is pointless
You can play with yourself to your hearts content

TightHEAD wrote:it very well may go up, but how much of that is that down to the popularity of the Pro 14 or is it down to the fact that the population inceases year on year?

And why start being abusive and throwing insults around?

Stay on topic

Population increases every year? WTF are you talking about?

You've been asked to back up what you say and instead you just talk more Poopie, if the league is the only thing true fans care about then why do you care about the the ERCC? Hell, why do the clubs for that matter?

geoff999rugby wrote:Abuse - simply your talking tripe.
You have come up with ANY facts to support your claims - not one

I leave you now as this thread is pointless
You can play with yourself to your hearts content

Bye then.

Must be hitting a nerve!

If you look objectively at the brief history of the euro cups, player fatigue/ injuries is a factor but not the deciding factor in one-off cup games.
The history shows the dominant sides in the competition Toulouse, Leicester, Bath (briefly), Munster, Leinster, Saracens all had the bulk of the Test side in their ranks. The only outlier was Toulon.

The IRFU trump card is that the test team is only ever seriously going to come from two teams - those players get test exposure and you can see that experience come through in club games.

The delicious irony in all this is that some of the irish on here criticize the club game in france & england but without it these euro comps would have no teams, fans or finance.

If England put their top sixty players into two squads, they might do quite well too.

TightHEAD, what age are you? I'd guess 16 or less but honestly, what's your vintage?