As much as I appreciate the discussion, I have to disagree with you Swifty.

First and foremost I am a Connacht fan whether the team is playing home or away, as I am sure you all are as well.

I always refer to Jonny Wilkinson in the below interview, and have probably posted it in here somewhere previously (from the 6 min mark):



"its difficult when people ask about the season, 'where do you think you will finish?', without saying well we want to finish first, there's no point in saying 'well I hope we finish 3rd or 4th' because it means you're actually choosing to lose games, we're not choosing to lose any games in this season..."

That is the attitude of a winner. There is no point in losing games before your season begins because you are targeting them mentally as a loss before you play a minute of competitive rugby.

Whatever about any merits that the Bradley Doctrine may have had at the time, things have moved on so that it's just not an option any more.

We're now in a situation where we should be seeing ourselves as a mid-table side, maybe towards the lower end of it, but we're in that region. Ideally, we want to get to the top of this group and a policy of shipping heavy away losses and B-Teams is not going to cut it when the top two criteria for seperating teams tied on points are overall wins followed by points difference. To get to the top end of the midfield pack, every point matters.

We saw in the 2011/12 season that 2 extra Losing Bonus Points helped us pip the Dragons by a point for 8th. Even last season, we pipped Cardiff on points difference alone.

ConnachtCows wrote:

RonanL wrote: I disagree with how Bradley went about it - as many have already said, the succession of heavy away defeats did serious damage to moral, of the players and the supporters.

Having said that, I think most would agree that Lam needs to be very conscious of player fatigue, and be strategic about how he rests key players. Surely if he is smart he can avoid resting our key players en masse like Bradley did, but still avoid playing them every week.

You going tomorrow?

I'm hopeful!

I still have nightmares about this!

www.ercrugby.com/eng/matchcentre/12213.php

phatguerilla wrote: Would people not agree that Bradley didn't have the squad to pick from that we do now, and if he kept playing the same 15-20 every week they would eventually be injured or fatigued anyways?

Not buying that. Bradley's last few seasons post-dated Borders dissolution and pre-dated the Italian teams joining the league. Also one of our European games we could send out the Eagles and still slaughter Sacrificar Los Matadores or whomever.

That's effectively 6 fewer games per season.

overstrander wrote: Agree 100% with tomsauce2000.

Welcome to the board by the way!

Hats off to Swifty for coming up with an opinion controversial enough to prompt new members to join.
Anyone want to start a "The IRFU should've disbanded Connacht in 2003" thread to see if that boosts registration?

Would people not agree that Bradley didn't have the squad to pick from that we do now, and if he kept playing the same 15-20 every week they would eventually be injured or fatigued anyways? I would not advocate sending the Eagles to play away games but a happy balance can be found between playing the best 15 into the ground and sending a scratch team to be nilled. There will need to be rotation in positions such as hooker and fly half anyways if the new players are going to be brought up to speed. You also have to have trust in the squad, if Duffy or Henshaw aren't fullback we still have about 3 or 4 genuine options there, if the team can't perform with changes at 1,2,3,4,6, 10, 11,14 and 15 between games for instance then we're not in the position of depth that we thought.

RonanL wrote: I disagree with how Bradley went about it - as many have already said, the succession of heavy away defeats did serious damage to moral, of the players and the supporters.

Having said that, I think most would agree that Lam needs to be very conscious of player fatigue, and be strategic about how he rests key players. Surely if he is smart he can avoid resting our key players en masse like Bradley did, but still avoid playing them every week.

You going tomorrow?

I disagree with how Bradley went about it - as many have already said, the succession of heavy away defeats did serious damage to moral, of the players and the supporters.

Having said that, I think most would agree that Lam needs to be very conscious of player fatigue, and be strategic about how he rests key players. Surely if he is smart he can avoid resting our key players en masse like Bradley did, but still avoid playing them every week.

100% disagree with this. It is tough being a Connacht supporter at the best of time, especially when based outside the province. We were a laughing stock back then. It did nothing for the province at all.

If we put out a second team for away games, who are losing badly each week, how are we expected to:

1) Sign any player as a squad player
2) Expect these player whos confidence would be at the very bottom to fill in for injured players during home games?

I think it would bring a bad atmosphere to the squad if half of the squad had no confidence as they are going away and losing each week!

I remember going to Edinburgh for an away match in 2008 I think.
It was an embarrassment. There was a pretty large Connacht crowd at it (maybe 100 - all in the same place) and we got nothing to cheer at all.
Put me off going to away games for quite a while

Very few are advocating we should be settling for sixty points defeats.

If your best players are fully fit and available, pick them every time. However, if a player needed to be rested and is really only going to be 100% fit for two of the next three matches then, yeah, be selective. Target the games we think we've the best chance of winning.

I believe that you should always pick a team to win every match. Playing to win is what it is all about, it would even put pressure on the games that you are supposedly targeting!

If you ever accept that losing is ok you should give up. With bonus points abound in rugby now there is so much to play for. Would resting certain players make that much difference? It's not as if we have loads away on international duties? How would young lads feel if they were played in the games were we supposedly had no chance? Lambs to the slaughter would not be good for progress of lesser players.

There is something to learn in every game, every training session, this game is all about giving 100% all the time, rotate players by all means, promote lads from the Eagles if they do well, they'll be trying to break into the first team. Never do anything but your best.

Id disagree as well, for a number of reasons.

It pisses off the supporters and sponsors, 50,60,70 nil defeats only sap the soul of even the most hardened supporter and sponsors don't want to be associated with these defeats either.

What does it say to your squad if you basically say to them that they are the sacrificial lambs to the slaughter and are not part of the A team.

As a player I would be more up for a game against a team that disrespected us by sending a deliberately weakened team to our game.

In general it just sends out a bad message that losing is acceptable.

Borders no.2 wrote: Our squad has more depth now and we can make a few changes and still put out a decent squad. We must rotate at times but I want to see no return to the lambs to the slaughter policy adopted by Bradley.

1 Wilko and Buckley
2 JHW and Henry
3 White and Loughney
4 Clarke and Swift
5 Muldowney and Kearney
6 Browne and Muldoon
7 Faloon and Heenan
8 Mckeon and Naoupu
9 Marmion and F.Murphy/Walsh
10 Parks and Ronaldson
11 Carr and Heally
12 Mc Sharry and Tonetti
13 Griff and So'Oialo
14 Poolman and TOH
15 Henshaw and Duffy

keep the players on the left for all home games, edinburgh away, cardiff away, zebre away and treviso away.

players on the right for away games, leinster, munster, ulster, glasgow, scarlets, ospreys, dragons.

players on the right could hold there own against them teams, but or best team would not win, rest our star players. if players improve then move them into the first team.

my bench for the home games would be players from the 'right' team.

to me, losing by 20 points and having no injurys/fresher players is better then losing by 8 points and key players taking knocks and getting tired for upcoming 'winnable' games.

I'm more shocked at how our home form was than anything else to be honest. I'd take our relatively consistency over the horrible away defeats any day.

I'm with Salmson tho, great topic.