Cohen, Glynn, to be sacked?

[Tiglon]

We have had several seasons of building for the future.

Still no sign of a bungalow let alone a sky scraper!

The alternative to building for the future, is living in the past.

[mol2]

We have had several seasons of building for the future.

Still no sign of a bungalow let alone a sky scraper!

Problem is none of the rebuilders has been given time to get beyond the foundations and they at times have been somewhat shaky. Much as I am dissatisfied with where we are at the moment we have to allow MOC time to finish clearing out the players he doesn't want and to bring in more of those he does.

The question is have we gone back to a builder who failed his bricklaying course both here and again at Leinster?

[Tiglon]

We have had several seasons of building for the future.

Still no sign of a bungalow let alone a sky scraper!

Problem is none of the rebuilders has been given time to get beyond the foundations and they at times have been somewhat shaky. Much as I am dissatisfied with where we are at the moment we have to allow MOC time to finish clearing out the players he doesn't want and to bring in more of those he does.

The question is have we gone back to a builder who failed his bricklaying course both here and again at Leinster?

Quite possibly, yes, but if the board believed he was the best bricklayer for the job 6 months ago, it's too early too do a U-turn.

When you keep changing bricklayer mid-build, you end up with an unbalanced house. At the moment we have a Cotswold stone fronted, red brick sided house with a half finished roof, 2 excellent kitchens and no bathroom. It isn't going to win Grand Designs.

[G.K]

I don't buy into all this re-building gush and thar we'll be just fine next year, or the year after, or the year after that. Same old 'transitioning' excuses for failure for me.

The fact is that a few years back we had a squad capable of at least winning the AP. Since then poor management, poor recruitment and poor coaching have led to this decline.

I had my reservations about re-appointing MoC and so did others. In my view if he was a top notch HC/DoR we would have seen some improvement after 6 months, instead the last few weeks I've seen quite the opposite and Tigers have been dire.

[Tiglon]

I don't buy into all this re-building gush and thar we'll be just fine next year, or the year after, or the year after that. Same old 'transitioning' excuses for failure for me.

The fact is that a few years back we had a squad capable of at least winning the AP. Since then poor management, poor recruitment and poor coaching have led to this decline.

I had my reservations about re-appointing MoC and so did others. In my view if he was a top notch HC/DoR we would have seen some improvement after 6 months, instead the last few weeks I've seen quite the opposite and Tigers have been dire.

I completely agree with most of what you say, and I don't think we will definitely be "fine" next year or the year after, but we definitely won't be fine if we keep starting again with a new coach every season.

[kend]

O'Connor's job isn't to win things with this squad, it's to build a squad that is capable of winning things, and that isn't done in 6 months.....{snip}....This time next season is where we should be seeing improvements - if we don't then it is time to consider his position.

Bear in mind too, last year we were losing games 40something to nothing, against much lesser teams than Exeter

Broadly agree with this. presumably he presented a development plan to the board which they have accepted. Besides, who would you bring in at this point in the season? Lancaster? Ford? A 'coaching consultant'?

That said, the disturbing thing for me are the playing patterns and that is in MoC's current control; Tigers look lost away from the set piece.

It might be true that the forwards aren't his ideal choice and aren't physically up to it (not sure I buy that - I think this squad are a top four team), but that doesn't explain why they sometimes look so clueless; taking the ball standing still, no attempt to move the point of contact, lack of support runners and so on. Tigers did make line breaks on Sunday, but there was rarely a runner on the shoulder to keep the pressure on. May's first run is an example; they know he's unpredictable, so someone has to bust themselves to get on his shoulder - instead he concedes for holding on with the rest watching on (if Thacker had been on the pitch I'd guess he would be the one on May's shoulder - Tigers are making an error there IMHO).

They just aren't creating space - look at the times Toomua received the ball behind the gain line with two defenders on him. Manu might be improving every game, but there isn't much he can do if the passes he gets are poor because of pressure on the 12. It is very difficult to pass round a press defence - particularly given the modern view of the offside line.

Just a thought. If you sack one coach and the performances improve you can reasonably say the causal factor was the coach. If you sack two (three if you count Burke) and the issues remain, then it is could be there are other causal factors?

That said, I'm looking forward to a 5 point win against LI and a ground out win against Glous

[tripeandonions]

Matt O'Connor, who seems to possess all the charm of a saltie crocodile, seems unable to organise or coach forwards on the evidence of what my eyes have told me. There used to be a forwards coach, who copped a load of flack and who left early in the season. And what has been done by the club to rectify this glaring deficiency in the meantime?
Well, I've acted. Direct Debit cancelled.

[Rugbyflanker]

Transition excuse is baloney too. Every AP team is in transition,some more than others but its the nature of rugby.

[ellis9]

Matt O'Connor, who seems to possess all the charm of a saltie crocodile, seems unable to organise or coach forwards on the evidence of what my eyes have told me. There used to be a forwards coach, who copped a load of flack and who left early in the season. And what has been done by the club to rectify this glaring deficiency in the meantime?
Well, I've acted. Direct Debit cancelled.

Thanks for turning up during the good times. It's a shame you've given up now it's gone a bit rocky.

[chewbacca]

The club is broken. It is and always has been about growing players and the team not buying players in. Sarries did it as a shortgap measure whilst they built their infrastructure which is now superb. Tigers did it as an alternative to developing their infrastructure. Was it a cost saving measure, was it ignorance, was it a business not understanding what business it was. One can guess. Whatever it is somebody has rightly ballsed it up.

[NONAME]

Interesting but I wonder how many of my fellow contributors were down Oval Park last season watching the Academy. The foundations are there you just have to look. Look also at the financial strength of the club. Simon Cohen and the board have done an excellent job. Now all we need is to see that success replicated on the field but I come back to my main point MOC is building his own team and you can't do it in a season. You can only sign World Class players when they are available, you can't put our 18 year old Academy guys in the first team to play Exeter. You can't expect Manu to be match fit and sharp. In the years gone by Manu would have been given a couple of A league games and possibly 20 minutes in the first team before being thrown in at the deep end. Unfortunately Tigers didn't have those options as the high incidence of injuries depleted even the biggest of squads.

The club is far from broken it is developing, coming to terms with new laws, a new much more Physical approach and trying to compete with the money rich French clubs. I was at Racing, we could have and should have won, I saw a brilliant display against Castres but I also saw us being bullied by Munster, just as I expected. (It helps when your players only play half the games) My only real moan was the Worcester game which was a poor performance but I would ask my fellow contributors to look at the team we put out.

Finally I didn't hear Sarries fans asking for the head of their Director of Rugby and Board when they were losing and losing in many cases to lesser opposition than Tigers were playing. We could have easily won at Wasps, should have beaten Racing and Worcester. We have a truly World Class player in Matt Toomua and it speaks volumes that he has signed a contract extension along with many others.

The Club is in safe hands....

[johnthegriff]

I agree with pretty much everything said by NONAME. The club recognised the fact that not enough players were making he step up from the Academy to the first team and have taken steps to change that but it takes time for young men to mature into Premiership players.

[chewbacca]

I agree with pretty much everything said by NONAME. The club recognised the fact that not enough players were making he step up from the Academy to the first team and have taken steps to change that but it takes time for young men to mature into Premiership players.

So it's currently broken but in recovery. Question might be as to why it was allowed to become broken.

[Rugbyflanker]

NONAME,no one called for Sarries heads because it was a 6 game blip rather than a near 5 year one! Terrible comparison imo but you put your opinions across well. We are just lurching from one disaster to another it seems. The lineout/defence/forwards coach isnt a fresh problem,its been going wrong for a long time,surely a safe hands BoD wouldve addressed this? You could argue that the HC/DOR upheavals have scuppered this but ive no confidence in a board that picks MOC over Ackermamn anyway oe a board who treated Mauger so disgracefully so why am i suddenly expected to have confidence getting this right? And what good is getting the academy right then hiring a HC who has historically and is continuing to ignore youth? Clueless springs to mind!

[Clowbeck]

ive no confidence in a board that picks MOC over Ackermamn anyway oe a board who treated Mauger so disgracefully

Take a listen to the Flats & Shanks podcast released in December co-hosted by Freddie Burns, he talks at length about how he came to join Tigers, how he left, and how he feels about it. The lad sounds like he was treated as a mercenary.