Deans SOS to Burgess?

[ACT Crusader]

I don't agree that Burgess was mismanaged by Deans and that is why he left Australian Rugby.

Sure, he should have been given more minutes in 2011, particularly at the RWC when Genia wasn't playing well, however I don't think a few 15 minute runs for the Wallabies was going to change his decision.

Compared to Chris Whittaker, Burgess got plenty of time on the field for the Wallabies. If you want an example, check the 2001 British Lions Tour. Whittaker sat on the bench for three whole tests and didn't get to play a minute. Considering we won one game and lost another one convincingly, Whittaker could have easily been given a run with the result already assured. Instead he was left on the bench for the entire series.

In terms of setting a precedent, I don't really have an issue with it. Our top two halfbacks are out injured and it is a position Australian Rugby is weak in. If you look at the next options that are Lucas and Kingi, both of them have only played a handful of Super Rugby games, particularly at halfback. There is a huge void in terms of experience.

I agree with your take on the Burgess situation and why he left. He was not as good as the number one, a number one that was younger and a future leader and for all intents and purposes an 80 minute player.

I liked Burgess' game. Sure he was a bit erratic at times and probably took on the line a little to often, but he seems to have embraced the French rugby and I think he did alright to get 30 plus test matches.

I dont share the bolded sentiments though B81. I think the current situation creates an incentive to stay in Australia and maintain a contract with the ARU, hence "contributing" to the improvement of the game in Australia

 

[Braveheart81]

I dont share the bolded sentiments though B81. I think the current situation creates an incentive to stay in Australia and maintain a contract with the ARU, hence "contributing" to the improvement of the game in Australia

I don't think Kingi, Lucas, McKibbin or anyone else could feel cheated that they've done their time in Australian Rugby and deserve to go on a Wallabies tour/play for the Wallabies.

They are players who have played a handful of games each in Super Rugby and struggle to get game time in most cases.

 

[daz]

I don't like this sentiment.

I see no problem in Chargers comments, he is voicing his opinion of Burgess. If you disagree with that point, fine. I don't see why we should have to reference our arguments, if we are voicing our opinion.

If we have to start posting references to support our views, then Gagr will get boring pretty damn quickly. One man's fact is another man's fiction.

From reading Chargers posts, he believes that Burgess was poorly managed. In my opinion, during the RWC he most definitely was. Did he go off to France as he was frustrated? Maybe, maybe not. Is it really that harmful to speculate?

Reasoned opinion is fine. Personal statements without any thought or substance behind it is not.

No different to your post. If you had stopped after the first line, we would have all wondered why you didn't like my post, and I probably would have replied to you to ask you to expand.

But you didn't. You gave some detail of why you didn't like it. I don't agree with it, but it was reasonable and thought out. Job done.


Make sense?

 

[qwerty51]

I don't rate Phipps, but if he's deemed good enough to play against New Zealand, South Africa and Argentina....

Why do we need to send out an SOS to anybody for a tour up north?

I see it as Deans would've preferred Burgess now but not available where as he is on the EOYT.

 

[RugbyReg]

who are the fit scrummies at the moment? Below are our pro scrummies from this year, and those I believe are unavailable are crossed out.

QLD:
- Genia
- Lucas
- Frisby

NSW:
- McKibbon
- Hart
- Lucas

ACT:
- White
- Prior

MEL:
- Phipps
- Kingi
- Stirzaker

Force:
- Sheehan
- Turner

Doesn't leave much does it. Phipps and Sheehan to tour and they'd take a third I'd assume? Who's the next most likely our of those? Kingi for his versatility? McKibbon for his ruggedness? Prior for his clearance?

I reckon Prior may be the darkhorse.

 

[ChargerWA]

Reasoned opinion is fine. Personal statements without any thought or substance behind it is not.

No different to your post. If you had stopped after the first line, we would have all wondered why you didn't like my post, and I probably would have replied to you to ask you to expand.

But you didn't. You gave some detail of why you didn't like it. I don't agree with it, but it was reasonable and thought out. Job done.


Make sense?

Who gave you the power to demand a dissertation behind every post made.

I will admit my post was a little glib, but considering the matter has been discussed on here (recently) I would have thought my point was fairly self evident.

I don't have a problem expanding on a point, what I do have a problem with is your self appointed role to deliver value judgements on the contributions of other members.

Not good enough, ChargerWA.

lack of facts behind your other comments makes it slightly trollish.

Feel free to ask me to expand on point or ignore my posts all together, but save the overbearing patronage for your kids.

 

[Caputo]

Kerr-Barlow still without a cap.

 

[The Red Baron]

Make sense?

I would very much appreciate it if you were a little less condescending.

Either way, as this argument does not belong here and contributes nothing, I will excuse myself.

 

[The Red Baron]

Kerr-Barlow still without a cap.

I don't think Kerr-Barlow will ever make himself available for Wallaby selection. He aspires to be an All Black.

 

[cyclopath]

I don't like this sentiment.

I see no problem in Chargers comments, he is voicing his opinion of Burgess. If you disagree with that point, fine. I don't see why we should have to reference our arguments, if we are voicing our opinion.

If we have to start posting references to support our views, then Gagr will get boring pretty damn quickly. One man's fact is another man's fiction.

From reading Chargers posts, he believes that Burgess was poorly managed. In my opinion, during the RWC he most definitely was. Did he go off to France as he was frustrated? Maybe, maybe not. Is it really that harmful to speculate?

Fair point, it was just an opinion.
I think Daz's point was we really don't know, and can't say for sure that Burgess would have stayed if managed better, given that he would have known pretty clearly, even with more game time, that he was a bench warmer more often than not. We also don't know why Burgess went for sure. At the time Genia was carving it up, we were not to know he would slump a bit at the RWC possibly as a result of being overplayed. Application of hindsight is 20-20 (well, 6-6 these days, with the metric system!).
Anyway, move along.

 

[Antony]

I don't think Kerr-Barlow will ever make himself available for Wallaby selection. He aspires to be an All Black.

He could have a bit of a wait ahead of him... I reckon Perenara v Smith is going to be the defining ABs positional battle of the next couple of world cup cycles.

Very good player though, like a Cowan in defence without all the convictions, and I'd love him to get a shot.

 

[Antony]

And on burgess, don't pick him. Kingi is an under-rated footballer.

 

[Hawko]

At the risk of bringing up a whole lot of anti/pro Deans commentary, let me make some points about why it is rumoured that Deans now wants Burgess:

1. Some people are adamant that the top team must always be picked until those are injured or burnt out. Deans would be one of those but there are plenty who would agree with him on that point. I'm not one of those people. The last three years of the Tahs campaigns, a better understanding of how Top 14 sides are managed and the Camp Rehab experience this year lead me to the belief that we now absolutely have to think in terms of squads not teams.
2. Burgess is not the first player to be stuck behind a better player and get no game time. The treatment of Whittaker was an absolute disgrace, particularly after Gregan's 90th cap, when Gregan was not the player he once was. But Gregan "had" to be selected and never substituted because he was captain and there was no way George was giving Whits any chance of showing him up at international level if he could help it. When it happens like that you feel sympathy for the man on the bench, but ultimately that is a result of poor selectors and coaches. Gregan was just protecting his patch.
3. Burgess got stuck behind Genia and we pretty much all agree that Genia at his best is better than Burgess but I would argue vehemently that when Genia is not at his best as he wasn't during the World Cup (basically because he was totally burnt out) Burgess was a way better option. The problem was that Deans couldn't see it and he takes good advice from no one.
4. Deans has favourites: Phipps is a special favourite and he totally mucked Nic White around to such an extent that Nic went off and had an operation that could have been postponed. Then Genia did his knee and all that was left was Phipps, whose performances during the Super comp ranged from average to appalling. Rewatch the Rebels games for confirmation of this and keep a close eye on his defence. It makes Cooper look like Jarrod Saffy.
5. Realistically Deans has Phipps and Sheehan available and is then down to options who cannot even command a spot as first choice for their Super team. The best of them are probably Lucas jnr and Stirzacker, but would you want to take them on a Wallaby tour?
6. Deans is now down to the bottom of a very empty barrel and he knows that a bad EOYT result will get him canned immediately they get back and now JON won't be able to save his skin. He needs the best halfback he can get and that's Burgess, who also now has plenty of experience playing on wet weather bogs in the NH. Phipps doesn't have this and will likely fold under pressure on a wet track. When faced with this situation, Deans needs Burgess.

Australian selectors and coaches at Super and national level have paid lip-service to the need to manage squads to prevent burnout in the pro era. By doing so they have left us in the situation of having key players injured/burnt out and very inexperienced replacements. New Zealand's management of McCaw and Carter has been exemplary, everything that our selectors and coaches have not. Although NZ has had less injuries than us, if they had had a list like ours they would have coped much better. They have back-ups with full caps for most positions on the field; we do not.

The modern game requires whole squads to be developed who all know the gameplan, who have played full internationals in that position and who know they will not ride the pine or get 5 minutes each all season. The purists will scream that we devalue the jersey if we don't choose the best players every time. When a Wallaby played five or six tests a year that might have been true but since June we've played ten now with another one on Saturday and four to come before Christmas. That's 15 tests in six months. The injury list is forcing a selection policy on us that we should have embraced several years ago. This weekend we don't have our best team on the park, only the best available uninjured. My comment to the purists is that that devalues the jersey just as much as a policy of selecting and rotating squads does.

So we should have selected a squad of 30-35 players in May and over the eleven tests up till Saturday they all should have had one outing and most have had several. You would probably selected the best team for the NZ games and rotated for the rest. Its what has happened anyway but if we'd planned for it then we would have had players ready to drop into positions with match experience and I sooth that our situation would be a whole lot better than it is. Some other philosophies would have had to be adopted, like choosing a players best position and then leaving them there unless exceptional circumstances intervened, but that would be no bad thing.

 

[Bardon]

I suppose I have a different attitude coming from the NH. But to me I don't see a problem with Aus asking if Burgess would be available. I can see the reason for the selection policy in terms of trying to ensure that the best players have an incentive to stay in Aus.

I look at this similar to how Wales drafted in Gareth Delve when they toured Aus earlier in the year. It's someone who's been capped before and would only be available to cover a specific tour with no guarantee he'll be played or even called up. Just as I wouldn't expect Delve to be in the next Wales squad or in their 2013 6Ns squad I wouldn't expect Burgess to be called up by Aus after the EOYT. It might even be an incentive for the guy to look for a return to Aus after getting a taste of what he's missed not playing for Aus.

Speaking of Wales they tried a similar tact to Aus and NZ by telling players they would be less likely to be picked if they moved to France or England. While it's true for fringe players any key players such as Mike Phillips have been unaffected.

The problem of players playing abroad is going to increase simply due to the amount of money in some leagues, especially the top 14 where teams like Toulouse, Stade, Racing and Toulon have massive annual budgets, in excess of $25m. I think I'm right in saying that the budget of one of those clubs is pretty close to the combined wage cap of the 5 Aus franchises.

Currently it's a lot of Welsh and English players that they are recruiting and the SH players tend to be either from outside the big 3 or players coming to the end of their careers. However it won't be too long before they start targeting Aus and NZ players in their prime as is beginning to happen more with SA players. Countries like England, NZ and SA and currently Wales can cope better with these drains than say Ireland and Aus due to smaller playing numbers.

I don't think it will be too long before countries like ours will have maybe 1/3 of our starting test teams playing their club Rugby outside of the domestic league. Policies like those currently in place will slow the move toward that situation but it won't halt it completely. I think over the coming years with the amount of money coming into the game, especially in France and England we'll see some of the biggest changes since Rugby went professional. The soccer style club v country rows are on the horizon.

I can see why people would have strong feelings about the issue but not playing Burgess for Aus now on a one-off basis on an EOYT isn't going to stop the above happening, it's just seems like an inevitability. Also I should probably point out I'm not in favour of the direction the game seems to be going, the last thing I'd want is for Rugby to end up like soccer.

 

[Ruggo]

He could have a bit of a wait ahead of him. I reckon Perenara v Smith is going to be the defining ABs positional battle of the next couple of world cup cycles.

Very good player though, like a Cowan in defence without all the convictions, and I'd love him to get a shot.

It has always been his dream. I can't see him selling out on that dream regardless.

 

[troxler]

I suppose I have a different attitude coming from the NH. But to me I don't see a problem with Aus asking if Burgess would be available. I can see the reason for the selection policy in terms of trying to ensure that the best players have an incentive to stay in Aus.

I look at this similar to how Wales drafted in Gareth Delve when they toured Aus earlier in the year. It's someone who's been capped before and would only be available to cover a specific tour with no guarantee he'll be played or even called up. Just as I wouldn't expect Delve to be in the next Wales squad or in their 2013 6Ns squad I wouldn't expect Burgess to be called up by Aus after the EOYT. It might even be an incentive for the guy to look for a return to Aus after getting a taste of what he's missed not playing for Aus.

Speaking of Wales they tried a similar tact to Aus and NZ by telling players they would be less likely to be picked if they moved to France or England. While it's true for fringe players and key players such as Mike Phillips have been unaffected.

The problem of players playing abroad is going to increase simply due to the amount of money in some leagues, especially the top 14 where teams like Toulouse, Stade, Racing and Toulon have massive annual budgets, in excess of $25m. I think I'm right in saying that the budget of one of those clubs is pretty close to the combined wage cap of the 5 Aus franchises.

Currently it's a lot of Welsh and English players that they are recruiting and the SH players tend to be either from outside the big 3 or players coming to the end of their careers. However it won't be too long before they start targeting Aus and NZ players in their prime as is beginning to happen more with SA players. Countries like England, NZ and SA and currently Wales can cope better with these drains than say Ireland and Aus due to smaller playing numbers.

I don't think it will be too long before countries like ours will have maybe 1/3 of our starting test teams playing their club Rugby outside of the domestic league. Policies like those currently in place will slow the move toward that situation but it won't halt it completely. I think over the coming years with the amount of money coming into the game, especially in France and England we'll see some of the biggest changes since Rugby went professional. The soccer style club v country rows are on the horizon.

I can see why people would have strong feelings about the issue but not playing Burgess for Aus now on a one-off basis on an EOYT isn't going to stop the above happening, it's just seems like an inevitability. Also I should probably point out I'm not in favour of the direction the game seems to be going, the last thing I'd want is for Rugby to end up like soccer.

fixed.

 

[GaffaCHinO]

Someone on the roar also said that DHP has been contacted to maybe stand by aswell not sure if its true but very interesting if it is.

Sent from my GT-I9300T using Tapatalk 2

 

[Antony]

It has always been his dream. I can't see him selling out on that dream regardless.

Then, genuinely, good on him.

 

[Bardon]

fixed.

Yep thanks, what I meant to say.

 

[southsider]

Burgess is a myth of a player, he may give quick ball but its wild and erratic ball at the best of times and he struggles with decision making under pressure.