Depends where you were playing. Campo said he was a millionaire long before the game turned pro oop north.
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I never knew Willie Anderson spent 3 months in an Argentinian prison for stealing a flag while on tour there in the 80s.
the letters he wrote to his wife that were a key element of his biography are a great resource
correct
the first so called professional league here wss the celtic league around 95 96 maybeā¦but pre that it was a bit like inter County gah is today id imagine.
Franno was a stockbroker during his playing days and references work pressure to explain his bad mood during the early 90s
Rugby lost a lot when it went pro
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Officially in 1995
Campo has always been a bit of a liar tbf.
I havenāt watched it properly really since the 1999 World Cup ā¦I went thru a phase of absolutely hating it with the whole munster Leinster nonsense from 2004 onwards , I did enjoy the group stages of the 2015 world cup but Iāve lost it again nowā¦
I still canāt figure it out tbh, in any sport, anything I want ireland to win, but in rugby I 100% today want them to looseā¦ the provincial franchises alsoā¦ its unbelievable ā¦what happened to rugby that has made us hate the supporters and culture of it so much at that elite level.
In December if Iām free on a Saturday Iāll be over watching Navan and City of Derry in AIL 2A ā¦no problem, thatās great sport. but christ the professional game is the ugliest thing in sport today imho
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Heās referenced in a Something Happens song.
It was a low point for everybody involved and brings the Tom Dunne being universally regarded as an alright sort into question.
I was surprised at the time that he didnāt get more grief over those comments. I know there was some controversy but he should have been cancelled back then. He obviously didnāt learn anything from it.
I was on a tour there and we went to his sports shop Campos. He did autograph sessions every couple of days to make a few quid and some of the older fellas were pissed that he was making them pay. Seemed like a real dickhead though tbf I imagine people always came in looking for him so you wouldnāt want to be handing them out. Didnāt strike me as a millionaire doing that stuff but I know he gave Mark Webber money when he was starting out in F1.
The Celtic League didnāt start until 2001. In the early days of professionalism the best Irish players were cherry picked by English clubs and the Heino was an English/French carve up.
Ulster came from nowhere in 1999 and changed all that and then Munster took up the ball and ran. A point Iāve continually made about that time though was the amateur ethos was still hard wired to a large extent - it was still hard wired among coaches, players, pundits and supporters - and that didnāt properly dissipate until maybe the late 2000s. Gradually over that period, the whole ethos around the game became much more sanitised and choreographed.
The amateur days in rugby had a sort of glorious chaos to them. The shambolic nature of it all was part of the fun. You mention inter-county GAA - one of the reasons Iām against the league as championship format in Gaelic football is because it turns it into a sort of soulless, rationalised competition - the imperfections of the championship format have always been a feature, not a bug. Now thatās already been taken away with cutting out replays etc., and will go for real when All-Ireland finals move to July.
If this Proposal B goes through, Iād expect Dublin, Kerry, Tyrone, Mayo and if weāre lucky one or two others to become the equivalent of Leinster, Munster, Ulster, Connacht in rugby. And most of the rest to become the equivalent of Cork Con, Young Munster, Instonians etc.
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Fair play to you. Theres a massive difference between what your getting for the ā¬10 you spend to watch and AIL game vs Pro. Honest effort, real passion, the pride put in by 100s of volunteers and the uncertainty of how the ref performs due to lack of technology. Drama and entertainment. Pro rugby will destroy the sport.
The comments were almost as bad as you could get in terms of homophobia without resorting to name calling. Just shocking.
What are the solutions to the woes of professional rugby that you see in Ireland? Maybe an Eire soccer style approach? Donāt bother sustaining the professional game domestically. Export nearly all your best talent into the professional scene in England, rely on the English system to develop the players and try and nab as many players as you can from England with tenuous ancestral links to play in the international side.
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The AIL screwed itself during the Celtic Tiger in wasting money on attracting under 20s and senior squad players. Thankfully most have now figured it out and have gone back to just trying to be friendly environments that welcome all.
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I had to drive from west Cork back up to fair Fingal on sunday and had fuck all battery on my phone so had to make do with offtheball for the journey.
They had an interesting piece on a Bernard Jackman piece from the weekend about how Leinster are pretty much oversubscribed at academy level and are asking/making players join sub academies and give up three years of their lives in the hope of getting an academy place. Barring the odd elite lad who gets fast tracked you would be looking at being in your late 20s before really getting a centralised contract in typical circumstances.
It appears that other clubs in Europe have copped this and are snapping some of these lads up. Why arenāt the other provinces offered the opportunity to bring some of these lads into their academies?
Pre Covid they certainly were.
They canāt compete with the offers of the French and English clubs. Leinster lost a very good player to Bristol recently who was only in Ireland since he was 13 so could end up representing England. I think jackman coached him in the senior cup.
Leo Cullen wants to keep everyone at Leinster. They use something like 50 or 60 players per season.
Yer man Stuey Lancaster was telling a friend of mine, heād halve the squad and clear out the dead wood. If he had his way heād play the same team every week whereas Leo tries to keep them all happy.
The wobbler is a renowned cunt