Mick O’Driscoll leads his team off the pitch at the Liberty Stadium. Munster had just suffered their worst defeat in eight years in his last game for the province he represented more than two hundred times. He deserved better.
The Mole is like a dog with a bone, and that bone is a broken record. Engrish rangruage, forgive-eness preeze. Continue reading
Dan Tuohy (26) takes on Simon Zebo (21) in an emblematic image that shows the differing age profile between the two teams.
The Mole has written before about how the failings of the Munster Academy in the second Declan Kidney era are now affecting the fortunes of the province. While Kidney handed over a hard-nosed championship team to Tony McGahan in June 2008, things weren’t quite so rosy under the surface. Continue reading
The Munster bootroom: throw another coach on the barbie, Skippy!
Where was I? Fingers pointing at McGahan? Maybe there were a few too many fingers pointing at him when some of them should have been pointing at his colleagues … and who knows if their appointments were even his call. Continue reading
McGahan lost a serious chunk of the Munster fanbase in the course of eighty minutes. It mightn't have been fair, but it happened.
However, the arc of McGahan’s tenure, and the feeling with which he was regarded by Munster fans, changed unalterably over the space of eighty minutes. Continue reading
Declan Kidney giving the game away in a typically outspoken pre-match press conference. Somebody needs to put a zip on that guy's lip. He's all mouth.
Declan Kidney’s Rotund Shadow
Declan Kidney is basically George Smiley, firstly. Old Smiley has returned to prominence over the last year as a result of Tomas Alfredson’s cinematic reprise of Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy; Gary Oldman plays him a little on the reptilian side compared to Alec Guinness’ ‘Declan Kidney in a British Warm’ portrayal from the BBC series of the late 1970s, so it mightn’t leap out at you if you’ve neither read the book nor seen the Guinness version. A highpoint in broadcasting. Continue reading
Canal+ are reporting that Munster’s Tomás O’Leary has signed for Perpignan. This move has been rumoured for a couple of weeks, and while O’Leary’s agent has issued a typical non-denial denial, there are a number of factors which point toward it being as good as a done deal. While Donal Lenihan reckons that O’Leary has not yet signed on the line that is dotted [thank you, Glengarry Glen Ross], there’s every indication that O’Leary is off to the sunny sud-ouest. Continue reading
Billy Holland: just when I thought I was out, they ... pushed me further out.
The Mole was watching the Munster vs Treviso game at Thomond Park on the idiot-box a couple of weeks ago, and was struck by one selection call in particular. Niall Ronan hobbled off just before halftime, and he was replaced by … Donncha O’Callaghan. Continue reading
C86 was an NME mix tape that catalogued the emerging British music scene in 1986. 'C' stood for cassette, and 86 ....
The Mole was second-guessing himself over the holiday season. Was it The Fear? Partially. It was also the feeling that he can be a little bit too harsh on certain elements of the Munster set-up. Continue reading
Munster didn’t require any last minute heroics from Ronan O’Gara to seal a vital away win at Parc y Scarlets, but the Heineken Cup centurion controlled the shape of the game and won his personal duel with Welsh out-half Rhys Priestland. Continue reading
Not intended as a slight on McGahan, but he's down a lot of backs.
If you’re down your entire first choice back three in Howlett/Earls/Jones – one of whom is a Hall of Fame calibre player, one of whom is a confirmed international try-scorer, and the other of whom is a great broken field runner – and you don’t have particularly good centers, what’s the point in playing to your weaknesses? Continue reading
Digging Like a Demented Mole 