Munster have the young assets to ‘rebalance’ squad and maximise performance

Everything is inevitable after it happens. You look back at Munster’s glorious strech from, say, the 21st of January 2006 to the 24th of May 2008 where they picked up iconic wins and two European Cups and everything that had to happen to lead Munster to that point, did happen.

Declan Kidney left his Leinster deal early, Trevor Halstead had to arrive from the Sharks, Mick O’Driscoll had to return from Perpignan, David Wallace had to score a last-minute try against Sale, Ronan O’Gara had to make that late kick to put Munster four points clear in the 2006 final, Doug Howlett and Rua Tipoki had to sign ahead of the 2007/8 season, Alan Quinlan had to get Fabien Pelous to kick him in the arse so he would get yellow carded and O’Gara had to kick the penalty Pelous conceded 14 minutes later to win the big one in 2008.

Then inevitability took over again in 2009 but my therapist tells me I’m not supposed to talk about that anymore. 

My point is that we’re currently watching the inevitable but we don’t know it. Do Munster win a trophy this year? Or next year? We don’t know yet. Liverpool fans didn’t know on the 26th of May 2018 that they’d be European Champions a year later and champions of England a year after that. That isn’t to equate the two, by the way, it’s merely a way to illustrate that we can plan for success all we want but the road there is only fully analysable in hindsight. Are we watching Munster make the steps that lead to what will appear to be an inevitable success at the moment? Or are we seeing something else? Time will tell.

But we can look at the time of year, read the context of the moment and see that the current contracting cycle is a key indicator of success both in the short, medium and long term. It’s not as simple as keeping absolutely everyone that you want. It’s rarely like that during regular times but the uncertainty around the pandemic is almost certainly going to mean that tough decisions are going to have to be made nationally and provincially. It’s already happening in Scotland. In the last few weeks, Glasgow and Edinburgh have confirmed that Adam Hastings and Duhan Van Der Merwe, two Scottish internationals, will be plying their trade in England next season and I doubt they’ll be the last. 

Will the same happen here? It’s already happened with Marcell Coetzee getting an early exit from Ulster and chatter of more to come. David Nucifora hinted that the prospect of current top-end internationals heading abroad was a possibility in a press conference in late November and I don’t have any juicy nuggets of information for you. We’ll literally have to wait and see who stays and who goes but whatever squad shaping happens in the next few months will factor into how the provinces move into the new decade of rugby, presuming we’re not in the middle of a zombie apocalypse this time next year.

The obvious choice for the provinces would be to focus on pushing high potential young players already on senior deals or academy players with a lot of senior appearances to move into more important roles while expanding the usage of next year’s Y2/Y3 players quite significantly. The real squeeze will come in the rebalancing of senior roles.

And that “rebalancing” is something that would seem to be a priority for the IRFU and provinces over the coming two or three seasons, especially if the PRO16 that David Nucifora was hinting at becomes a reality in the new year. That change to 16 teams would provide a template for an 18 game regular season which could pave the way to having a test window free season. No test window games would mean stronger regular-season league selections which are;

•             Better for attendances

•             Better for the TV “product”

•             Fairer to sides who can’t match the size and depth of the Irish squads (everyone else)

In my opinion, that would also allow all the teams in the league to downsize their professional squad numbers because, with no test window rugby, there wouldn’t be a need for the kind of depth that Munster/Leinster/Ulster and, to an extent, Connacht currently wield to cover for the seven or eight games test window games that take place during the PRO14 season.

Those seven or eight games are the buffer that the Irish provinces use to extend dominant conference leads and that advantage has grown. Beating a depleted Zebre by 49 points or walloping a Cardiff Blues Z team during a test window earns you the same five points as a hard-fought, four try a piece nail biter against a full-strength Edinburgh or Scarlets side in late March.

If those games are no longer being played during a test window, there’s scope to reduce your squad size by five or six “middle tier” players who;

•             Are 26 and above.

•             Aren’t in regular test squad contention or on a specific role depth chart at international level.

•             Are pretty deep in a provincial depth chart.

•             Are pretty well paid “second layer” players (perhaps with a few international caps) who aren’t cast-iron European Champions Cup matchday regulars if everyone is fit.

If you reference these criteria against the above list, you can see who might be “on the bubble” in an environment where there will be cost-cutting.

Munster currently has 43 senior professionals with 15 academy players. There are 23 senior players out of contract this coming summer if we don’t count academy players.

For context, Leinster currently have 46 senior professionals and 18 academy players, Ulster have 43 senior professionals and 15 academy players and Connacht have 44 senior professionals and 17 academy players. I do not have information on how many senior players they have coming up for contract but I would imagine the numbers will be similar enough.

In any situation where you expect to endure cost-cutting, the obvious place to start is in that middle group of players but to do that, you need to promote a lot of young players who are ready to take on expanded roles. That leaves space to keep most – most – of the top guys you really want but anyone on the highest level of wages will have to be one or ideally two of the following;

•             Irish Qualified Priority 3 tier max (that is, they will need to be fully replaced inside three seasons excluding any adverse injury events). Anyone Priority 2 or lower is in danger here.

•             At the top of their national depth chart in a high priority role set (tighthead lock, power forward, power winger) or position (front three, scrumhalf, 10).

•             Or a key player at provincial level for which there is no immediate young player replacement that would realistically be able to replace them within two seasons.

Those are broadly the criteria that will be applied to the central contract players who have expired contracts at the end of this season.

For Munster, I think we are uniquely positioned to push multiple young and academy players to advanced squad roles and dramatically rebalance the squad to a younger focus. That is not without risk – clubs like experienced players for a reason in that they are mostly known properties – but guys like Casey, Healy, Coombes, the Wycherley’s, Ahern and Hodnett (never mind the Y1/Y2 guys) have too much “upside” to be overly conservative.

They are the future and the present. Smart investment now could set Munster up over the coming two or three seasons to rebalance our squad financially and maximise on-field performance.