80+ column : February 3
Our weekly newsletter looking at the wider rugby world
ON THIS WEEK’S COLUMN…
WRAP OF A WRAP
THURSDAY’S CHILD…
SOLIDARITY
EARLY DOORS
LAWS UNTO THEMSELVES
DEVINE INTERVENTION
HARPIN’ ON…LEINSTER SEASON OVERVIEW
TEAMS FOR FRANCE V IRELAND
TROLL PATROL
COMPETITION UPDATES (incl Leinster Schools)
NEXT HARPIN’
WRAP OF A WRAP
As you’ll see a bit down the page, this ‘Thursday Six Nations kickoff’ malarkey is really grinding my gears, not least because it messes up my content schedule. Our preview will record Wednesday evening so I will post this late on Tuesday.
When it comes to the Edinburgh wrap, I was joined by Mr Leinster Royalty himself Tom Coleman who gave an excellent account of the match as well as an overview of Leinster’s season as you’ll see in the bonus chat. We began by focusing on Leinster’s NIQ players. I’m sure I wasn’t the only one cursing RG Snyman during the match on Saturday for overdoing the funky offloads but Tom did a decent job of providing counter point with all the good he’s done, as well as looking at Reiko & Rabah.
ICYMI click here to have a listen.
THURSDAY’S CHILD…
…this year’s Thursday start is because of the 2026 Milan-Cortina Winter Olympics.
Why is the Six Nations starting on Thursday?
Jonathan Bradley - BBC.com
…had far to go. And I’ll tell you what, you’d have to go pretty far to convince me that any of the reasons given for bringing this match forward to a goddam Thursday make any sense.
I mean, forgive me for not keeping up on the latest bobsledding and luge news but when this day switch was first announced, and I heard it was to do with the opening ceremony for the Winter Olympics, I thought that meant the games were IN France. But they’re not. They’re actually in Italy. So why isn’t it their game with Scotland that gets moved instead of ours????
I mean, going by this article it seems that a weekly ProD2 fixture plus several World Cup matches under a very flawed format somehow makes this marquee matchup going to midweek understandable. Excusez‑moi, mesdames et messieurs, but it doesn’t.
SOLIDARITY
“The Solidarity / Solidarité Trophy reflects the deep and enduring relationship between Irish and French rugby”
IRFU And FFR Unveil New Trophy For Ireland And France Six Nations Matches
IrishRugby.ie
As you can see I’m highlighting the more trivial aspects of Thursday’s match in this week’s Front 5. I’m perfectly aware that when the the ref blows for the kickoff in Paris, none of us will care a jot about what night of the week it is, nor what the name of the trophy is.
These awards are obviously superficial, and the language used to promote them is similar to what you’ll read on a restaurant menu to describe the dishes (on the bank holiday Monday I had some nice pub grub in a local establishment, but I have to say the chicken wings didn’t need to be described as “pan-kissed”), but given the Calcutta Cup is such a “thing” and there have been trophies added for most of the other fixtures, they may as well go all the way and have them for the full slate of 15 matches.
EARLY DOORS
Melbourne hosts Ireland’s final pool game against Uruguay on Sunday 17 October with a start time of 4.45am
Ireland’s Rugby World Cup 2027 dates and venues confirmed
Michael Glennon - RTÉ.ie
At least the Scotland game is at a reasonable hour; I’m sure pubs will be open and serving a decent breakfast at that time, but 4:45am is more than a bit of a pain I have to say. But right now I’m still too angry over the Thursday thing to give this a lot of ink so maybe it’s best to leave it there for now.
LAWS UNTO THEMSELVES
With the emphatic support of clubs, match officials and stakeholders, the competition has approved five key law innovations for the 2026 season
Super Rugby to trial exciting law innovations
Rugby365.com
In general I’m fine with law tinkering, especially in this sport with its grey-area-heavy Laws. But this many all at once, more than halfway through a World Cup cycle and in what’s meant to be one of the planet’s leading club competitions, simply makes no sense to me.
We could possibly go down through the list one by one and see how they can theoretically improve things. Like I could get on board with the 5022 one, for example, and also the “don’t join the ruck after ref says use it” provided the ref enforced it consistently.
But again it’s too much for one go in my book and it seems to be papering over the cracks for a competition that has fallen from grace since the heady days when the southern hemisphere were the pioneers of professionalism courtesy of the original Super 10/12. Now they struggle to get bums on seats and seem to think mucking about with the laws will help - in our WhatsApp group RugbyKino put it best when he evoked the phrase “rearranging the deckchairs on the Titanic”.
And it’s not just us online rugby nerds saying it; northern hemisphere officials appear to agree…
DEVINE INTERVENTION
“Having worked with the coaching staff before with the U20s, I have a great relationship with them, and I feel their style suits my game.”
Devine to leave Connacht this summer and join Ulster
Fintan O’Toole - The42.ie
First of all, I had to check to make sure this wasn’t THAT Fintan O’Toole or even a relation, but it seems not.
On the transfer itself, it seems like a good move for the lad and I respect the reasons he gives for moving. Just because he hails from Ballinasloe doesn’t mean he absolutely must play out west so fair play for choosing to move for rugby reasons. Also if you heard a 9 was heading from Galway to Belfast you’d assume it was Richie’s lad Ben, but the word is he’s going to Munster? Will Stu have anyone left but Caolin Blade next season?
I suppose the main reason I chose this story for this week’s segment is that it makes a change for the interprovincial transfer talk to NOT involve someone leaving Leinster for once…
HARPIN ON…LEINSTER SEASON OVERVIEW
“I’m joined by Tom Coleman who was with us right before the season kicked off and we’re using him as an overseer of sorts, checking in every so often.. You were last with us after we beat Harlequins and we have continued winning since so just before all eyes turn to the Six Nations, how do you think we’re doing?”
TEAMS FOR FRANCE V IRELAND
This is where I usually try to speculate what team is going to be picked for the weekend, but because of the “Jeudi Joué” (as nobody else calls it) they’ve already gone and named the teams. I’ll just pop them here as I’m sure myself & Hugo will have plenty to say about it when we record the Preview Show on Wednesday evening.
TROLL PATROL
Now it’s time for Troll Patrol where we ‘detain’ a social media commentator and charge them with gaslightery and general online mayhem.
Owner/operator of Post To Post Sport and regular Harpin contributor Ciarán Duffy decided to go the Simpsons meme route to celebrate Leinster’s latest victory…
Hey, who’s that “Jeff” guy who has leap frogged four others this week to top the Harpin’ Prediction League???? He must be pretty good at the forecasting eh?
Seriously though, there have been some crazy results in the URC of late, and this week we had a rare occurrence on rugby Superbru, namely someone accurately predicting a draw, which happened to Ciarán Duffy who won the round thanks in part to foreseeing the Ospreys/Dragons stalemate. In the knockout mug competition, last year’s winner Conor may be down the bottom of the overall league but he moved into the semifinals with a convincing win over Mark.
Back to the actual rugby, when it comes to the AIL I have harped quite a bit on the women’s side of things in recent weeks so I suppose it’s about time I mentioned the blokes - Tarf lost only their 2nd match of the season at the weekend allowing Mary’s to close the gap at the top as well as the chasing pack led by Terenure.
Also February is the time of year when we add the Division 1B updates to this section, Old Wesley are leading the way although they’ve a tough assignment up next away to Trinity who are also near the top.
Finally there was a very curious ruling in the Leinster Schools Cup, check out the link in their update section below to learn about why a first round tie is being replayed. I’m not so sure a replay was the right call FWIW.
WOMEN’S SIX NATIONS
CELTIC CHALLENGE
URC IRISH SHIELD
Leinster 14-31 Munster
Munster 17-15 Connacht
Leinster 24-20 Ulster
Munster 8-13 Leinster
Connacht 24-29 Ulster
Ulster 28-3 Munster
Leinster 52-17 Connacht
Connacht 23-34 Leinster
Mar 20 Ulster v Connacht
Apr 17 Ulster v Leinster
Apr 25 Munster v Ulster
May 9 Connacht v Munster
U20 SIX NATIONS
ALL IRELAND LEAGUES
WOMEN’S
MEN’S 1A
MEN’S 1B
LEINSTER SCHOOLS SENIOR CUP
QUARTERFINAL DRAW
Mon Feb 9 - Terenure v Gonzaga
Tue Feb 10 - Blackrock v St Gerard’s/Pres Bray
Wed Feb 11 - St Michael’s v Roscrea
Thu Feb 12 - St Mary’s v Newbridge
FIRST ROUND
Terenure College 51-14 Kilkenny College
Clongowes Wood College 15-22 St Mary’s College
Newbridge College 38-31 Wesley College
Belvedere College 8 -18 Cistercian College Roscrea
Gonzaga College 62-7 Temple Carrig
St Gerard’s School 24-17 Pres Bray [match to be replayed due to ineligible player]
St Fintan’s 10-22 St Michael’s College
Blackrock College 47-32 St Vincent’s
Fri Feb 6 - St Gerards v Pres Bray (replay)
VINNIE MURRAY CUP
QUARTERFINALS
(4 semifinalists advance to Senior Cup)
St Vincents 26-24 CUS
Temple Carrig 14-14 St Andrews
St Fintan’s 59-23 St Patricks Navan
King’s Hospital 12-19 Pres Bray
(replay) Temple Carrig 17-12 St Andrews
EPCR CHALLENGE CUP
SVNS
WOMEN
Standings
Fiji – 58 pts
New Zealand – 56 pts
USA – 40 pts
Canada – 36 pts
Australia – 36 pts
France – 36 pts
Japan – 32 pts
Great Britain – 18 pts
MEN
Standings
Fiji – 52 pts
New Zealand – 48 pts
South Africa – 46 pts
France – 46 pts
Australia – 38 pts
Argentina – 32 pts
Spain – 26 pts
Great Britain – 24 pts
PREMIERSHIP
Round 10
Bath 19–45 Exeter Chiefs
Bristol Bears 21–24 Gloucester
Leicester Tigers 30–33 Northampton Saints
Newcastle Falcons 15–38 Sale Sharks
Saracens 45–21 Harlequins
Round 11
Friday 20 March
Bath v Saracens
Saturday 21 March
Harlequins v Gloucester
Northampton Saints v Newcastle Red Bulls
Exeter Chiefs v Sale Sharks
Sunday 22 March
Leicester Tigers v Bristol
🔝🐱🐴
PROD2
SUPER RUGBY
Round 1
Friday 13 February
Highlanders v Crusaders
Waratahs v Reds
Saturday 14 February
Drua v Moana Pasifika
Blues v Chiefs
Force v Brumbies
Bye: Hurricanes
JAPAN LEAGUE ONE
Saturday, 7 February 2026
Kobelco Kobe Steelers v Shizuoka BlueRevs
BlackRams Tokyo v Saitama Wild Knights
Mie Honda Heat v Toshiba Brave Lupus Tokyo
Toyota Verblitz v Yokohama Canon Eagles
Tokyo Sungoliath v Mitsubishi Sagamihara Dynaboars
Sunday, 8 February 2026
Urayasu D‑Rocks v Tokyo Sungoliath
Next match : DAVID v RICH
NEXT BATCH OF HARPIN’
Wednesday
France v Ireland preview featuring Hugo Gordon (YouTube)
Thursday
Throwback Thursday (Substack)
Dublin South FM segment (after 5pm news)
Leave your thoughts after FRAvIRE full time whistle on our Facebook page
Saturday
Broken Play article (Substack)
Sunday
France v Ireland wrap pod featuring Mark Jackson
In the meantime be sure to enjoy your rugby wherever you are, even if it is on a Thursday. JLP