Good news, Parks should be a good addition for us. NOC has improved but still our game plan when he's at 10 is extremely limited.

Parks will gives us what we have strived for over the years real options at key junctures in games and international experience to help steer the ship home in some tight matches.

NOC still has a lot to do to become a rounded 10, Jarvis has potential but is a rough diamond lots to work on but he has time. I wouldn't be surprised if Nikora slipped away from the final year of his contract and tried to get rugby elsewhere for next season. The likes of Leader and Carty can only really benefit from Parks being here and by the time Parks contract is up we should have plenty of options at out half.

Good to see we have acted on 2 problem areas. Still plenty to do. A quality scrum half like Stringer would really get me believing.

Why was the points per game average so high in 08/09 at 25pts. I see the try average was lower than this season at 1.11 per game. i can only assume that we had a very handy kicker?

If thats the case Parks will be a very welcome addition. By all accounts he is a model pro and Noc is a very dedicated trainer so it could be a very good match. They also are similar in style so should share the position well. I would invisage a 50/30 split in game time which is more than keats gets in munster so noc obvious improvements should continue.

Yeah Rob Murphy said in his commentary on Friday night that we were expecting to announce the signing of a "*major" 10 this week. (*I'm 99% certain he used the word major)

Have to say I am not overly sold on the idea. The only real reason being that we have invested so much faith and time into NOC this season and now we appear to be harvesting the benefits of it, my concern is that when NOC goes onto the bench for next season are we not risking undoing a lot of the good work that has been put in this year.

Hopefully though the signing of Parks will add to NOC's development rather than hinder it but i think gametime maketh the player as opposed to observation. The few times I have watched Keats kicking for Munster or Wolfhounds this year he seems to me to have gone back a year or 2 IMO.

Cardiff Blues SC ‏ @CardiffBluesSC Reply Retweet Favorite · Open
Waiting for official confirmation that Dan Parks has signed a 2 year deal with #Connacht - another day, another player leaves #cardiffblues

rugby agent

Jason Smith ‏ @JasonSmith_1 Reply Retweeted Favorite · Open
Dan Parks signs for Connaght. Bit of a statement by IRFU. Just reward.

Pro12 only

are them stats in the league only as there is big difference between amlin and heineken.

with a try average so low that is why we need a very good kicking out half.

Poor aul Henry gets a lot of stick. Still, a group of centres of Griffen, Tonetti, McSharry and Henry are much better in terms of options compared to Matthews, Ta'auso, Nathan and Griffen as our top 4 last year.

At one point last year Keatley got a start at 13 we had so few options for centres. Only Matthews from last year could push this years group for playing time.

When Henry is your 4th choice and you know he'll still go and do a job you're doing ok I reckon.

We were a much more competitive team in the second year of the Keatley/Carr/Cronin/Hagan era, thanks to a more settled squad. I'm hoping for more of the same next year. As few changes as possible, no like for like swaps unless entirely unavoidable and a focus on small tweaks to improve, not stay afloat.

From that perspective if Parks can get our points average up that's all I'll ask of him.

We're scoring 14 points a game. Last year we averaged 18. That average alone would give us a for/against ratio more or less breaking even, so we're close. We have as many losing bonuses now as we did by the end of last year. We need to remain stable so we can turn those into wins. Those missing 3 try bonus points would have us just one point behind Treviso for the 8th place on the table.

We desperately need to improve our attacking overall. Last year we had 3 try bonus victories. This year we've had none at all. But is looks very similar to two seasons ago, so it's a good omen for next year.

Year	Pts per game	Tries per game	Try Bonuses
2011/12	14	1.2	0
2010/11	18	1.45	3
2009/10	11.5	0.9	0
2008/09	25.5	1.11	1

2 years for a player his age seems like a lot but I suppose you have to give an incentive to come. Would like to see a center coming in as well though. McSharry, Tonetti and Griffin are good but not gone on Henry. Still he's alot better than he was at the start of the season.

PARKS will be signing a two year deal in a few days it will be this week.

him and white are great news for next season, dont think anyone else would be coming in unless one or two from ail or rejects from munster leinster ulster

Make him a hooker !!

Someone mentioned before about giving Ah You a go at LH and I'd be up for that just to see how he does. Glad Buckley is getting a start this wknd it'll do his confidence good.

ummm, wrote: Ronan has shown great skills at TH, but moving him back to LH would actually do wonders for his international hopes because internationals only have 22 man squads and a LH/TH replacement is gold dust.

That's a really good point. I prefer Loughney on the left side of the scrum and think he and Wilko can compliment each other exceptionally well, splitting starts between them. Him covering the right side too is invaluable to us and possibly Ireland because I think we lack depth there.

I'm still keen for us to try and sign another tight head prop who can lock a scrum. Having Wilko, Loughney and a developing Buckley at loose head and White, AN Other and a developing Maguire at tight head would put us in a strong position. If we can't sign another tight head, I'd be prepared to give Ah You another year to show signs of improvement.

Great result landing White.

It'll be interesting to see what this means for other guys. A lot of comments seem to think this is the end of either Dylan or Dave, but I'm not so sure.

For a start we have the smallest squad possible, so there is the possibility that we are adding without the need for a reciprocal subtraction. I'll admit I have a soft spot for Dave and I'd love to see him come back strong. He was a rock when he first joined and has tailed off, perhaps the White signing is partly from a mentoring point of view.

With Dave, Dylan and Nathan all signed Rollocks could move back to loose head. This is not as bad a deal as it sounds. We need depth to give players a rest and we're not as well served at LH as we are at TH.

Ronan has shown great skills at TH, but moving him back to LH would actually do wonders for his international hopes because internationals only have 22 man squads and a LH/TH replacement is gold dust.

I know it was nothing major but for the Leinster game in the RDS Leyden was on the bench and got some gametime towards the end. It was a nothing game by that stage as we had blown our half time lead.

It may not have been significant but he has experienced what happens for game day. This will stand to him when his time comes.

I agree to an extent but for the away games were there's less interest putting a few on the bench wouldn't hurt. If we're winning then great don't put them on if the other team is 15 points ahead giving them 10 mins at the end wouldn't make that big a difference.

At the moment, I feel we should be playing our strongest team from 1-15 every game.
We might have very little to play for, but if we're trying to sign players for next season, our win/loss record will be important.

If someone is tempted by a contract with Connacht, and then sees that we lost a few games in a row by large scores, the player wont care that we've blooded some youngsters, they will care that we're not competitive.

Competitive results also keep the fair weather fans coming along. Tonkings at the hands of teams around us will put off some fans from returning to the Sportsground. Thats the opposite of what we need right now.

Connacht are trying to develop a brand here, and unfortunately it's results only which will aid us.
5 years down the line, if we have an average of 8k at every game, and things are going badly, we can afford to let the younger players have a try