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Cash rich Sale Sharks to search globe for player - Diamond
By Chris Jones
AJ MacGinty, the USA Eagles No10, is waiting to discover how seriously he damaged his knee helping defeat Harlequins 30-29 and Sale are set to launch a world wide search for a replacement to get them through the rest of the season.
The short term option for Steve Diamond, the Sale director of rugby, will be Australian international James O’Connor who started at full back against Quins but has considerable experience in the play-maker role. O’Connor’s chequered career has included spells at London Irish and Toulon and now he finds himself with the responsibility of ensuring Sale finish in the top of the Premiership to guarantee European Champions Cup rugby next season.
MacGinty, 27-years-old, has been in excellent form for Sale having struggled with a leg injury last season and Diamond admits his loss is a massive blow but he does have room in the playing budget to bring in a quality No10 and stay within the salary cap.
He said:"We've been building the side around AJ. It took him a year to settle in with us but he's a phenomenal goal-kicker and a great defender and he understands the game really well.
"So it's a bit of a loss for us but we'll be seeing more of James O'Connor at 10 in the next batch of games and I might even go around the world looking for another one.
"We're in a good position in the league and because we don't spend the money that some of these other teams spend, we do have a huge reserve there so we might go to have a look at whether we can get a number ten to see us through to the end of the season to help James and Sam James.”
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Latest Comments
The manner of all these comments is that it doesn’t matter who plays No10 for the All Blacks, apparently they are all rubbish!
Seriously, people need to get a grip and stop obsessing over every tiny error made from an overscrutinised position. DMac was good this year for the most part, as was Beauden Barrett. Mo’unga was good last year and would be an asset in the group if he did come back. I don’t see it as an area of concern.
The main concern in 2025 is finding another world class lock and loose forward, followed by some scrutiny over the midfield combination in my view.
Go to commentsI was at this match. Jordie Barrett earned his money with a massive hit to slow a connaught attack to win the math when Leinster had 14 in the last few mins. Mack Hansen had a real go at the refereeing after citing a serious head hits on Iaone and Aki.
connaught were up for this. Snyman tried a trademark dirty after, and the onnaught 4 and the onnaught pack absolutely laid into him.
Leinster hose to kick to the corner when only winning by 5 with 10 left and qith only 2 tries scored. onnaught should have punisihed them for that utter stupidity after they broke out and Leinster yellowed to stop the attack.
13 changes from last week. It seems teams are scoring about 10 points less against Leinster this year. With Neinaber in his second year, the new attack coah established, surely they will be a bigger threat in champions up? Or will the attack recgress further.
They must adopt the SA philosophy of take your 3 pointers and the bonus points will come.
connaught back line inluding Iaone, Murphy, Aki, Forde, cordero is the seond best in Ireland surely. Leinster were lucky here
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