HOT OFF THE plane from Sydney, NRL champion Ben Te’o joined his new Leinster team-mates in training today.
After an extended season in rugby league, Leinster’s coaching staff would no doubt prefer if they had time to bed Te’o in to a new team in a new sport.
However with the injury count still swelling and the collective team still struggling to find form, Te’o just might be too much of a temptation for Matt O’Connor to refuse over two weeks of European action.
“He arrived yesterday. We’ll have to see what he looks like on a rugby pitch first,” joked forwards coach Leo Cullen, “but he’s certainly physically imposing looking when he’s down the gym there.”
Asked whether the former Rabbitoh would be among the backline options for the visit of Wasps this weekend, Cullen said:
“That’s a little bit out of my realm, but we want to see him out on the pitch as soon as we can.”
“I don’t know if guys have seen much of the NRL, but he’s been very impressive in the semi-final and final. He’s a pretty outstanding athlete, very aggressive carrier and he has a massive work-rate as well.
“I just saw his stats from the final and he made 33 tackles, so he’s a really good athlete and we’re looking forward to see what he can do.”
I thought Barcelona are over a billion in debt & now they are spending €1.5 billion on their stadium and they also want to buy Mohammed Salah?
Wha?
@O’Brien Michael: I’ve come to learn that when rich people and teams are in debt it’s not the same as us being in debt. They can always find someone else to lend them more
@O’Brien Michael: They have signed a huge sponsorship deal with Spotify including the naming rights to the Camp Nou. Once they satisfy the Spanish league funding requirements they can sign who they want.
Woe and betide any financial institution that try to foreclose on Barca
@thomas walsh: yes but surely someone at some stage is going to have to say enough is enough.
We are not even talking about being millions in debt we are talking billions now.
Barcelona just defy belief what they are at.
@Diarmuid: how much is the sponsorship deal worth Diarmuid?
@Diarmuid: did the tour of the nou camp about 7-8 years back,cost about 15 euros each at the time. Place was full of people,bus’s and bus’s everywhere.Think it costs about 60 now to do the tour won’t get as many doing it.
@O’Brien Michael: if memory serves me think it’s worth around €300 million over 4 years
@Joe Gorham: Joe I done the tour in summer 2019. Think it was around €30 each well worth. €60 certainly seems a huge increase.
@O’Brien Michael: This is an infrastructural project and the loans will be separate to the current debt to be paid back over 35 years. The idea is that the extra income from the expansion and upgrade will pay off the construction loans.
It’s also not just the stadium. There will also be a new Blaugrana indoor arena, offices, a hotel and a new museum.
@Diarmuid: it does lad I work with just back from Barcelona and he said it’s too dear now to do unless your a barca fan.
Ed Sheeran playing a heap of gigs
Cork county board are project managing the build. Should only cost about 3 Billion
accbank still handing out loans