KANE DOUGLAS HAS returned home to Australia after agreeing a three-year deal with Queensland Reds.
The 26-year-old second row joined Leinster in May 2014 but failed to settle in Ireland and endured a difficult campaign under Matt O’Connor.
Having played 20 times for the province, Douglas was released from his contract last week despite having two years remaining after the Australian Rugby Union paid suitable a compensation package — believed to be between €150,000 and €200,000.
“I’m very grateful to the ARU and QRU for giving me the opportunity to return home to Australia to continue my Rugby career in Queensland,“ said Douglas.
“It’s a really exciting time here for the game and I’m looking forward to being a part of it over the next few years.
It’s great to see the Wallabies build some depth across the park over the past 12 months, especially at lock, and I’ll be working hard to fight my way back into contention.”
Douglas will now compete for a place in Australia’s World Cup squad and head coach Michael Cheika is delighted to have him available.
“It’s great to see Kane back playing his rugby in Australia for the long term,” said Cheika.
“His return will bolster our tight five stocks and that is a strong objective of ours over the next 18 months.”
No loss. He was useless for Leinster and a bad buy. One cheap punch from behind on O’ Connell is all you’d remember him for .
leinster are really stuck for second rows now
Is Ryan Caldwell out of contract for Exeter Chiefs? Irish qualified, experienced & available – could be well worth a punt to bolster options..
He was such an bad buy, time for the academy lads to stand up and make a claim
The best academy player coming through was Ben Marshall and we let him go.
The two problem positions we have are scrum half and secondrow and we let cooney and Douglas go.
Somewhere someone has to ask if Leinster are interested in this season at all.
It does look like Leinster are just holding until the RWC is over.
Good Bye.. he was a poor addition to the squad
I’d love to see ringrose play a game beside Darcy as he’d learn as much in that game as he would in 10 games beside say Noel Reid or madigan.
Strangely enough Leinster have brought through plenty of young forwards over the last two seasons but there was a 25 year old age restriction on backs.
Leo Cullen to come out of retirement? If Isa Nacewa can make a comeback he can surely slot in for a bench game or two in the league.
Leinster need a big favour from joe. The best chance they have is if he doesn’t bring too many Leinster players to the World Cup.
Players like McFadden, Dave Kearney, madigan, Fitzgerald, Murphy, McCarthy, bent, Strauss, Darcy, furlong and boss all could go to the World Cup or all of them could stay at home.
That’s an 11 player swing. I guess about 7 of those will travel, I’d say Leo is saying his prayers twice a day
C’mon Chris, would you? Do you seriously want Boss back to keep Luke McGrath on the bench? We should be blooding our young fellahs sooner. Andre Pollard went last year from the U20 WC straight in as Bok outhalf and he’s flourishing. Garry Ringrose has trained with the Irish squad under Joe. When, ffs, is he gonna get a start for the Leinster Senior Team? With MO’C gone and Girve on the coaching ticket, the main thing I wanna see is greater use of our Academy. That’s what we have it for!!!!!!
In fairness Pollard is a freakishly talented player, but more importantly is physically ready for the top level. Ringrose, and most other u20 players around the world, whilst very talented, are not physically ready for pro rugby.
I’d have Luke McGrath as first anyway, my point is the World Cup squad could leave Leinster without any cover at all. A few established players would be of great help otherwise when the internationals come back we will have 2 different teams and that’s much better.
Pollard’s not the only one – Springbok RWC squad: Jesse Kriel – 21 years of age. Jan Serfontein – 20 years of age. Why do our fellahs have to be nearly always into the middle of their 20s before they get trusted in the big games? Say what you like about Warren Gatland, but except for him Brian O’Driscoll would probably not have gotten his first cap at 20 and look how that panned out!!!!!!!!!!!!!
I know, Chris, and I agree with you. Still with the academy we have, we should be able to provide the bulk of the Irish team and still obliterate any team that comes our way in the PRO 12. Anything less than that and we’d be conceding that MO’C had a point with all his moaning.
@Riocard It’s not that simple. 1. The players you mentioned are physically ready. 2. South Africa has not produced as much talent as normal in the last ~5 years, meaning they’ve been ever more reliant on aging stars. As soon as good young (physically capable) players came through they are/were desperately needed. 3. Ireland have brought through some players at a young age; Henderson, Jackson, Ruddock, Fitzgerald (off the top of my head). However they were physically ready. The vast majority aren’t at that age. The key point being Ireland doesn’t produce as many big lads as the saffers. You can have lots of talent but if you’re too small you are less likely to break through aged 20. It takes more time for the Irish guys to build up that strength level. Now if you want to bemoan that point please do, but we haven’t not brought through a bunch of u20s due to some innate conservatism
The points you make, Eoin, are valid – no question. My point about giving young players a chance had more to do with Leinster, rather than Ireland. The fact that Joe even had Ringrose training with the senior squad shows that he’s prepared to bring on new talent. Unfortunately in the last two seasons this wasn’t the case certainly with the Leinster backs. How much gain time has Ringrose got with the Senior team in blue? If he played for them at all it was so insignificant I nearly can’t remember. Oh yeah, I think he got a run out after we missed the Pro 12 play-offs. Big deal in Dodge.
Not so much innate conservatism as coaches with a lack of confidence in developing youth opportunity. Younger players need a run of games to find their feet but do they really get that filling in from the bench? The strangest thing about the MOC tenure was that in trying to change the style of play he did not give more opportunity to the group of players most readily open to his ideas?
I agree Leinsyer have been quite poor at bringing through young players over the last two seasons. But I don’t think Ringrose is a good example. He hasn’t looked physically up to pro rugby – until hopefully now. I hope he spent a lot of time in the gym. He was brought into a training squad by Joe, but so were many young players purely for the experience and to see how the top players train. He wasn’t dominating players physically at under age level, he was using his great skill and pace. I expect we will see a good bit of him in the year to come.