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It’s the Yuletide season, where tradition insists we should all be of
good cheer, but undoubtedly the next week will be more bountiful,
in rugby terms, for some more than for others.
REASONS TO BE CHEERFUL
This evening’s clash of protagonists Ulster and
Connacht continues a long history of Inter-
Provincial battles, but in this inaugural Guinness
PRO12 year the sides have perhaps never
been so well-matched, the fixture never more
unpredictable.
Neil Doak’s squad is emerging from a bruising –
literally and metaphorically – sequence of games
in the league and in the Champions Cup, solidly
positioned in a PRO12 table which is crowded with
genuine challengers. Amongst them is the side
from the West, ‘under new management’ too, with
Pat Lam, of Samoan and Kiwi legend, shaping
a side as rugged and deft as he was in both
hemispheres as a player.
After years of internal IRFU debate as to how
Connacht rugby could best be served – and that,
at one point, seemed to suggest its ‘relegation’
to a development region only – the Province has
emerged as a strong, viable sporting and business
entity. Resources have been strengthened, on
and off the pitch, and after good work by Michael
Bradley and Eric Elwood the coaching and
management structures are forward-looking and
bearing fruit.
Much of the side’s current success as a credible
challenger in the PRO12, and as a real contender
in Europe’s Challenge Cup this season, can be
put down to the impact of Pat Lam’s personality:
the qualities of hard work, commitment, complete
dedication to the cause marked him out as
an outstanding back-rower who never took a
backward step.
Whether as captain of Samoa during three
World Cups, and as an All Black, or playing for
Crusaders with fearsome tackling and ball-
carrying. He’s built a team in Connacht nit unlike
his own image.
He’s used native Western talent more effectively
than most, and he’s recruited well from the
Southern Hemisphere, and the Connacht pack is
no longer one to be taken lightly.
Behind the scrum there is flair aplenty, with
Robbie Henshaw, record try-scorer and skipper
Miah Nikora, free and inventive runners. Lam
demanded that any idea that Connacht would be
the ‘whipping boys’ of Irish rugby be banished,
and there is a confidence and momentum in
a shrewdly-assembled squad which has seen
Leinster, Munster and Ulster put to the sword.
Flanker Faloon, despite serious injury woes, is
highly-rated by his coach and would be happy to
show the Kingspan crowd that at 28 he still has
plenty to offer at representative level.
Over the holiday the four Irish Provinces meet each
other in what are now truly competitive fixtures,
with rich rewards the prize in the league. Those
games come at a vital stage of the rugby year,
at the halfway stage effectively, and advantage
gained in the next few weeks could be key to
the race for a top four finish in the PRO 12, and
coaches will be focussing hard on the five months
ahead and even beyond.
Connacht’s European Challenge Cup campaign
seems likely to yield a quarter-final spot, and
Lam will be aiming for automatic promotion to the
Champions Cup next season.
For Ulster the league is unquestionably the priority
now, though the European challenges in Toulon
and against Leicester in Belfast next month will be
important on several fronts, not least – hopefully
– in seeing returns to action from injury for players
such as Andrew Trimble, Paddy Jackson and Iain
Henderson.
Ulster supporters can look to 2015 with some
confidence despite recent reverses in the
Champions Cup, for with a full, fit squad there are
few better-resourced squads in Europe. Doak,
Jonny Bell, Allen Clarke and Niall Malone have not
used injuries as excuses for some disappointing
results, but with a ‘full deck’ the coaching team will
expect and prepare for a storming few months.
Summer recruits Franco van der Merwe, Wiehahn
Herbst and Louis Ludik have quickly shown their
pedigree and they will be key figures in the first
months of the New Year as Ireland collects its
Ulster contingent for a protracted Six Nations
programme. But with Ruan Pienaar back and
determined to make up for sadly lost injury time in
the autumn, the omens are good.
At this juncture in the calendar it’s normal to
reflect, and for Ulster few can deny that it has been
a year of some change, a wonderful new stadium,
surprises and, yes, tumult. But the club is now
such a successful playing and business entity that
it can, and has, absorbed the comings and not
insignificant goings, the injury plague and other
unforeseen challenges.
So, be of good cheer indeed, it is
a season to be very merry – and to be
optimistic about Ulster Rugby, its
players and those responsible for
polishing and sustaining one of
the Province’s sporting jewels.
The call for 2015? Bring it on!
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ULSTER
RUGBY
www.ulsterrugby.comROD NAWN