YOU know what you’re going to get from visiting French teams in European competitions: predictably, they’ll be unpredictable. The French don’t like travelling and often prefer focusing on domestic competitions. So, who knows what sort of a team Bayonne will send to the Sportsground tomorrow Saturday (5pm) for this pool two, round three, Challenge Cup clash; or what mood they’ll be in?
And to put it bluntly, who cares? In the overall scheme of things, nothing of significance is at stake.
That won’t deter the crowds from packing into College Road – European matches are special, fans go for a night out, the atmosphere, and occasion, as much as they do for the rugby.
It won’t change the mindset of the Connacht players, either.
In fact, head coach Pat Lam has hinted that he will name a weakened starting 15 today (Friday) at noon, and so the fringe players have a chance to stake their claim for the trio of upcoming Christmas inter-provincials.
Those games – away to Leinster (Dec 19), away to Ulster (Dec 26) and home to Munster (Jan 1) – could define Connacht’s season. They’re obviously the target.
Back-to-back games with Bayonne, in a competition that even if Connacht win, will not bring them qualification for the European Champions Cup, is a bit of a distraction.
The players that do pull on the Connacht jersey, certainly don’t want to be the first to lose this season at Fortress Sportsground.
But in GAA parlance, this isn’t even the National Football League – it’s the equivalent of the Galway hurlers in the Walsh Cup or the footballers in the FBD League in January.
Lam again confirmed that the league is the priority but he said they have to “park” the Pro 12 for a fortnight, and concentrate on beating Bayonne. You’d expect nothing less from professionals.
“Our pool is one in which all four teams are alive. So it’s an important game. Everyone has won one and lost one,” said Lam, who was pleased with how his charges responded to falling eight points behind against Scarlets on Saturday, after an error ridden start.
“When guys don’t execute right, it’s not the end of the world. We try to encourage not to get into a false sense of ‘Oh that was rubbish’. It just happens someone dropped the ball or someone didn’t quite do it. Keep your heads up and move onto the next thing. We missed our kick-off, we gave away a penalty, three-nil, we missed a high ball, and all of a sudden we’re eight-nil.
“Probably the pleasing thing for the guys on the field was . . . instead of going ‘Oh, what’s going on’ and panicking, we just made a couple of errors, we’re down eight but let’s just get back to the job,” he said of his side’s transformation, which saw them fend off the Welsh, 14-8, to cement sixth place in the league, with an assured, cool comeback.
For more, read this week’s Galway City Tribune.
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