Connacht travel to Murrayfield this Friday looking for a rare away win in the Magners League when they take on Edinburgh in the national stadium at 7:30pm. Michael Bradley’s men have suffered a number of narrow defeats in recent rounds and are currently 11 points adrift at the bottom of the table.
That predicament leaves them needing to secure their first victory in Scotland’s capital for over four years if they are to keep in touch with the rest of the field. Captain John Muldoon is fully aware of the challenge facing the westerners.
“Edinburgh are a quality team, they supplied 17 internationals to the Scottish set up this year and all those players are returning off the back of five tough Six Nations games. The have possibly the starting nine for the lions in Mike Blair and have the core of the highly respected Scottish pack to choose from. We are fully aware what to expect.”
Connacht lost 27-14 to Edinburgh at home back in October having conceded three tries to their opponents in a shocking opening half. “I think the one big disappointment for our home form this season was the defeat to Edinburgh. In all our other games this season, we have been extremely hard to beat but against Edinburgh in that first half we really let ourselves down and didn’t perform at all. That is at the forefront of our thoughts this week.”
Rugby is on a high this week following Ireland’s Grand Slam success in Cardiff and with the European Challenge Cup and Heineken Cup quarter finals on the horizon for Connacht, Leinster and Munster the profile of the game is set to remain in the limelight. Muldoon is feeling positive about the game’s future and the knockon effect the victory will have.
“It is obviously a major boost to the game in the whole country at all levels. Even on Sunday I was in town and you could see Connacht jerseys everywhere. People are really enjoying watching and following rugby all over the country and hopefully we can tap into that in Connacht.
“When you’re a kid,” continues Muldoon, “you are very impressionable and stuff you see on television can really inspire you. A lot of young people in Ireland will be eager to emulate their heroes on the Irish team and hopefully that will lead to more of them taking up the game.”
In many ways Ireland’s plight mirrors that of Connacht as the fourth province has been chasing its holy grail of Heineken Cup qualification for six years now under the current management and falling short time and time again. The persistence might yet pay off.
“On another level the team is a great example to us here in Connacht as they just kept believing and refused to give up when year after year they were falling just short of the ultimate prize. For Connacht it is a similar scenario and we can’t let recent late set backs in games get us down. We are playing well at the moment and will look to make that count in Scotland on Friday.”
The forthcoming busy period of games is a welcome change for all involved in the squad.
“I think as a professional you want to be on the pitch as much as possible. We have had a couple of good hard weeks training during the off periods and Kevin and Greg, our fitness advisors, have really pushed us to the limit in that period.
“I think overall our form has been consistently good since Christmas but there is no hiding from the fact that we haven’t turned that into victories. We had a good chance to beat the Ospreys away and we simply should have beaten the Scarlets and Cardiff at home. That is hard to take but in recent months we have been putting ourselves in position to win game after game and we just need to keep doing that.”
