Magnificent westerners crown great season with fairytale win

Connacht 20

Leinster 10

THE audacity of it all. The rugby team that represents the province of Connacht are now PRO12 champions after a campaign where they made a mockery of conventional wisdom in every conceivable way and a mesmerising performance in this final that neatly encapsulated the ambition and talent underpinning all that had gone before.

At a sun drenched Murrayfield on Saturday, the masterplan reached fruition and the heroes in green scorched Leinster with three never to be forgotten tries and 80 minutes of uncompromising, unyielding and uninhibited rugby. The perfect day.

Yet this match report can’t do the afternoon justice by merely covering the 80 minutes of rugby on the field. This game started at 4:10, not 5:30. It started when the Connacht team bus turned off Roseburn Street and in through the gates of Murrayfield. Players and management immediately spotted the sea of green that was there to greet them. ‘Game on’, the must have thought.

The bus pulled up outside the west stand entrance and thousands of supporters in green bellowed out the loudest and most haunting rendition of the Fields of Athenry one is ever likely to hear as the team got off the bus and walked in. Pat Lam led the way, briefly turning around to take it all in, looking up on the packed steps and balconies all around that had provided a natural amphitheatre to the whole scene.

Afterwards, Lam spoke of the emotion in the Connacht dressing room after that welcome and his belief that it would only bring a positive reaction. The notion of hype or pressure from your own fans affecting performance has always been a ridiculous one and the novice finalists from the western province underlined as much by conjuring up a performance that has had the rugby world talking ever since.

The winning of the game came in the first half hour, Connacht withstood some early testers as Jamie Heaslip and Leinster came out with a fire and brimstone effort. However, the men in white were repelled and repeatedly disrupted by the westerners in the first ten minutes. Tom McCartney, Ultan Dillane and Eoin McKeon notched up some huge tackles during that period.

Such tackles allowed Connacht time to get to grips with the breakdown area where they initially seemed to be on the back foot and where Eoin Reddan seemed to have the time to move the ball quickly. He would play second fiddle to Kieron Marmion from that point forward. It was a testing period but not one for panic and the early signs were good on that front.

The first attacking spark from Connacht came appropriately from a brilliant break out of the 22, ambition and skill combined with AJ MacGinty’s brilliant pass releasing winger Matt Healy deep inside his own half. The kick and chase from the prolific try scorer had Leinster scrambling and led to a 90 metre gain. While Connacht didn’t score at that point, the tone was set, this was going to be a day of high octane rugby and Leinster had better be ready. They weren’t.

For more, read this week’s Galway City Tribune.