“Kick it. KICK IT!!!” Pat Lam has been hearing that ever since he arrived in Galway.
He won the league with Connacht and got them back in the European Cup. All of it by taking a cut and delivering daring, running rugby.
Still, 15 minutes to go and still five points down to Toulouse, Lam heard it again. Connacht were awarded a penalty in their own 22 and decided to quick tap and run it.
Kieran Marmion made ground, so did Craig Ronaldson but Andrew Browne was left isolated and Toulouse turned the ball over just inside the Connacht 10-metre line.
Your emotions would be shredded.
Connacht refused to panic. They dug in and wrenched the ball back. Then they ran it out of their half. Again and again. They were relentless.
People keep saying Connacht can’t get away with this sort of hectic, haywire rugby but they back themselves to bring it to the opposition and bring it harder; for longer.
Never in doubt 😬😬@connachtrugby, we salute you!
23-21 win over Toulouse! pic.twitter.com/Zh3dfxLWV4
— SportsJOE (@SportsJOEdotie) October 15, 2016
Toulouse could not cope. They had led 9-0 and 21-11 but they could not kill the westerners off. It helped that Sebastien Bezy’s kicking fell off a cliff but Connacht can just as easily point to Jack Carty’s misses off the tee.
Bundee Aki and Craig Ronaldson – final try-scorer and conversion kicker – will get a lot of the plaudits but so many players shone. Cian Kelleher and Tiernan O’Halloran blitzed the French giants up the flanks, Browne was huge, Finlay Bealham bristled with menacing intent and Jake Heenan was a pain in the hole for the opposition.
MoM @bundeeaki12 in #CONvTOU tonight! 17 carries, 75 metres, 5 offloads, 6 defenders beaten & the match winning try! https://t.co/za2oxcMyJt
— Sky Sports Rugby ? (@SkySportsRugby) October 15, 2016
They kept probing, taking darts, throwing cut-out passes and offloading to the next man out. 17 offloads? Insane.
The most exciting thing about Connacht is that they are not perfect yet. They never will be perfect and they are comfortable with that. It is part of what makes them so hard to beat. They don’t get themselves too down when they fall behind. There is an innate trust in what Lam has instilled in the squad.
And so they take the ball into their clutches and have a go.
They go away to Zebre next weekend and should do a number on them. They are a different side from the one that trailed to the Italians, last month, before being rescued by a hellacious downpour.
We may yet look back at that postponed game as the turning point for Lam’s men. They are back winning league games and have got off to the perfect start in Europe.
Their aim is the knock-out stages and after that, who knows. Who knows? That is the beauty of it.
Connacht are here off their own toiling steam. Anything is possible.
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