Pure honesty on display here.
If it’s in the stands, terraces, or debating with friends over a pint, we all air our opinions on the game that we hold so dear.
However, we can often forget the pressure which professional rugby players experience on a day-to-day basis.
It can be so easy to believe that these players, who we often idolise, are invincible, that they are not affected about what is said about them in the various ways in which we consume rugby coverage.
However, this is clearly not the case, as Munster’s Conor Murray reveals in an excellent BBC Sport interview with former Munster and Ireland legend, Keith Wood.
Wood opens the questioning by asking Murray whether he can ever switch off from rugby and if he can truly enjoy it.
Murray reveals that he knows players that are “shadowed by the pressure”.
“It’s something that I’ve consciously worked in my mind to correct or to try and enjoy things a little bit more. Because you see some players that are shadowed by the pressure and I just want to make sure I enjoy it because hopefully on Saturday, running out at Murrayfield in front of packed stadium…to not enjoy that is such a shame,” Murray reveals.Â
Wood covered a number of topics with the Munster and Ireland scrum-half; from dealing with the pressure of being considered the world’s best player in his position to the difficulties he faced early in his career.
Inevitably though, Ireland’s victory over the All Blacks came up.
Murray admits that the victory was the best sporting moment of his life but to gain an even greater appreciation for that win, you must also recognise the frame of mind in which Murray and the rest of the Irish players were in, considering the game came so soon after the tragic passing of Anthony Foley.
“The week felt a bit weird from coming from Munster and Axel’s passing, to jumping into another camp and to have that in your head. It was still a bit weird but from the beginning of the game, from the national anthems to the haka, with the eight and just the emotion that built up in that game…
“You realised that when you were standing in the figure of eight that you could hear the crowd kind of recognise what it was. There was a bit of a roar when the haka was going on and it just felt like a really powerful thing to do and the images are just spine-tingling.
“To put in a performance like that was the best sporting moment of my life.”
Being one of the best scrum-halves in the world undoubtedly comes with a lot of pressure. Murray has to deal with the expectations that he has to perform to a consistently high level in order to guide both Munster and Ireland to victory.
From the way you see Murray speak in this interview, it is clear to see that he is a man who has his feet firmly on the ground and when it comes to the ambitions of Munster and Ireland, they couldn’t ask for a better man to help fulfill these.
