TADHG FURLONG WAS satisfied with his contribution in last weekend’s draw with Wales but the Leinster tight-head prop knows there’s a long road ahead if he’s to become a regular fixture in the Ireland front row.
Furlong played the final 16 minutes of Sunday’s Six Nations opener at the Aviva Stadium after being introduced from the bench to replace Nathan White.
The 23-year-old did his cause no harm whatsoever as he put in a relatively brief but bruising defensive shift at a vital stage in the game.
“[Last] weekend I was happy,” said Furlong. “We were defending for a lot of the time I was on the park. You just try to get through a workload, fit into the system and do your job.”
Furlong showed his composure and handling skills when he released the ball to CJ Stander from a ruck just in front of Ireland’s line. That helped the Wexford native to ease his way into his first taste of Six Nations action.
“I suppose I would have been nervous if it had been a 15-metre pass, but I was lucky that CJ was only about two metres away. That settled me down a small bit. I suppose it’s something I’ve been comfortable with,” Furlong said.
“I did a lot of skills, underage systems, through the youths and clubs, and into that Leinster sub-academy/academy. We would have been doing the same amount of skills as backs or back-rowers or whatever, so I’d be comfortable passing the ball.
If I was asked to stand in at scrum-half and pass that two-metre pass, that’s not a problem.”
With his Leinster team-mates Mike Ross and Marty Moore currently both unavailable to Ireland due to injuries, Furlong is aiming to make hay while the sun shines. Easier said than done, however, in a particularly competitive area of Joe Schmidt’s team.
“You can’t really focus on it. You focus on what’s ahead of you,” Furlong insisted. “There’s still Mike Ross, Marty, myself and Michael Bent at Leinster for the rest of the season.
“I don’t think I want to gauge myself and say, ‘Next year I will be fighting for the number one spot’. This year, after the Six Nations, you want to go back and make it your spot going forward.”
Furlong added: “The two Welsh props that were starting for Wales at the weekend, Samson [Lee] and Rob [Evans], are both in my age group — in their 20s — so is the landscape changing in terms of blooding front-rows earlier? I don’t know.
“But if you would have said to me a few years ago, just after that [Under] 20s World Cup, that the three of us were in, that we’d be going to the World Cup and playing our first Six Nations game at the weekend, I would have felt it hard to believe you.
“But that’s the way sport is. You get your chance and you have to take it. I suppose getting your chance last weekend, it only tries to spur you on now and make you more determined to keep getting to that level and keep playing to that level.”
Should Furlong make an appearance against France in Paris on Saturday, he’s likely to come up against the impressively mobile Eddy Ben Arous. The Racing Metro man, who made his first international start against Ireland during last year’s Six Nations, is fast establishing himself as one of the most effective loose-head props in the game.
“Yeah, he’s dangerous and he’s lively. He has a wicked step on him and a good hand-off, very dangerous over the ball, and he’s lightening quick,” Furlong explained.
“He’s a really good athlete for a loose-head. I suppose he goes against that general prop mode. There doesn’t look like there’s a pick on him. At scrum-time he’s very dangerous. He’s obviously very explosive and he’s a big man, so yeah, he’s definitely up there.”
As for the type of test that can be expected from Ben Arous at the scrum, Furlong said:
“From what I’ve seen, and I can only judge it on the one game last weekend [against Italy] which they had, he stayed pretty square. They’ve a big angle coming across from their tight-head (Rabah) Slimani, and he’s very good, so we have to try and work to negate that.
We always try to scrummage the same every week and that’s really square and straight, and try to get a good stable platform within the rules. So it’s no different this weekend.”
Furlong is hoping to play in Paris for Ireland for the first time this weekend. However, he’s looking ahead to the Stade de France encounter with enthusiasm, not fear.
“We’re all very excited going over and the challenge that’s ahead,” he said. “I’m sure they’ll be ready to rock in Paris when we come there. Look, there’s not that fear, there’s just excitement, getting ready to go out there and perform.”
Furlong now has four Ireland caps to his name but he’s still waiting on his first start. If it comes on Saturday he’ll relish the opportunity. If not, he’ll be ready nevertheless to make another positive contribution to Ireland’s bid to win a third consecutive Six Nations title.
“Obviously I’d love to start for my country. If I’m given a shot or not, that’s another option, I don’t know. All I can focus on is every minute that I’m on the pitch that I put my foot forward as best I can.”
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