LEINSTER’S NEW SIGNING Ben Te’o has been on a crash course of breakdown lessons over three weeks since his arrival into Ireland and rugby union.
Tomorrow, he’ll finally get a chance to vent all that pent-up enthusiasm when Edinburgh visit the RDS.
Nobody will be expecting the eastern province’s new number 13 to be as refined and effective on the ground as the former owner of the jersey. So when it comes to clear-out time the Auckland-born Samoan international has been receiving straightforward orders.
“The breakdown is about hitting people, and he understands how to hit people,” head coach Matt O’Connor said today.
“He described it to me as ‘a free shot’. So I can only see it as positive if that’s the way you approach the breakdown. There’s no decisions to be made, you just whack the bloke who’s near the ball as hard as you can.”
As Kevin McLaughlin, who captains his province at the RDS tomorrow, points out though: The NRL champion still needs the odd prompt about when that ‘free shot’ is needed.
“He’s adjusting well,” said the blindside. “From time to time the guys beside him will have to give him a little nudge to go to ruck or what exactly his role his – I think in league there aren’t nearly as many plays.
“But he’s along side Jimmy [Gopperth] and Noel Reid and Zane [Kirchner]. Really experienced guys can help him. It’s bit different to forwards where you have to learn all then set-piece stuff as well as the plays. He’s adapting very quickly.”
When the ball is not on the ground, Te’o will be much closer to his comfort zone. Carrying, tackling and offloading are skills that the ex-Rabbitoh can bring in spades to the Leinster setup. And O’Connor is looking forward to seeing how the opposition react to the man he describes simply as a “105 kilo Samoan.”
‘Scare the life out of the opposition’
“The physical attributes that he has in relation to impact with and without the ball is a little bit different,” the Australian responded when asked to describe the contrast with O’Driscoll that Leinster fans can look forward to.
“His ability to dominate the gain-line and scare the life out of the opposition when they’ve got the ball is a bit different. I don’t think we’ll see quite the guile and the silkiness out of Ben in the short-term, but the way the game’s gone – and the way it’s going – you need to have that ability to get over the gain-line in the backline.
“From that end, it gives you platform to play off. Hopefully in the short term Ben can live off those things and grow his knowledge of the game and from that end, we can then manufacture a game and a skill-set around those natural attributes that he has.”
