BYRON RALSTON IS rediscovering his past as he embarks on something new. The grandson of a Letterkenny emigrant, he has returned to Ireland’s west coast with a mission, not just to learn about a woman who left Donegal for Australia, but also to learn something about himself.
At 22, Connacht’s new centre has plenty to prove. Then again, you could say that about just about every player who landed in Galway. You don’t get Richie McCaws or Dan Carters spending their peak years at The Sportsground. What you do get are raw diamonds waiting to be polished.
Is that Ralston? The truth is it’s too early to say. He’s enjoyed a taste of first-team action with Andy Friend’s team, equipping himself well in defence across the last three matches, when Connacht have restricted Scarlets, Leinster and Munster to just three tries.
He talks about the responsibility of being ‘captain of the defence’; a new boy forced to find his voice and bark instructions to internationals on his left and right. “I came over here because I wanted to become an international 13,” Ralston said. “That is one of my goals. That is the challenge that is ahead of me.”
Eligible to play for Ireland, he has swapped Perth, where the temperatures average 18 degrees in winter, for Galway, where, it’s fair to say, it rains a little more often ‘and at a horizontal angle’.
“It has taken a bit of getting used to because I grew up playing in the sun, with the ball being dry, but that is the weather we are blessed with here in the west of Ireland and it is a home-town advantage because when the Scarlets came here last Friday night, you could sense they didn’t want to play in conditions like that. And for us, that is our edge, our extra one per cent.
“Put it this way, if our fans can stand out there in the rain, then we can certainly play in it.”
Prior to leaving the Western Force for Connacht, Ralston used his contacts to get in contact with the Australian-born players in Friend’s panel, John Porch, Mack Hansen and Jarrad Butler. What is it like there, he asked.
The weather got mentioned, yes. But so did something else.
That this club doubles up as a place of therapy, where guys who’ve had one setback or another have the facility to bounce back. Hansen, in many respects, is the poster boy for this collective story of career rehabilitation.
Ralston, though, steers away from the Hansen comparison, noting how well his friend has played since arriving into Galway a year ago, but pointing out he wants to write his own story.
“Living in the west of Ireland, it breeds a tough character. I have certainly grasped that from being around the place. We were blessed that we actually spent those first few games of this season on the road with each other and although it was hard not to be winning (they lost away to Ulster, Stormers and Bulls in their first three games), it was also good that we were together. It was a case of roll your sleeves up, we’ve all got to get ourselves out of this situation.
“Living here in the west, a lot of boys in the Connacht squad aren’t from the region, so on our days off we are all together. We are not going off with separate friendship groups outside of rugby. We are all in it together. It is like a brotherhood, it is amazing.”
Results, so far, haven’t been amazing, four defeats from six.
But there is hope. Two of the last three matches ended in Connacht victories. Better again, their fixture list is lopsided.
Yes, their opening series of games were difficult but it gets easier from here on in. And should they defeat Ospreys tomorrow and improve their record to three wins out of seven, then hopes of an end of season play-off will increase significantly.
It’s just that kind of crossroads game.
“We have to dig in, aim to get five points. Then after our break, we will be targeting the interpros.”
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