ANDY FRIEND SAID that Connacht are heading to Paris at the weekend looking for victory over Stade Francais on Sunday regardless of whether or not by then they have qualified for the knockout stages of the Champions Cup for the first time.
Connacht will qualify automatically on Friday night unless Castres produce an astonishing result and get a bonus point win away to English champions Harlequins, but Friend said they are going for the win in any event and want to bounce back from the disappointing late loss to Leicester Tigers last weekend.
And with top try scorer Mack Hansen set to return from injury to belatedly make his Champions Cup debut, Friend said they may freshen up the side.
“Where we’re fortunate as a team is that we’ve got some real depth of players who haven’t been playing, so I’ve no doubt that we’ve got some new faces there but at the same time it’s a really important game for us because in Europe at the moment we’re one from three, and who knows what’s going to happen with Castres,” said Friend.
“All we know is we have to turn up to Paris on Sunday, we need to play our best brand of rugby and if we do that and we put out a really good performance I truly believe we can win and that’s all we’re going to focus on.
“We’re going to pick a team for a 4G pitch, we’re going to need to be fast and be stronger in our set-piece, we need to pick a team that can express that and show that. You may well see a few new faces in there.”
He said the whole squad was itching to get back out and get the Leicester loss, when they blew an 18-point lead and got caught in the final play to lose 29-28 having recovered from 10-0 early on, out of their system.
“I know our start the other day wasn’t what we needed or planned for, but I felt the way we rallied was very good and again, going into this weekend, we know that performance is really important for us so really regardless of what happens we Castres, we know we have to put out a good performance.
“I actually don’t want us to be a team that…okay, we want to get out of the pool and into the knock-out stages, but I’d much prefer to do that knowing that we went two wins out of four and picked up two or three bonus points out of the other two games, I’d be really proud of that.
“I’d still be proud that we got in, but I don’t want us to be a team that limps in. I want us to be a team that gets in on our own merit, and all the boys would be the same,” added Friend.
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