LEINSTER’S DARRAGH FANNING has said the team can’t be getting too fixated with their mouth-watering Pro12 clash against Munster in two weeks’ time.
The much-anticipated game will be played at the Aviva Stadium, but Fanning has said Leinster can’t afford to overlook their upcoming clash with Cardiff.
“For us as a squad, we can only focus on this week. We can’t win the Munster match this week. We just have to focus on beating Cardiff, because if we focus on Munster, Cardiff will come and do a job on us.
“Our focus is purely based on Cardiff, but of course, we want to come off the back of a win. We want to be in good form going into the Munster match, because it’s going to be huge for us.
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“There’ll be no hiding at the Aviva. It’s a massive derby. There’s a huge amount of tickets sold already.”
“You can’t come away from a defeat like that and not look at it,” he says. “You have to learn something from it. It was a tough review this morning. It’s going to be a long week building into the weekend.
“There is a lot of things we have to fix, but in the first 20 minutes, I thought we were very good. We got really comfortable. Our set piece was going well. We were attacking well. They were getting a few lucky chances. They broke the line of defence once or twice and hit the man. On any other night, we might have finished the opportunity.
“We had two good chances with the TMO decisions that went against us. At half-time at 9-3, I still felt comfortable, but I thought our accuracy in the second half let us down. They got one chance and took that one chance. There was lots said about stats and ball percentage, but at the end of the day, the only important stat is the result and they won.”
Fanning also paid tribute to Connacht, who are still unbeaten in the Guinness Pro12 after last week’s win.
“They played dangerous rugby but it paid off in the end. You can’t knock Connacht. They’re progressing massively. They’ve got a lot of confidence and have a good few players to add to the squad as well.
“Looking back, it was just accuracy in the second half that killed us. With that scrum at the end, I thought if we win a penalty here, Jimmy [Gopperth] might knock it over or Mads might knock it over. But again, we let ourselves down — we had plenty of chances and plenty of ball.”
As for their next opponents, Fanning says there is little chance of Leinster underestimating the Welsh side despite their somewhat disappointing start to the campaign.
“Cardiff are a good team. They put five tries past Zebre. Then they lost to Glasgow — we already learned how good a team they are. Then they lost to Ulster but they were in it at half-time in both their last losses. It could have gone either way. But it’s one lapse in concentration like at the weekend — the intercept killed them. Hopefully we come out the right side at the weekend.”
Darragh Fanning: 'We can't win the Munster match this week'
LEINSTER’S DARRAGH FANNING has said the team can’t be getting too fixated with their mouth-watering Pro12 clash against Munster in two weeks’ time.
The much-anticipated game will be played at the Aviva Stadium, but Fanning has said Leinster can’t afford to overlook their upcoming clash with Cardiff.
“For us as a squad, we can only focus on this week. We can’t win the Munster match this week. We just have to focus on beating Cardiff, because if we focus on Munster, Cardiff will come and do a job on us.
“Our focus is purely based on Cardiff, but of course, we want to come off the back of a win. We want to be in good form going into the Munster match, because it’s going to be huge for us.
“There’ll be no hiding at the Aviva. It’s a massive derby. There’s a huge amount of tickets sold already.”
And before Cardiff, Matt O’Connor’s side will be addressing some of the problems evident in their loss to Connacht last Friday.
“There is a lot of things we have to fix, but in the first 20 minutes, I thought we were very good. We got really comfortable. Our set piece was going well. We were attacking well. They were getting a few lucky chances. They broke the line of defence once or twice and hit the man. On any other night, we might have finished the opportunity.
Fanning also paid tribute to Connacht, who are still unbeaten in the Guinness Pro12 after last week’s win.
“They played dangerous rugby but it paid off in the end. You can’t knock Connacht. They’re progressing massively. They’ve got a lot of confidence and have a good few players to add to the squad as well.
As for their next opponents, Fanning says there is little chance of Leinster underestimating the Welsh side despite their somewhat disappointing start to the campaign.
“Cardiff are a good team. They put five tries past Zebre. Then they lost to Glasgow — we already learned how good a team they are. Then they lost to Ulster but they were in it at half-time in both their last losses. It could have gone either way. But it’s one lapse in concentration like at the weekend — the intercept killed them. Hopefully we come out the right side at the weekend.”
- Audio courtesy of 98FM.
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