JACK CONAN STOPS himself short while discussing a Leinster defeat to Munster in which he played no role.
“Probably one of the worst performances… I don’t want to be dogging the lads, ’cause I wasn’t playing,” Conan says on a video call from Ireland’s Chicago base.
“We even spoke about it last week in Leinster: you’ve got to make it happen. Just ’cause we show up on the day doesn’t mean we’re going to be right, physically or mentally, so you’ve got to get yourself to that space — whatever that means for you — come game
day. We just didn’t show up on the day.
“I think it’s a good lesson in that [there are] no excuses: other teams are going to pitch up with the right mentality and we need to match them and surpass them at everything else.”
This, Conan suggests, applies to an out-of-practice Ireland side just the same as it did to a Leinster team jampacked with internationals and Lions at Croke Park last Saturday.
Conan and fellow Ireland international Tommy O’Brien were late withdrawals from Leo Cullen’s matchday squad at GAA HQ with minor injuries. Both will be fit to face New Zealand at Soldier Field in two Saturdays’ time.
Conan slipped at home on the eve of the season’s first interpro and required a scan on his knee, but he reckons he was only a day or two away from being sufficiently fit to face Munster.
As such, Ireland’s Chicago showdown with the All Blacks will, in the likelihood that he is selected in Andy Farrell’s back row, make for Conan’s first appearance since the Lions’ third test in Australia in early August.
That 18 Irish players ultimately wound up joining Farrell’s party should be a source of pride for rugby in this country. After the pride, though, typically comes the fall: perhaps we saw the consequences of a draining tour at Croke Park last Saturday, where several of Leinster’s frontline internationals were outshone by their snarling opposite numbers from Munster.
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Conan, however, picks out a man who wore red last Saturday as the perfect refutation to the concept of a post-Lions hangover.
“I don’t think anyone has said that Tadhg Beirne had a Lions malaise, if that’s how you put it,” he says of Munster’s captain. “Looking at him over the weekend, he was fantastic.
“Obviously, things didn’t go right for the Leinster lads against Munster the other day but there were still some good performances in there and it’s not something that’s on anyone’s mind.
“I don’t think it’s a thing myself. I suppose I was very conscious after the season last year that I’d obviously been on the go for a long time. I think including rehab and whatever else, I was on the go 14 months in a row, so I was conscious of taking enough time to get my body right and switch off and recover and mentally give yourself a bit of space before getting back at it.
“I think I have enough experience, now, at this stage to just be able to flop back in and pick up where I left off.
You just have to get over yourself a little bit.
“You can’t dwell on these things or make them to be more than they are,” Conan adds. “It’s unacceptable in this environment to have any excuse to not perform well.”
Ireland’s Chicago meeting with the All Blacks on 1 November has been marketed as ‘The Rematch’ to Ireland’s first ever victory over New Zealand at Soldier Field in 2016.
Conan, then 24, had yet to establish himself as a test player: he debuted for Ireland during a World Cup warm-up victory over Scotland in 2015 but didn’t earn his second cap until the 2017 summer tour of America and Japan.
His memories of his exact surrounds for Ireland’s landmark win over New Zealand in November 2016 are a touch hazy. Far clearer in his mind are the roles of his Leinster teammates on what was a seismic day for Irish rugby in the Windy City.
“I watched it on one of the lad’s phones,” Conan says. “We played Zebre that day, over there (in Parma), and we watched it on the way back. I think that’s what happened. I’ve convinced myself that’s what happened: sitting on the airport floor on the way back from a game.
“A few of the lads that I would have started out with at Leinster were playing. Garry was on the bench for us (Ireland), first cap, didn’t get on. But Tadhg [Furlong] was there, Josh [van der Flier] came off the bench, Robbie [Henshaw] was playing 12.
“They’ve very fond memories from that week. My memory from that week was just beating Zebre, 12-0 or something like that, so not exactly a classic performance — but anyway!” (Conan actually scored a try in a 33-10 Leinster win).
A lot of water has passed under the bridge between the 2016 original and what will be, in reality, the 10th ‘rematch’ on Saturday week. New Zealand lead 5-4 in the years since and have undeniably regained the upper hand in this modern-day rivalry.
Their World Cup quarter-final victory over Ireland in 2023 — the last game in which Conan faced the All Blacks — has not been near the forefront of Conan’s mind, he says, but will always remain at the back of it as “one of those moments you never really get over”. The All Blacks’ 23-13 success in Dublin last November, meanwhile, felt like a turning of the tide.
Whatever about theoretical Lions hangovers, indisputable is the fact that the All Blacks should be sharper than Ireland as they head to Europe fresh off a Rugby Championship campaign in which they finished second to South Africa only on points difference. Most of Ireland’s matchday 23, meanwhile, will have had only an underwhelming performance against Munster under their legs when they stare down the haka on Saturday week.
New Zealand have their own complications, certainly: that former Munster man, assistant coach Jason Holland, has decided to leave Scott Robertson’s coaching setup at the end of this tour based on “a gut feeling” doesn’t sound especially auspicious. But that New Zealand are seven-point favourites to earn a third-straight victory over Ireland provides at least a snapshot as to the shape in which these sides are believed to be.
Conan, though, dismisses offhand any caveats or concerns on Ireland’s side of the equation. More than a week reconnecting in Chicago, he reckons, should see them right.
“We’ve had success before: you think of November 2021, where I know we played Japan the week before, but that was our first game together and then we played them (New Zealand) the week after that and we had success that day.
“No excuses, y’know what I mean?
“It’s great to be over here this weekend to have the time to train together without the distraction of travel and all that, and prep really well for next week.
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'I don't think anyone has said that Tadhg Beirne had a Lions malaise'
JACK CONAN STOPS himself short while discussing a Leinster defeat to Munster in which he played no role.
“Probably one of the worst performances… I don’t want to be dogging the lads, ’cause I wasn’t playing,” Conan says on a video call from Ireland’s Chicago base.
“We even spoke about it last week in Leinster: you’ve got to make it happen. Just ’cause we show up on the day doesn’t mean we’re going to be right, physically or mentally, so you’ve got to get yourself to that space — whatever that means for you — come game
day. We just didn’t show up on the day.
“I think it’s a good lesson in that [there are] no excuses: other teams are going to pitch up with the right mentality and we need to match them and surpass them at everything else.”
This, Conan suggests, applies to an out-of-practice Ireland side just the same as it did to a Leinster team jampacked with internationals and Lions at Croke Park last Saturday.
Conan and fellow Ireland international Tommy O’Brien were late withdrawals from Leo Cullen’s matchday squad at GAA HQ with minor injuries. Both will be fit to face New Zealand at Soldier Field in two Saturdays’ time.
Conan slipped at home on the eve of the season’s first interpro and required a scan on his knee, but he reckons he was only a day or two away from being sufficiently fit to face Munster.
As such, Ireland’s Chicago showdown with the All Blacks will, in the likelihood that he is selected in Andy Farrell’s back row, make for Conan’s first appearance since the Lions’ third test in Australia in early August.
That 18 Irish players ultimately wound up joining Farrell’s party should be a source of pride for rugby in this country. After the pride, though, typically comes the fall: perhaps we saw the consequences of a draining tour at Croke Park last Saturday, where several of Leinster’s frontline internationals were outshone by their snarling opposite numbers from Munster.
Conan, however, picks out a man who wore red last Saturday as the perfect refutation to the concept of a post-Lions hangover.
“I don’t think anyone has said that Tadhg Beirne had a Lions malaise, if that’s how you put it,” he says of Munster’s captain. “Looking at him over the weekend, he was fantastic.
“Obviously, things didn’t go right for the Leinster lads against Munster the other day but there were still some good performances in there and it’s not something that’s on anyone’s mind.
“I don’t think it’s a thing myself. I suppose I was very conscious after the season last year that I’d obviously been on the go for a long time. I think including rehab and whatever else, I was on the go 14 months in a row, so I was conscious of taking enough time to get my body right and switch off and recover and mentally give yourself a bit of space before getting back at it.
“I think I have enough experience, now, at this stage to just be able to flop back in and pick up where I left off.
“You can’t dwell on these things or make them to be more than they are,” Conan adds. “It’s unacceptable in this environment to have any excuse to not perform well.”
Ireland’s Chicago meeting with the All Blacks on 1 November has been marketed as ‘The Rematch’ to Ireland’s first ever victory over New Zealand at Soldier Field in 2016.
Conan, then 24, had yet to establish himself as a test player: he debuted for Ireland during a World Cup warm-up victory over Scotland in 2015 but didn’t earn his second cap until the 2017 summer tour of America and Japan.
His memories of his exact surrounds for Ireland’s landmark win over New Zealand in November 2016 are a touch hazy. Far clearer in his mind are the roles of his Leinster teammates on what was a seismic day for Irish rugby in the Windy City.
“I watched it on one of the lad’s phones,” Conan says. “We played Zebre that day, over there (in Parma), and we watched it on the way back. I think that’s what happened. I’ve convinced myself that’s what happened: sitting on the airport floor on the way back from a game.
“A few of the lads that I would have started out with at Leinster were playing. Garry was on the bench for us (Ireland), first cap, didn’t get on. But Tadhg [Furlong] was there, Josh [van der Flier] came off the bench, Robbie [Henshaw] was playing 12.
“They’ve very fond memories from that week. My memory from that week was just beating Zebre, 12-0 or something like that, so not exactly a classic performance — but anyway!” (Conan actually scored a try in a 33-10 Leinster win).
A lot of water has passed under the bridge between the 2016 original and what will be, in reality, the 10th ‘rematch’ on Saturday week. New Zealand lead 5-4 in the years since and have undeniably regained the upper hand in this modern-day rivalry.
Their World Cup quarter-final victory over Ireland in 2023 — the last game in which Conan faced the All Blacks — has not been near the forefront of Conan’s mind, he says, but will always remain at the back of it as “one of those moments you never really get over”. The All Blacks’ 23-13 success in Dublin last November, meanwhile, felt like a turning of the tide.
Whatever about theoretical Lions hangovers, indisputable is the fact that the All Blacks should be sharper than Ireland as they head to Europe fresh off a Rugby Championship campaign in which they finished second to South Africa only on points difference. Most of Ireland’s matchday 23, meanwhile, will have had only an underwhelming performance against Munster under their legs when they stare down the haka on Saturday week.
New Zealand have their own complications, certainly: that former Munster man, assistant coach Jason Holland, has decided to leave Scott Robertson’s coaching setup at the end of this tour based on “a gut feeling” doesn’t sound especially auspicious. But that New Zealand are seven-point favourites to earn a third-straight victory over Ireland provides at least a snapshot as to the shape in which these sides are believed to be.
Conan, though, dismisses offhand any caveats or concerns on Ireland’s side of the equation. More than a week reconnecting in Chicago, he reckons, should see them right.
“We’ve had success before: you think of November 2021, where I know we played Japan the week before, but that was our first game together and then we played them (New Zealand) the week after that and we had success that day.
“No excuses, y’know what I mean?
“It’s great to be over here this weekend to have the time to train together without the distraction of travel and all that, and prep really well for next week.
“We’ve done it before. We can do it again.”
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