ROMAN SALANOA IS still dusting himself down from Munster’s tête-à-tête with Toulouse at the Stade Ernest-Wallon.
“Even defensively, running into collisions with them… In every aspect of the game, you feel it.”
He’s got the bumps and bruises to prove it, he says. Mind you, a few of the Toulouse lads will probably remember running into Salanoa as well.
Those war wounds are further evidence, at least, of a breakthrough for the Hawaiian tighthead. He’s played more games this term — 13 — than he had in his previous three seasons in Ireland combined.
Injuries have smothered Salanoa’s progression at Munster since he moved south from Leinster in 2020, but he would appear to have physically acclimatised, now, to senior rugby. “Touch wood,” he says.
As a late convert from American football, he’s still but a prospect even at 25. But there have been indications in Salanoa’s recent performances that he is in the process of graduating beyond being merely an up-and-comer with the southern province.
“I kind of wanted to leave my last two seasons behind. I had a very slow start coming over here from Dublin but I’ve been able to find my feet this year and kind of use the change of coaching staff to really take advantage of that fresh start, work on my body a bit more, and take advantage of the things I didn’t in the last two years… Just being able to go out week to week.
“Doing it with your mates is always good,” he adds, before explaining how he’s been working not only on the technical aspects of front-row play but on developing a universality that is integral to Graham Rowntree and Mike Prendergast’s attack.
“Because we’re playing more exciting rugby, you kind of have to develop those skills to be able to play with the team. We’re working on the ball in hand a lot; the hand-eye coordination, the catch-pass…
And we’ve a lot of staff helping us out on our days off. They have these extra slots open for us to get more handling in, more touches, to become more comfortable on the ball and in making decisions. A lot of it is just prepped for us during the week so you’ve gotta take advantage of that, go to those extra sessions and get those touches. And hopefully it shows on the weekend.
It’s mad to think that until he was 18, this man was playing an entirely different sport. Not only that, but Salanoa played the majority of his schools football career as a running back — closer in role to a centre than a tighthead in rugby currency — before eventually earning an All-State selection for his role as a defensive lineman in Kahuku High’s state-championship success in 2015.
Life in Hawaii, he explains matter-of-factly, was pretty much exactly as idyllic as it tends to be portrayed in TV or film.
He grew up rurally, near the beach. His hometown of Laie — located in the Koolauloa District of Hawaii’s third largest island, Oahu — had two traffic lights. “For about 40 minutes you go one way or the other,” Salanoa smiles.
“Tropical life, island life, good food, seafood…” he continues, beginning to sound slightly wistful.
Surfing?
“…Not anymore!” he laughs.
Salanoa harbours no regrets, however, about his transition to rugby, a sport which he was invited to play during his final year of high school, and with which he became a dual-sport state champion with Kahuku High in 2015.
“It was just an opportunity to keep playing ball,” he explains.
“I graduated from high school in 2015 and I was lucky enough to get picked up by the USA U20s. When I was there, I wasn’t really doing anything [outside of sport]. I was just working. But I got invited to the next camp, went to the next camp. Went back working, went back for the next camp… So, I wasn’t really training for anything, I was just trying to save money and was hoping to go back to a junior college to play football.
“But that didn’t really work out. It was just that the cost of tuition of going to new schools was a bit more than I hoped and expected to be paying.
“Then I just ended up working and I got an email to come for a trial in Ireland. I came for a trial in 2017, in the fall/winter… I got a week-and-a-half trial with Leinster and got invited back…”
Salanoa doesn’t shy away from expressing the culture shock he experienced in swapping Hawaii for Dublin as a 21-year-old. There was the weather, obviously, “but even the small stuff… like cars driving on the other side of the road, the roads being so narrow, cars being so small. Even the architecture and stuff like that…
“It was definitely an experience in itself, just being in a different country. Luckily enough, through rugby, you’re kind of able to travel through most of Ireland — and you get to experience life in Europe as well.”
Salanoa credits a number of Leinster’s still-prominent front-rows for educating him in their trade when he first crossed the Atlantic as a redshirt. “Early enough into my career in Leinster, it was really just learning the foundations, learning the rules, learning the technical aspects of everything; and why you do certain things, and the outcomes of that.”
There’s also a special mention for his former Old Belvedere clubmates Declan Lavery and Adam Howard, the likes of whom the smiling Salanoa says gave him “the tips and the dark secrets” that allowed him to keep his head above water in senior rugby.
As for his move to Munster following two and a half years spent in the capital, the American says that “the transition was easier because I was already in Ireland…”
…But I did have to learn a bit of the accent change and stuff like that, the different slangs and lingos… especially with the Cork lads! When they’re all around each other, they’re different gravy.
“I still have to kind of look over to the side when people are laughing… like, ‘Ha ha!’” Salanoa explains, physically reenacting a daily scene in which he’s laughing along with his teammates before turning away looking utterly puzzled. “But you slowly pick up things.”
Including Limerick or Cork slang?
Salanoa hums and haws before playing it safe: “…Probably the most common one is just that they say ‘kid’ or ‘boy’… after literally everything!” he laughs.
The powerful tighthead reckons That Night at Páirc Uí Chaoimh, one on which the kids and/or biys were all right, is the highlight of his Munster career so far.
Salanoa also shares a belief held by most of his colleagues that Munster’s November victory over a strong South African selection on Leeside was a catalytic event in Graham Rowntree’s tenure, accelerating the rate at which the province’s players invested in their new head coach’s philosophical overhaul.
“Oh, that was incredible,” says Salanoa, recalling the night on which he played in front of the biggest crowd of his career to date. “Just… Even walking out there before the match even started, for the warm-up, and seeing the people filling into seats, filling the stands… I didn’t get to play in that Toulouse game up in Dublin at the Aviva [last season] and to be able to experience that in Páirc Uí Chaoimh, it was definitely one to remember.
“It was also nice to win as well,” he adds. “It was definitely a turning point for us. That game gave us a lot of belief. For us to start so well, we were definitely like, ‘Woah… Why stop now?’ Or, ‘Why change what we’re doing?’
“It was like, ‘Oh…’” Salanoa recalls, illustrating with raised eyebrows an epiphanic moment under Rowntree. “And then: all gas, no brakes. Just keep going. Go with the flow of things.
“We’d had a slow start to the season and we all knew we were going in the right direction. It was just that everything came out, then, at Páirc Uí Chaoimh. That gave us the belief and the confidence we needed to fully get on board and back what we were doing.”
Munster haven’t looked back too often since, improving incrementally week by week and growing as a group even following the odd narrow defeat to more seasoned opponents.
Salanoa has been a virtual ever-present throughout that process, either included in Rowntree’s starting XV or adding 123kg of Hawaiian punch off the bench.
On a personal note, he hopes to continue to “build up a few more layers, build in the experiences” during the months ahead, beginning with Saturday’s crucial URC clash away at Benetton.
“I’m playing a lot more, so you’re getting those opportunities to feel those things out and being able to problem-solve even between the scrums — and the matches,” Salanoa says.
“It’s definitely just learning more and obviously through training, you’re just trying to paint the pictures you’re going to feel on the weekend.
“Still doing it today,” he adds. “Every day is a new opportunity to perfect your craft.
“I mean, on the weekend, I wasn’t really picture-perfect so you take learnings from the match before, in this case Toulouse, and you’ve just got to focus ahead for this week.
“You can’t really dwell too much on the negatives, otherwise this week will fly by and you’ll miss your chance to prepare for the game this weekend.”
Get instant updates on your province on The42 app. With Laya Healthcare, official health and wellbeing partner to Leinster, Munster and Connacht Rugby.
