Firmly believing the best is yet to come

RUGBY: GERRY THORNLEYtalks to Connacht's determined fullback, who is aiming to push himself into contention for a starting place with Ireland at the World Cup by continuing to impress with his rejuvenated native province

IT REMAINS a leading contender for try of the season. At a packed Sportsground one Wednesday evening in April, Gavin Duffy gathered an Andrew Conway kick inside his 22 with 14 team-mates and all of Leinster in front of him. From his thrilling counter and link with Fionn Carr, the ball travelled through two recycles and a dozen pair of hands before Michael Swift scored brilliantly in the corner.

After the couple of seasons of safety first, aerial ping-pong, the changed laws and mindset have given Duffy more of a licence to thrill, and both he and Connacht have been rejuvenated by it. At 29, he is almost certainly playing the best rugby of his life.

“We’ve grown in confidence in ourselves and in our belief in our team-mates, and it helps in your counter-attacking when you have a bit more belief in the lads around you as well. Everyone is on the same wavelength.”

Not long before, his first instinct would have been to kick long or kick to regain possession. No less than the surfeit of fullbacks around, with his Gaelic-football playing roots, Duffy has always been good under a high ball too.

“Geordan , Rob , Luke ; they can all catch a high ball, and they all go to the position to catch a high ball, and that’s certainly from our roots in Gaelic football. There’s a timing involved, but there’s also just the conviction and the confidence to go for it; that’s the biggest thing as a fullback.”

Now, though, Duffy is bringing all his abilities to bear, and consistently and in the same position, perhaps like never before.

“Eric has brought in Brian Melrose, or Billy Melrose as he’s known here, from Australia, and his remit is to get our attack up to scratch and score a hell of a lot more tries than we did last year. I think we only scored 20 tries in the whole of the league last season, which is nowhere near enough.”

With the pack producing quicker ball and Fionn Carr also drawing the attention of opponents, there is more scope to hit the line and run with the ball. The more ball he gets, the less anxious Duffy has become, the better his decision-making.

As a son of Ballina, Duffy could clearly have gone far in Gaelic football, having played midfield on the Mayo minors that narrowly lost the 1999 All-Ireland final to Down. Last Sunday he watched Benny Coulter play a starring role for Down in the final and recalls, 11 years ago, marking Coulter.

“I was set the task of marking him in midfield and keeping him quiet. Unfortunately he got in behind me once and more or less got the winning goal. That was the changing of the game,” he says, self-recriminatingly.

But rugby always consumed him too. Last Saturday he turned 29 and received a text from his mother (Dorothy) – hard to believe he went to his first rugby session down in Ballina 22 years ago.

“They literally had to hold me back. I was mad into rugby. My dad (Tony) was involved in the club but then being from Ballina I played Gaelic from under-8s as well.”

He continued his Gaelic football with Ballina Stephenites and though he admits it was a hard decision to give it up at 18, he’s had no regrets. Rugby gave him a chance to play for his country and the life choice of a professional sports career, notably when living in London for almost four years while playing for Harlequins.

He also won All-Ireland titles in the shot putt and hammer from under-13s to under-16s, generally alternating between first and second with his friend Barry McCann, under the tutelage of the late Pat Creagh.

Another big influence on Duffy was Hugh Lynn, a teacher in the Quay National School, who coached Duffy’s age group through the years at Gaelic football, rugby and basketball.

Going to Roscrea helped to progress his rugby, his last Senior Cup team becoming the first from the school in over 50 years to reach the Leinster Schools Senior Cup final; they lost to Blackrock. Recognition followed with two years on the Ireland Schools teams as a goal-kicking outhalf, captaining them to victory on an unbeaten eight-match tour of Australia when scoring 19 points in the Test at Ballymore in Brisbane.

Other contemporaries on that team were Shane Jennings, Rory Best, Roger Wilson, Stephen Keogh, Eoghan Hickey and Bryan Young.

He soon made a big splash in the AIL with Galwegians and playing for the Ireland under-21s (at outside centre) and Ireland A at fullback. But ankle and shoulder injuries disrupted his progress, and despite an offer from Alan Gaffney to join Munster – which Eddie O’Sullivan encouraged as well – at 21 he headed to Harlequins in the summer of 2003. When relegated after two seasons, again he opted to stay in London. A thoughtful, bright lad, he has always been his own man too.

“I always back myself in my decisions because no-one has given it as much thought as I have. I certainly mull over things a hell of a lot, quietly in my mind, and when I make a decision eventually I make it with confidence and in the belief that I’m doing it for the right reasons.”

His versatility had become a hindrance as well as a blessing, though looking back he thinks overall it has stood to him, but at the Stoop it was John Kingston who saw Duffy as first and foremost a fullback. Although his fourth and last season there back in the Premiership (2006-07) was curtailed after a frustrating spell in the reserves, overall he enjoyed his time there.

He had won his first cap while at Harlequins in the second Test in Cape Town in June ’04. He had been rooming with an unwell Geordan Murphy, who had been passed fit on the morning of the game. As his father and friends from Ballina were over he did some window shopping before returning to the hotel where his mobile phone was being charged.

Returning two and a half hours before kick-off, he was told that there was a search party out for him. Murphy had been ruled out and Girvan Dempsey promoted from the bench. Memories of the day?

“Eddie O’Sullivan telling me to get my head out of my arse, that I was on the bench!” Classic Eddie O. “It gave me a shake and got me ready.” Dempsey was injured at the end of the first quarter, and Duffy came on. He played well, and Ireland came within a converted try of winning near the end, before losing 26-17. “It was 100 miles an hour and a bit of a blur, but I enjoyed it.”

The full-time whistle had barely sounded before Anthony Foley was telling him the next challenge was to make sure he wasn’t a one-cap wonder. In February ’05, he was named on the bench in Murrayfield. At Donncha O’Callaghan’s insistence they were warming up for the umpteenth time about 20 minutes from the end, the last subs to be used, with Ireland well ahead.

On the sidelines they passed Mervyn Murphy, who asked them if they were coming on. “Yeah, we are,” said O’Callaghan immediately. “I was like ‘Are we? Are we?’ Mervyn must have been miked up and said: ‘Am I putting on these two lads?’ and the call came down to put us on. So I got on that day with a little help from Donncha.”

In his five minutes he received one pass, and scored the final try in the corner.

Of his 10 caps, none have been won in Ireland. The closest he came was as an unused replacement at Lansdowne Road in the 26-19 defeat to France in 2005. Instead, Duffy’s Test odyssey has thus far taken him from Newlands to Murrayfield, Nagai Stadium and Chichibunomiya in Japan, Santa Fe and Buenos Aires in Argentina, Murrayfield again, Parc des Princes (against Argentina) and most recently, the Thunderbird Stadium in Vancouver and Buck Shaw Stadium in Santa Clara, California in June of last year. He has won three caps as a replacement (all on the left wing), three at fullback, two at outside centre and two at inside centre.

Not playing in Croke Park was a particular regret for the former Mayo minor midfielder, but not playing in Lansdowne Road/Aviva Stadium would be a bigger one. The November Test window offers the next opportunity.

Along the way he rejoined Connacht in March ’07, sufficient time for him to play twice on the Argentinian tour and in the World Cup, which had been his target. That said, a late cameo in the concluding defeat against the Pumas left him with mixed feelings.

“I remember sitting in the dressingroom afterwards thinking ‘Jeeze, is that it, like? Is that the World Cup? Should I be happy that I played the seven minutes? Should I be pissed off that I only played seven minutes?’ It was a bizarre kind of ending. The whole experience, I suppose, makes me hungrier to get back, get another chance and rewrite the book.”

Hence, though. he can say he played in a World Cup.

“Yeah, but I’m hugely determined to get back there again. 2011 is my goal now.”

Now more relaxed in his own skin, he’s also more philosophical. “I feel that if I’m playing well I’m giving myself every chance, and then it’s up to the coaches. As long as I know I’m playing up the level I can then I’m happy, as long as I’m giving myself the best chance.”

He’s also happy in his native province.

“I would have struggled to go anywhere else, really. You’re never going to experience the same emotion, no matter how much success you have anywhere else, as you will win when you’re with your own province.”

The Holy Grail is reaching the Heineken Cup, preferably of their own accord.

“There’s a huge effort being made by the players on the field; that belief and desire to do it every single week, and Eric is getting that out of us now, and we’ve a good backroom staff with Dan McFarland, “Billy” Melrose and Mike Forshaw, they’ve all brought something new to the table. Hopefully this will be the year.”

Sitting fourth, with that away day monkey off their backs, nonetheless Duffy is under no illusions. “Ulster are certainly going to be the biggest test we’ve faced so far and we’ll know whereabouts we are after this game.”

Gavin Duffy

Date of birth: September 18, 1981.

Place of birth: Ballina, Co Mayo.

Height: 6ft 1in (1.85 m).

Weight: 14st 7lbs (92 kg).

School: Cistercian College, Roscrea.

Clubs: UCG, Ballina, Galwegians RFC Professional: Connacht (2001-03 and 2007), NEC Harlequins (2003-06, played 110 times).

Honours: Ireland schools, U-21s, Ireland A and Ireland senior (1 0caps).