I fought the Claw but ...

Gerry Thornley talks to Munster prop Marcus Horan who is finally emerging from the shadow of Peter Clohessy and makes his first startingappearance for Ireland, against Fiji tomorrow.

Talents like Marcus Horan don't come along very often. A modern day all-singing, all-dancing prop, there's a bit of the firebrand in him as well. At 25, he's had to bide his time more than he would have liked but at last his day has come.

It's been seven years since he broke into the Shannon team, five years since he became a regular in an AIL-winning team and three years since he marked his full European Cup debut with a quite outrageously audacious try away to Colomiers. Three seasons ago - his first as a professional - he was a regular in Ireland's first A championship-winning team, culminating in a first cap, away to the USA Eagles on the summer tour of 2000 to the Americas.

Yet here he is, only getting an extended run in the Munster team this season and winning his second cap today, a first run-on for Ireland. So, what kept him? In truth, it's actually gone according to the tea leaves, even if Horan's representative career has taken a frustratingly long time to brew for the player himself. The odds were always on him having to bide his time until Peter Clohessy retired, whilst learning from the master.

In any event, before last season he resolved to change his attitude.

"I had to take a step back. I was thinking of fighting for an Irish spot when really I should have been fighting for a Munster spot first. I had to re-assess my priorities. In saying that I had to fight for a place with Peter Clohessy, which was pretty daunting."

In point of fact, due to injuries to Clohessy or John Hayes, Horan started in eight of Munster's games last season, and subbed in another eight, though some of those were strictly bit parts.

"A lot of people were saying 'hang in there, he's going to retire', and that's the one phrase that nearly made me sick last year. I'm always mentioned in the same breath as Claw and I've the utmost respect for the guy, but it's like as if 'oh he's gone, I've filled his boots'. I'd like to think that I could have made it last year, and I did push him hard. I'd hate to think I was the kind of guy who was just waiting for his turn. I wasn't. I was fighting hard all along."

Now it's time to carve the Marcus Horan niche. "Every game Claw is mentioned, 'Claw will be missed in the front-row'. But I think Claw and myself are very different players. Claw offered something to the team that I probably couldn't offer, but I feel that I can offer stuff that he wouldn't be able to, and he'd admit that himself."

The young pretender is at pains to ensure he doesn't sound remotely disrespectful, for Claw is a legend in his eyes as well, and he learnt from him.

"From him and Gaillimh. His cuteness. He knows when to give it and when not to. He can hold back on a scrum and read a guy so well, then have a cut. He taught me that, how to calm down, not to always be trying to prove a point, and to do the simple stuff."

For Horan, that might be more difficult than most. From Clonlara in Co Clare, skills honed playing hurling (he is yet another example of the benefits of playing several sports in one's formative years) have helped augment his natural quickness with excellent handling ability.

Horan can do things in matches which most props wouldn't dare attempt in training. You think back to Horan scampering up the middle of Lansdowne Road in an AIL game four seasons ago against Lansdowne, and firing out a left to right 20-metre skip-pass for Mick Galwey to score.

He's no top-of-the-ground specialist either. Shannon toughed it out on a mudbath in Clontarf last season en route to their fifth title. The numbers were utterly indistinguishable, but the fella who single-handedly and repeatedly dragged Shannon upfield, with a series of searing bursts which defied belief as much as the conditions, was instantly identifiable.

That aforementioned try-scoring European Cup debut is almost part of folklore now, Horan having the audacity to sell a dummy pass before scoring. Alas, the suspicion always lurks with any skilful front-row - witness dour old souls who criticise Keith Wood - that when he starts making big plays in open field he must be shying away from the coalface.

"For example there were games with Shannon when I wouldn't know the patterns so I would just go out trying to do something. But Declan Kidney told me to do the simple stuff first and I've started to enjoy that more now, like hitting rucks and defence. You get a good feeling after hitting a ruck which gets the ball back cleanly and they're my priorities in the first half-hour of a game."

However, it's not just what you see when Horan is playing that makes you believe he can be special, it's what you hear and specifically from whom, namely fellow members of the front-row fraternity, such as Claw, Gary Halpin and Paul Wallace. They all rate him hugely.

HE has survived at both tighthead and loosehead against some mean hombres at European Cup level, and in latter seasons one can only recall Robbie Kempson - whom Alan Solomons rates as the best scrummager in the Southern Hemisphere - giving him a tough time. At 6ft 1ins and 16½ stone, Horan is no monster, and he's up against one today in Bill Cavubati.

"When I come up against guys who have three stone on me it is a big task. You try to compensate with technique and a bit of speed in the legs in the snap. I know I've a long way to go as regards development, but it helps that I'm playing with Frankie (Sheahan) and John (Hayes) on Sunday. We're working well together, we're working on getting low and with Paul McCarthy in Munster and Tony D'Arcy at Ireland there's a lorryload of expertise. And it's amazing when you analyse games, the smallest thing can make a huge difference."

Horan was late to the concept of bulking up, finally heeding the advice of Niall O'Donovan to take up a programme of weight training when he was 20. But that might be no bad thing now, in some respects, and his best years should be undoubtedly ahead of him. No less than Clohessy, the example of Reggie Corrigan should inspire him and help temper his frustration.

Oh yes. His temper. It is part of his make-up, and sometimes incidents seem to bring down the red mist. "Stupidity", as he admits, sometimes "takes over", though team-mates such as Anthony Foley spot the signals and help calm him down. But then you wonder if, à la Roy Keane, this might detract from his game as well.

"I've thought of that and people have said it, that if a guy plays on the edge and you ask him to calm down, is he the same player? I feel it's a matter of me channelling that aggression in the right way. I am always hyper. I come off the pitch fairly drained and it's really an emotional thing, rather than physical, and that's after games when I haven't lost the rag. And there's times when I've lost the rag and I've actually channelled it very well."

Understandably, he seems calmer in himself this season. The belated Munster run has perhaps satisfied his desire to prove himself, given him more confidence, more chance for self-analysis and fine-tuning, as well as more match fitness. Picture a greyhound straining on a leash, Horan is now finally being unleashed.

"I hope I can keep calm out there. It's very easy to get carried away when you've been pulled back for so long. You want to prove a point. But I think if I can go out and do the simple things right, do what's been outlined in training, things are going to work out."

He doesn't really count the first cap as a replacement away to the Americans, not least because his parents, John and Margaret, weren't there, nor his three brothers and two sisters. Last season the youngest of the clan, David, won something which had previously eluded Marcus and the family, a Munster Schools' Senior Cup medal with St Munchin's, and theirs is a family which wins and loses together.

"They weren't in the States, which was a short period on the pitch and probably not against the best team in the world. A cap is a cap, it's hanging at home in the house and it is a big thing for me. But after last weekend, to be able to start, with my family there as well it's going to be a big day for me. I've dreamt about walking out on Lansdowne Road with the number one jersey on and I'm going to relish it."

He might have to wait a while for the next one, but this one won't be the last.