Loyalty has its own rewards

INTERVIEW: JOHN MULDOONHe's turned down offers from other provinces to stay loyal to his native Connacht and now John Muldoon and his men have the chance to tackle the aristocrats of Europe, writes GERRY THORNLEY

NEXT SATURDAY week, Connacht will host their first ever match in the Heineken Cup at the Sportsground. Guy Noves will bring his aristocratic multi-decorated, four-time European champions from Toulouse, complete with five World Cup finalists, to town. It’s hard to credit, but that game also happens to be Connacht’s 100th match in Europe.

Previously, as ever presents in 14 seasons of the Amlin Challenge Cup, Connacht have played 98 games in that competition, and over the last seven seasons, John Muldoon has played in 38 of them. So he’s trawled through a fair few far-flung venues on their Discover Europe travels, and while there have been some great days, notably semi-finals at the Sportsground, he accepts there is still a stigma attached to continually being excluded from the Challenge Cup’s big brother.

“Of course. It’s seen upon as a lesser competition. Yes, we’ve had success there and some great days there, but it is a second tier competition. We’re dining at the top table now. Whether we belong there, we’ll find out pretty quickly.

“We’ve got to make sure we’re competitive, and our home games are vitally important to us. We know it’s not going to be easy for us. But we’ve got this door open for us and we’ve got to keep it open and that come next January it’s shut behind us and never opens again.”

He cites both new supporters and sponsors coming on board, the newly formed Connacht PBG (Professional Game Board) and, of course, Eric Elwood, a local legend and infectiously enthusiastic and positive voice.

“We’ve got a local man who’s passionate about rugby. You can see it in Eric. He’s nervous, and that means he’s excited. Eric wears his heart on his sleeve. Now we’ve got to make sure that, from a players’ point of view, we all give that extra bit.”

Before the marquee encounter with Toulouse, there is the far from minor matter of a trek to Ravenhill today (where Connacht haven’t won since 1960). There’s also a visit to Harlequins to kick off this season’s Heineken Cup away to Conor O’Shea’s unbeaten Premiership leaders on Friday. But bring it on, for this is where they want to be.

Loyalty can be a curse, but it can be rewarded too. Muldoon had an opportunity to join one of Connacht’s provincial rivals, but, being a true man of the west, opted to stay. His rationale was simple; Connacht having been on the outside looking in for so long, it would have been too much to bear if he was then looking in from the outside when they finally reached their Holy Grail.

“It would have been very frustrating for me having jumped ship and then be on the periphery looking in from somewhere else. It’s probably my GAA background that kept me loyal to a place and kept me thinking you can dare to dream that you’ll get there someday.

“But we’re here now, and there’s going to be a great buzz over the next couple of weeks. In fact, it started three months ago. You’d meet people on the street and they’d be saying, ‘when’s the season starting’? There are people coming to games that probably never came to games before.”

He’s been telling friends for weeks not to bother asking him for tickets. But for all the interest, Muldoon maintains the supporters are realistic.

“They’re not expecting us to win the league or to qualify for the quarter-finals, but on the big day they want to see us go out there and mix it, show that we can put

it up to Toulouse. And do I think we can cause an upset in the Heineken Cup? Damn right I do.”

Alas, not everyone has been as loyal as Muldoon, and in a World Cup year, Leinster and Munster came calling for a quartet of their key men over the last few seasons.

“I’d be very naïve to sit here and say we’re not going to miss the lads. I was saying to Eric on the way up in the car ‘wouldn’t it be great to be coming up here with the four lads still on board?’ And I firmly believe that if we had the four lads we’d be close to the top of the table . . .”

Indeed, last season Connacht had the highest number of losing bonus points in the league, and this season, despite a run of three successive defeats every one of Connacht’s seven games have been one-score affairs save for the 30-20 defeat the RDS and were only denied a bonus point with the last kick of the game.

But Muldoon bears no grudges to his ex-team-mates. “Rugby is a short career. They decided they needed to move on for whatever reasons and we’ve got to deal with it and do the best we can. Connacht rugby needs this.

“We need to move forward and the Rabo Direct/Magners League was only getting us so far. We’ve been wanting to build the facilities in Connacht for the last few years, and there’s been talk about it. But the minute we’re in the Heineken Cup, the builders moved in. We’ve needed this launchpad.”

Along the way in his 161 games for Connacht, the lowest point was also against Cardiff when losing 58-0 there three seasons ago. “I thought ‘oh God, this is us done.’ I did actually say to myself in the dressing-room afterwards ‘I need to get out of here’. Even though it’s your home province I asked myself ‘do I really want to do this?’ There have been low points, and a lot of high points too, but I’d be lying if I’d say it’s not frustrating.”

“What really frustrates me the most is looking at players wasting themselves. I’ve always said that I’ve never been the most talented player in the world but I work bloody hard for what I have and it frustrates me to see more talented people not working at it; to settle for being third or fourth choice and play four or five games in the Rabo Direct and then back down to the AIL for ten weeks, and then when the Six Nations comes around again, do exactly the same thing.”

“Because for one, they’re not thinking of the bigger picture, and two, we could make Connacht and Irish rugby more competitive. Individually they could get more out of it, Connacht rugby could get more out of it and Irish rugby could get more out of it. That frustrates me a lot really.”

Now, he maintains, that while competing in the Heineken Cup will “put us on the map”, in order to recruit players this cannot be a one-off. “We’ve been trying to sign a marquee player for a couple of years. Playing in the Heineken Cup could open that door for us.”

But that will become more difficult with each year, he believes, citing the rapid advances made by the Italian teams.

Connacht have maintained their focus on the league until now and last week, a team-mate said to Muldoon and others in the gym ‘it’s hard to believe the Heineken Cup is next week’. Yet the meetings with Ulster could, conceivably, go some way toward determining which of them obtains the third automatic qualifying so in all of this, there must be a fear that today’s game could be overshadowed by what’s to follow.

“I hope not,” admits Muldoon. “But Eric has made it clear we’re not going to target games. Every game is going to be treated on merit. If there’s a lad carrying an injury, then we’ll look at it, but otherwise our strongest 15 is going to play every week for 13 weeks.”

It’s time for Connacht to put their best foot forward, this week and every week.

JOHN MULDOON

Date of birth– November 30th, 1982 (28).

Place of birth– Ballinasloe, Co Galway.

Height– 1.91 m (6ft 3 in).Weight – 106kg.

Honours– Ireland Youths, Under-19, Under-21, A, Connacht (161 games), Ireland (3 caps).

Other honours:Played hurling with Portumna GAA club and won an All-Ireland minor medal in 2000 playing for Galway against Cork.