HEINEKEN CUP POOL SIX Connacht 10 Toulouse 36:HAD THE All Blacks themselves been in town they'd hardly have created a bigger fuss. This was Connacht's Holy Grail, and that it should come in their 100th European match merely underlined how long they've had to wait.
Hence, it was about more than the opposition, though the Toulouse men in white may as well have been clad in all black.
As feared, Guy Noves had seen what was coming and had prepared accordingly, selecting a team comprised almost entirely of experienced French campaigners who had been to pretty much every other corner of the Heineken Cup map and this also made them more cohesive than a week before. Toulouse had paid Connacht the respect of playing pretty much a full-strength side, if such a thing exists in their multi-decorated squad.
They’d also done their homework, and stopped Connacht at source to prevent them from building any momentum, both at set-piece time, where the wreaked utter carnage on the Connacht scrum, and across the defensive line. Hugely physical around the fringes, where that freakish human wrecking ball Thierry Dusautoir led the charge, and in midfield, they shot up with unrelentingly quick line speed (and scant policing from the officials) to stop the Connacht rumblers, more often than not behind the gain line.
Les rouges et noirs classically constructed an early lead through three-pointers to dampen the spirits of the home team and crowd alike as Lionel Beauxis stepped into the pocket for a nonchalantly-taken drop goal in between two penalties.
Nothing came easy for Connacht, all the more so after Mike McCarthy was binned for a high, straight-armed tackle on Vincent Clerc, and especially at scrum time. Such was Toulouse’s manifold and energy-sapping superiority here that 33 of their 36 points could be traced from this source one way or the other, whether it was the three scrum penalties Beauxis kicked, his drop goal off an attacking scrum, their penalty try, or the two backrow moves with which Jean Bouilhou and Yannick Nyanga scored – once off a pressurised Connacht scrum and one from their own put-in.
Even in cruise control, there was so much to admire in the Toulouse game, not least their traditional close-in offloading and intelligent decision-making on the ball, which was as likely to come from, say, lock Gregory Lamboley popping the ball out of the tackle to the array of nearby support trailers, or loosehead Yohan Montes taking turnover ball up the blind side to set up quick ball and make the pitch wider, as by any of their galacticos.
There was also the ever-alert countering of the tricky Clemont Poitrenaud and hence the speed with which they transformed defence into attack from deep off forced Connacht turnovers in contact. Had Florian Fritz’s pass found Maxime Medard or Luke Burgess located any of the support runners with a cross kick after another stunning break out, they’d had been further out of sight and sooner. Fritz also failed to locate the dangerous-looking Clerc.
As it was, Burgess was excellent, and Connacht players spoke afterwards of how, in just his second outing for Noves’ team, he was bossing everything in pidgin French. He already looks one of the signings of the season.
Eventually adapting to what they felt was Toulouse’s early hits at scrum time, ironically Connacht’s consolation try was also a penalty try off a scrum, not long after the introduction of Ronan Loughney, and, the indignity of it all, immediately after the introduction of Jean-Baptiste Poux, a starting World Cup finalist no less.
They deserved that much for their second-half revival, a testament to their own trademark resilience. Eric Elwood turned to his bench, from where Frank Murphy, in particular, made an impact, as did Ray Ofisa and, most certainly, Loughney. With the help of a few decisions finally going their way, Connacht build up a head of steam by carrying hard into contact, looking for offloads and running from everywhere.
Gavin Duffy, utterly assured and confident in everything he did in this company, augmented some wonderful ball-winning in the air by looping around Tiernan O’Halloran’s counter-attacking line to spark the ensuing bouts of offloading and Connacht storm which culminated in that try.
Their pack had kept soldiering throughout and Connacht had shown a willingness to have a go out wide, where they had a little more joy. There had been glimpses from the young tyros in the backline even when Toulouse had been at their most pre-eminent, notably when Eoin Griffin trailed Dave McSharry’s forceful break only to be denied a try by Burgess’s covering tackle.
For them, it had been something of a loaves and fishes job. As expected, this had been an eye opener for them, the rest of their team-mates and the Connacht public alike. Not having quite done themselves justice, there’ll be a concern amongst the more established Connacht statesmen as to whether the performance did enough to keep the new fans. For if they want more days like this, squad and fans alike are going to have to earn it on less rarified days.
Sco ring sequence: 6 minsBeauxis pen 0-3; 12Beauxis drop goal 0-6; 15 minsBeauxis pen 0-9; 22Bouilhou try and Beauxis con con 0-16; 32Beauxis pen 0-19; 35Nikora pen 3-19; 40Beauxis pen 3-22; (half-time 3-22); 47 minspenalty try, Beauxis con 3-29; 70penalty try, Nikora con 10-29; 77Nyanga try, Beauxis 10-36.
CONNACHT: G Duffy [capt]; T O'Halloran, E Griffin, D McSharry, B Tuohy; M Nikora, P O'Donohoe; B Wilkinson, A Flavin, R Ah You, M Swift, D Gannon, M McCarthy, J Muldoon, G Naoupu. Replacements: E Reynecke for Flavin, D Rogers for Ah You (both 49 mins), R Ofisa for Gannon (50 mins), F Murphy for O'Donohue (51), R Loughney for Wilkinson, T Anderson for Muldoon (both 64 mins), H Fa'afili for Griffin (67), Flavin for Anderson (77 mins). Not used: N O'Connor. Sinbinned– McCarthy (29-39 mins), Reynecke (77),
TOULOUSE: C Poitrenaud; M Medard, F Fritz, Y Jauzion, V Clerc; L Beauxis, L Burgess; Y Montes, W Servat, C Johnston, G Lamboley, Y Maestri, J Bouilhou [capt], T Dusautoir, L Picamoles. Replacements: G Botha for Servat, J Falefa for Johnston, L McAlister for Poitrenaud (all 50 mins), R Millo-Chluski for Maestri (55), G Galan for Picamoles (60), N Vergallo for Burgess (62), Y Nyanga for Millo-Chluski (68), J-B Poux for Montes (69 mins).
Referee: Greg Garner(England).
