LUKE FITZGERALD INTERVIEW: GERRY THORNLEYfinds the 20-year-old prospect with the devastating sidestep is well over not making Ireland's World Cup squad
IN HINDSIGHT, Luke Fitzgerald admits he was possibly better off not making the World Cup squad. But this is a young lad in a hurry who wasn't able to rationalise his omission at the time, and in his case, he didn't even make the preliminary squad of 37 a week before the final cut-off.
Frustrated at being taken all the way to Argentina for a token five minutes at the end of the second Test, he felt he'd played well in training while in Limerick, when there was nothing else to go on. Then, on Friday, August 3rd, he was informed he was one of the 11 players being culled.
"To be honest, I was absolutely gutted. I could barely speak. I got in my car. I couldn't talk to anyone. I just went straight home."
He can't remember who he talked to first. The drive to Dublin was all a blur. "One of the worst things - the worst thing - that's every happened to me in my rugby career so far."
In hindsight, à la Rob Kearney, he realises he was possibly better off with game time at Leinster than going to France. The public and pundits alike are always impatient for an exceptional young talent to make rapid strikes, and Fitzgerald is no different. But it's worth reminding ourselves, and maybe him, he's already played 36 times for Leinster as well as four times for his country. Not bad progress for a 20-year-old.
"It's the first time I've really thought about it. You always want to be involved and I suppose when you're training with the top-class players all the time you feel you're as good, and so you're always sick at being left out. You're always disappointed."
He has played in 18 of Leinster's 20 games this season, starting 15 of them and scoring seven tries, though only two have been at his preferred fullback.
He likes picking when and where to hit the line, and loves counter-attacking. The more space to operate in, the better he is. He's a lethal broken field runner with an exceptional ability to beat a man by stepping off either foot, or draw two or three defenders and offload.
"I love beating someone. I absolutely love that. I love being two on one with a fullback and setting someone away; I love giving the pass for some reason; hitting the line and stepping the fullback or putting someone away. That's one of the nicest feelings, slicing a team open."
It comes as no surprise to hear that prior to the past two seasons, it had been two further years since he had last played on the wing, in a schools trial.
He thinks his game is developing quite well but accepts he has a long way to go. Fewer mistakes, more consistency is what he's been looking for.
"If I was looking at a time frame I suppose the next year, year and a half, is when I'm hoping to develop hugely. I hope I'll be able to impose myself a bit more on the game physically."
Three or four sessions a week in the gym, sleep time and nutrition; this season he has fallen off less tackles, as much a mental as a physical adjustment to playing on the wing or coming off the bench. Much of it comes down to footwork, something he's been working hard on with Kurt McQuilkin (Leinster defence coach).
He is working to improve his offload skills "pre-contact", to emulate Brian O'Driscoll, Gordon D'Arcy and Shane Horgan, and Johnny Sexton too.
"He wouldn't be in the same group as those in terms of experience, but you'll see it in the next few years. His vision and his passing are really excellent to see in training."
He's in good company, both on the training ground and in matches. "I just love playing with Felipe (Contepomi). He's crazy as well but he's really brilliant," says Fitzgerald, smiling broadly as he thinks of a kindred spirit. "He'll run it from anywhere. I suppose his awareness of space and listening to him talk about the game - Drico, Darce, Shaggy and Girv as well.
"Denis (Hickie) was a great talker as well, his understanding of the game and its ebbs and flows and when to get involved. They're on a different level."
He also talks of the quality of players Leinster regularly come up against in the Magners League, pointing to the presence of Daryl Gibson and Andy Henderson in the Glasgow backline recently, and Doug Howlett today.
Even when his son was a tot, Des Fitzgerald coached him on the importance of balance and speed, and introduced him to weights - "power cleans and stuff like that" - from about the age of 15 or 16. And that desire. Always aspiring to be the best. Think big, not small.
Given his dad was one of the best tightheads this country ever produced, rugby was part of the family's fabric. Luke is the "top dog" of five, followed by Rachel, Rebecca, Sara and Aaron, and has been told by his father he had a size one rugby ball in his cot before he could open his eyes.
"I've been dreaming about being the world's best rugby player since I was about five. Ever since I picked up a ball it's what my dad's always pushed, to be the best at whatever I do."
Fitzgerald's memories of seeing Des play have been formed more by the video age, though as he says "even if you were looking at the game you wouldn't have seen him, having a break at the bottom of a ruck or stuck at the bottom of a scrum."
The stand-out video is the 1991 World Cup quarter-final against Australia. "That was a sickener, but it was the game more than any other where you could make out what was going on. Other than that I haven't seen too much of him."
You wonder how the son of a prop becomes a skinny, all-singing, all-dancing game-breaking outside back. He points out that aside from being a brilliant scrummager, his dad was quicker than people realise, had good hands and would have flourished in the modern game. He was also only 14-15 stone at the age of 18. And his mother, Andrea, was an accomplished netball international. Ahh.
His dad remains the major influence on his career. "The poor women in the house," he says, "at dinner table it's all rugby and they're sick of it. When dad wasn't giving out to me about school we were talking about rugby."
Studies? "An impossible job, but he did his best."
From the age of five to 10, his father was based in Cork, so Luke attended Scoil an Athar Tadhg in Carraig na bhFear, hence the cúpla focal when TG4 are in the vicinity.
Even when the family moved back to Enniskerry, he went to Scoil Naithi and played Gaelic football before going to senior school in Blackrock College. To the manor born.
Much of Fitzgerald's understanding of back play comes from Tony Smeeth, his under-13 coach, who remained an influential figure through Fitzgerald's Junior Cup and Senior Cup years. And Frank Macken, "just so enthusiastic about the game". And Turlough O'Brien.
"I absolutely loved the place", he says of his alma mater. Boarding for a year meant he could eat, sleep and drink rugby along with like-minded peers such as Dave Moore, Paul Ryan and Niall Morris.
Looking back he realises it wasn't the be-all and end-all: "Some of the guys go all out for it. Don't touch a drop for the whole year. It's their everything, and that's it for them, which is a shame because you lose an awful lot of talent."
He muses about this conundrum. "Maybe it is over-competitive, and maybe guys are burnt out. They find the pressure too much and maybe don't enjoy their rugby, and maybe they're not that type of animal. The one thing that schools rugby has to be careful of is that personal development isn't sacrificed just so that the team does well."
When wondering why so many young rugby players opt for rugby league in Australia, David Knox explained to him that this was a better forum for developing individual skills.
Fitzgerald went to a few summer camps in rugby in French in Soustons, near Biarritz. "I didn't want to go home. I absolutely adored the place. I spent three-and-a-half weeks the second time. The weather was great, we played loads of 'tip', and the emphasis was very much on skills, always moving the ball, passing off both hands. It improved my game a lot.
"Brian O'Driscoll and Denis Hickie came out and there's a great picture of me - I was about 14 and I was eight and a half stone. One of the lads sent it me by email with the caption 'Getting Ready for Ireland's Call'. And I'm just above their waist."
He also now appreciates how difficult it is to balance rugby and third level studies, having this season begun a BA in economics, history and philosophy. "To be honest, it's not working out. It's very hard to do the two. I'd say I'll be calling a halt to that and doing a part-time degree."
UCD couldn't have been more co-operative, and he wonders about his motivational and organisational skills.
But he believes it's important to broaden the mind, if in part to make him a better player, citing the examples of D'Arcy, Kearney and, of course, Dr Phil. "Felipe's mind is always active, and maybe that's partly why he's such a clever player and such a good thinker on the game. And for a lot of the guys, it's good to have something to do apart from rugby. Not that I'd have too much trouble doing rugby all the time," he smiles, self-deprecatingly.
There are other sacrifices in being a professional rugby player. He smiles when thinking of his peers who have a more active social life, though is fortunate he rooms with Leinster Academy and UCD flyer Vasily Artemiev, and his old school-mates are playing competitively in Blackrock.
With gym work and video work, he's "ashamed to admit" his primary occupation away from rugby is his cherished X-Box. "A lot of the lads have the X-box as well. You'd be on the computer and playing games against Jamie and Steve, and even Mal is on it as well. It's like having a telephone conversation. You'd be shooting each other and saying: 'I'm gonna get ye; you're useless'. I do a bit of reading and . . . Jaysus, what do I do?"
He has four caps, the first in the last Test at Lansdowne Road against the Pacific Islands in the autumn of '06. It was an open game, which suited him, though he was very nervous. "I made one defensive blip, but I felt comfortable at that level and I really enjoyed it."
Yet, thanks in part to niggly injuries, his second cap didn't come until that late cameo in the second summer Test in Argentina. He still managed to look good.
He provided some shafts of light as a replacement in the defeats to Wales, and in Twickenham. Spotting a gap, he took one great line off Shane Horgan, knowing "Shaggy always gets his hands free", only to run into Tony Buckley. In a blink he was on the ground, and thought: "Jeez, I must have got whacked there."
He wants to play a big part in the Magners League run-in, and win it, and has long set a goal of playing the summer Tests against the All Blacks and Australia. And improving his defence, his passing before contact, maintaining consistency and all the while enjoy himself. Onwards and upwards.
"I've been dreaming about being the world's best rugby player since I was about five. Ever since I picked up a ball it's what my dad's pushed
Date of birth:September 13th, 1987.
Height:6'1' Weight:92kg
School:Blackrock College.
Honours:One Junior Cup, two Senior Cups, Leinster Schools (4 caps), Ireland Schools (3 caps).
Club:Blackrock RFC
Leinster Under-19s (3 caps).
Leinster Caps: 36 (8 tries).
Magners League Caps: 27 (5 tries) Heineken Cup Caps: 9 (3 tries) Ireland A (2 caps).
Ireland: 4 caps.
