Connacht men earn reward for emptying their souls for cause

For the first and possibly only time in his rugby life, Connacht coach Pat Lam permitted his imagination to run riot when he advised all rugby supporters unable to get a ticket for the Sportsground on Saturday evening to "have a barbecue and get built up" for the match for which locals have been waiting all their lives. It's a beautiful thought but: has big Pat looked skyward lately?

A heavy veil of rain swept in from Galway Bay on Friday morning; it was one of those west of Ireland specials, making you fear that you are never going to see sunshine again. Locals don't bat an eyelid at this kind of crack: at the very most, they will cast a quizzical look at the heavens and note that "there was rain promised, all right".

It was the kind of deluge which causes the constant trail of tourists and visitors on Quay Street to stop in their tracks and wonder if the end, isn’t in fact, nigh.

And this latest weather front seemed intent on drenching every Glaswegian in town for Saturday’s big game at least eight times – on the walk up to the Sportsground, on the quick dash down to O’Connell’s on Eyre Square afterwards, on the monstrously long wait at the cash-points and, finally, at that time when night is turning to morning when they will inevitably find themselves down by the Spanish Arch trying to explain Bundee Aki to a stoned Afghani didgeridoo player, without the faintest idea of where his hotel is or where his mates are. Galway does that to visitors: it invites them to step out of themselves for a wee spell. There’s a feelin’ I get when I look to the west and all that. Many rugby visitors know that. They leave damp but happy.

The weather has become part of the Connacht rugby story and in a way it would be appropriate if it is – as promised – raining buckets when the team rumbles out to what will be guttural, frightening and intensely proud roar of appreciation.

Saturday’s semi-final will present the Sportsground at its best: early evening, raw May weather, a fully engaged local crowd and a sports theatre that, for all its well-advertised imperfections, has an elemental feel about it. The club could not have chosen a more serendipitous week on which to unveil its strategic vision for the next four years.

Culmination

The win against Glasgow a fortnight ago, to secure Saturday evening’s semi-final against the same opposition, has been the culmination of a hugely faith-affirming sports story.

One of the reasons that Connacht’s support base appreciate the team so deeply in this, its winning season, is that they were there during the many, many losing ones, when the world didn’t care a hoot whether Connacht won, lost or fell off the face of the earth. It is easy, just now, to forget precisely where Connacht were supposed to inhabit, year in and year out. Every opposition team knew the deal with Connacht.

They knew that the players and staff were operating on a smaller level than the other three Irish provinces. They knew that the teams, from Michael Bradley through Eric Elwood’s time in charge, would be fiercely combative and unreasonably proud of playing for a team that, more often than not, lived in the lowest reaches of the table. They also knew that if they kept running their plays and their bench, the resistance would crack sooner or later.

They knew the deal with away games in Connacht: the long journey, the cramped dressing rooms, the Atlantic spray that hit you as soon as you stepped outside, the bleakness of the place on nights when it wasn’t full and, of course, the fun to be had down the town afterwards.

The fearlessness and vision with which Pat Lam decided to play rugby from the moment he landed in Galway and the smartness of his recruitment policy have been the key factors in facilitating the team’s truly heady, heroic emergence as the most popular rugby team in the country just now.

Everybody is rooting for them and this week's half-daft venture into technology retrieval by several Connacht stars who, like Jules in Pulp Fiction, decided to strike down with great vengeance and furious anger at those who would attempt to destroy and poison their brother – let alone steal his laptop.

The incident was at once amusing and reckless and, as Lam pointed out, ultimately foolish. But you can’t help but think that the backroom staff were quietly thrilled at the what the little episode spoke about the sense of togetherness within the squad: vigilante policing is about as far removed from by-the-numbers professionalism as you could imagine.

And it is in keeping with the essential message which successive coaches have promised through the ages: that Connacht take on all comers, on their own terms.

A few years ago, in an interview with this newspaper, the then Galway football manager Alan Mulholland noted how visible Connacht had become in the city.

This was during the championship but the promenade in Salthill was festooned in rugby colours. Mulholland was impressed by the energy and innovation.

There is no doubt that Connacht have managed to make their presence felt over the last decade. It has been a slow process.

It goes back to the stunning cup runs engineered by Connacht in Michael Bradley’s time, when rugby didn’t get as much exposure.

TG4’s excellent documentary on Connacht was a priceless advertisement of the fact that the emotional investment and physical effort of the players and coaches went way beyond the definition of professionalism: they were emptying their souls into what seemed like an impossible cause.

Canny and patient

That collective sense of cause and emotion has now been flipped into a winning mentality through the canny and patient on-field vision of Pat Lam. Galway city has always been open to every sport without being defined by any one club.

But Connacht have tapped into a sense of belonging and community and defiance which has caught everyone’s attention. People across the province – from regular rugby supporters to the mildly curious – will be rooting for them. Whether by accident or design, there is a sense that this team represents the values and concerns and defiance of the entire province.

So Connacht are on a high, which is no bad place from which to lay out ambitions for the next four years. Staying in the Sportsground must surely be central to who Connacht are.

Perhaps a decade ago, the place seemed like a reflection of where the club stood: players and officials may have felt it an embarrassment whenever they visited more comfortable and moneyed clubs in Europe.

But a redeveloped stadium which retains that rawness of atmosphere – and which is designed with a seating capacity mindful of future seasons when Connacht won’t necessarily be appearing in league semi-finals – would help the club to retain the unique identity which has become its selling point.

For years, being the last outpost of European rugby; playing on a pitch which can resemble a Game of Thrones battle scene; revelling in the fact of having just survived, of never being beaten down: all of these traits have been transformed into a really potent elixir which ordinary clubs with comfy, standard-issue stadiums in the suburbs and temperate weather and a history of smooth reliability cannot hope to replicate.

Connacht are a bit different. It’s the kind of place that the head coach can advise the supporters to have a barbecue in the pouring rain and be confident that they will probably do it because nothing should get in the way of a good party.