Green relishing ‘fantastic’ Leinster experience

AS a regular with a hugely successful Wasps side in the war of attrition that is the English Premiership, Will Green was well used to being flogged like a horse but he found that he missed the whip when he first moved to Ireland.

The 33-year-old prop found himself with unprecedented amounts of time on his hands on any number of weekends. But It was time he didn’t want.

It is now eighteen months since he crossed the Irish Sea though and the Leinster prop is now a committed convert to the IRFU’s unique fixtures calendar. He even credits it with elongating an already lengthy career.

“They’ve got a great set-up here in Ireland,” the Englishman says. “It’s fantastic. When I first came here, I admit that I found it a bit frustrating because I was used to the bread and butter of playing rugby every week.

“Now that I’m a bit older and a bit wiser, I can see that it will allow me play a bit longer. My mates back in England were asking me what I’m doing in February and March (during the Six Nations) and I said ‘well, I’m playing one game of rugby’.”

Though his workload has dropped, the job is equally rewarding thanks to the philosophy Michael Cheika and David Knox have imported to Donnybrook from their Randwick roots in Sydney.

Some of the movements Leinster string together can be awe-inspiring, but it does ask a lot of the poor old grunts like Green.

“It tends to burn your lungs alright but it’s fantastic and I’m really enjoying playing the style of rugby we play. I can take three or four balls on and make 15 tackles in a game but, if the scrum isn’t doing well then I’m not doing my job. So, I’ve got to concentrate on the basics.”

Now more than ever. Against the Ospreys last weekend, Green and the rest of the Leinster pack operated under the new scrummaging laws brought in on January 1.

Designed to make scrumming safer after recent concerns over the welfare of props and hookers, there is now a four-stage sequence for the engagement of the scrum instead of three and Green is a fan.

“All it has done is take the hit out slightly, but it has also called for a bit more technique maybe. It’s quite early days and all the old dinosaurs are going to have a go at it. It’s never like it was in their day but it’s pretty tough out there.

Green is no stranger to the odd pain in the neck himself and it was just such an injury that forced him out of the back-to-back Heineken Cup wins over Agen and the St Stephen’s Day defeat to Munster.

He did return in time to say farewell to 2006 and Lansdowne Road against Ulster on New Year’s Eve but he will be eager to ensure that his latest European experience — against Edinburgh tomorrow — tastes sweeter than his last.

That was also against the Gunners, at Murrayfield in late October, when a last-gasp drop goal from Duncan Hodge wrestled what seemed to be certain victory from Leinster’s grasp by the smallest possible margin.

“A lot of people said we went to Murrayfield in late October and lost the game, but that is completely disrespectful to Edinburgh. They beat us fair and square and we are looking forward to a massive challenge on Saturday.”