Defiant Horan plotting Thomond atonement
He was so unwell two nights before the game that he didn’t sleep a wink and spent much of the time in the bathroom. He didn’t feel a whole lot better the following morning and very nearly got sick again on his way to meet up with his team-mates. He felt so poorly he didn’t feel like getting on the plane but coach Tony McGahan decided he should make the journey anyway.
“I went straight to bed on arrival and slept nearly all the way through,” he says. “I felt great in the morning but as the game went on, I faded badly. I hadn’t eaten in 24 hours which isn’t good going into a game like that but I got through as much as I could.”
It says much for Horan’s constitution and will power that he lasted so long and in the process touched down for a remarkable try.
He likes to hang out on the right wing and while the purists will doubtless feel he’d be much better employed closer to the scene of the forward action, it’s a strategy that has paid off many times in the past. Indeed, in his first full appearance as a late replacement for Peter Clohessy against Colomiers back in 1999, he scored a beauty.
“I was trying to make my way back in towards the ruck but the boys kept saying, keep wide, keep the width,” he recalled. “Wally was staying out and he pushed me out as well. He got a great pass out to me. I stepped to go in and went out again and I think that checked their full-back coming across. I couldn’t believe the space I had.”
Horan dismisses suggestions the Munster scrum struggled against their French opponents. Indeed, he sees things in a different light and made light of the heel that went against the head, simply stating that “the ball was kicked against my foot and bounced back into their side”.
Even more significant, though, was the way the scrum seemed to swivel a little and forced David Wallace to struggle to keep control in the set piece before Doug Howlett was checked right on the French line.
“The first heel was a cleaner strike and the ball got back cleanly to Wally and he would have had more time and their back row wouldn’t have been off as quickly had it not been necessary to reset the scrum,” he explained. “Small things like that stick in your craw. Clermont are a tough outfit. We showed last year at Thomond Park that we could take them on and put huge pressure on them in the scrum.”
All of which leads one to the view this was a game Munster left behind, all the more so because they could have two more tries in a first half after which they were still leading by four points at the break.
“Looking back on it, we feel we didn’t do ourselves justice in the second half,” Horan says before adding: “They’re a great side and their pride was hurt by losing to Sale at home.
“They’re coming to Limerick now with something to play for and we have put a bit or pressure on ourselves. It’s cup rugby from here on in. We need to start right on Saturday. The Thomond Park crowd definitely has a big say in things and I think people are getting used to the new stadium and hopefully what the boys did against New Zealand and what the crowd did that night … people will build on that. But we need to give them something to shout about in the first 10, 20 minutes.”
Horan takes no solace from people telling him that they didn’t understand why they conceded so many penalties against Clermont. “We can bitch and moan about refereeing decisions but the buck stops with us. They were still in the game because of our indiscipline. I think a lot of guys have taken a hard look at themselves this week.”
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