O’Gara looks to the future

THE life of a professional rugby player can be a relentless, hard business with little time to rest on one’s laurels. Last season may only be receding in the rear view mirror but, after a short break, Ronan O’Gara is already relishing his return to the Munster camp next week. A new season with new challenges beckons and one of Ireland’s most talked about figures wouldn’t want it any other way.

To those on the outside, dealing with the fallout from his experience during the second Lions Test in June might have taken its toll on the Munster and Ireland out-half, but, as O’Gara says himself, he put the whole affair behind him three days after the match. Yesterday he picked up a Red FM Cork South Side Sports Award but said that if he keeps talking about ‘the tackle’ on Jacques Fourie or ‘the penalty’ that led to Morne Steyn’s Series-winning drop goal, it’d only add fuel to the story.

However, it doesn’t mean he didn’t spend some of his holidays dwelling on a season garnished with more highs than lows.

“I must say I needed the break,’’ he said. “The Lions tour was obviously difficult towards the end, and then it was great to have holidays, learn from your mistakes, dwell on them for a little bit and then move on. And that’s exactly what I’ve done. I’ve got away, and feel rested now and refreshed. Coming back into the Munster scene, there’ll be huge ambition there and I can’t wait to start working with the lads again.”

Ambition was hugely evident in how Munster developed their game last season even if their Heineken Cup defence ended at the semi-final stage. Nevertheless, their rugby was thrill-a-minute, daring, displaying a kind of ambition that was matched off the park in their summer transfer dealings with the acquisition of Springbok centre, Jean de Villiers.

“At the level we’re at, you always need to try to attract the best players,” added O’Gara, “and the signing of De Villiers I think is indicitive of where we’re at. It’s a huge boost for us that someone like him, a class player, will sign for us. But there are no reasons he shouldn’t either. I think when you look at our record over the last 10 years Munster have been there so it might have been an easy choice for him.”

The personnel within the Munster squad will have altered when he returns next week to camp. Friends he’s battled with for years on European fields like Frankie Sheahan and Anthony Horgan have retired, others have been released while indigenous talent was promoted to full time contracts. It’s the nature of the business, he concedes.

“You always have to shake things up. That’s the ruthless side of professional rugby – everyone has a shelf life, and there comes a stage where they mightn’t fit into Tony (McGahan’s) or the rest of the coaches’ plans. People might find those decisions difficult to accept, but that’s all going to hit us at some stage. He (Tony) has to keep freshening it up, youth has to keep coming through and he’s working hard bringing local Munster players into the scene and try to get those into the European Cup squad.”

O’Gara says the challenge at international level is to maintain a level of consistency, of aiming to go out and annex another Grand Slam. Before all that Australia and South Africa visit in November, and maybe in his own mind O’Gara might have something to prove against the Springboks. No doubt his 2009 Lions experience will be raised once again come November.

“We’re probably beyond… well I’m certainly beyond the stage of looking at these one-off scalps, we’ll have to expect to win these games. We’re at home and they’ll be coming to end of their season. I know from touring down there it’s difficult when you’re coming to the end of a long hard season to keep that focus. But that’s what separates them from the other sides in the world; the top three can maintain that ruthlessness throughout the season.

“We’re well capable of pulling off one-off scalps but I think with Deccie (Declan Kidney) now at the helm and his management team, he’ll be looking to beat these teams on a consistent basis.”

Kidney already has one eye on the 2011 Rugby World Cup. The Ireland head coach consistently talks about building a panel, and the fruits of his labour are already visible, says the Ireland No 10.

“That’s Declan, but as a player you don’t look at it like that. The philosophy that works for us at Munster is ‘last game, next game’ and that’s the way it has to be. But you need intense competition right throughout the (Ireland) squad. If you look at the front row, even out-half to an extent, there wasn’t much competition there (before), but now there is and that’s exactly what’s needed right across the board.”