No masking brilliance at number eight

WHILE he may have the kind of French name Irish people may struggle to get their tongues around, there has never been any doubt as to Imanol Harinordoquy’s brilliance on the rugby pitch.

He proved the point yet again in spades in San Sebastian yesterday when in spite of wearing a grotesque-looking facial mask to protect a badly broken nose, he once again proved what a master he is of number eight forward play when inspiring Biarritz to a merited Heineken Cup semi-final victory over Munster. He seemed to be down injured all day but time and again he got up and carried on.

When he finally departed in the 65th, having inspired his side’scomeback, it was bruised ribs that forced t him ashore. It was littlewonder, then, that his coach, Jack Isaac lavished praise on Harinordoquy.

“He’s a great player and when he put the mask on and decided to run out for us, it was very pleasing and boosted the group a lot,” said Isaac.

“He probably wasn’t as good as he can be because of the injuries but it was a reflection of the courage all the guys showed throughout the park from one to 15. There were plenty of character in the group today.”

Isaac had said some very complimentary things about Munster in the build-up to the game but admitted last night: “I wasn’t expecting to dominate as much as we did but as I said there were eight guys in that forward pack who really gave their all. We’ve talked about Imanol (Harinordoquy) but I think there were seven other guys in that pack who really gave 100%.

“All our boys played out of their skins. That’s what made the difference I think. We know exactly what sort of team Munster are, a high quality team and very clinical, and our boys just showed enormous courage. That was probably what made the difference.

“We won the battle on the ground, on the ball, and we thought that was a particular area that was going to cause us a lot of problems but the boys were very aggressive in that tackle zone and that’s probably what pushed things in our favour.”

Isaac also praised his team as a unit. “There was no real panic to be honest with you,” he claimed. “I thought we were trying to play a bit too much ball in hand and we sort of paid the price for that as soon as we turned the ball over. We told the boys to calm down that Munster were in the game through our errors in the first half and so the boys stayed confident. We just had to change a few things at half-time to play the game in their half.

“I thought our ball possession was reasonably good in the second half and we played most of the game in their half. You expect a few penalties if you dominate and we gave away a few penalties in the later stages.

“I don’t think we were outstanding. We dominated the lineout and scrum and we didn’t use a lot of that ball. We need to alternate our kicking game and our running game. So there are things to work on.”