Penney hails ‘excitement machine’ Zebo

Munster winger Simon Zebo put pen to paper on a three-year contract yesterday and was told he has at least a decade of top-flight rugby ahead of him with the province.

The 22-year-old Corkman is having the season of his young career, emerging as an automatic choice for Munster and enhancing his Test prospects no end after an Ireland debut in New Zealand last summer and an impressive autumn series at full-back for Declan Kidney.

With a two-year contract up at the end of this season, Munster yesterday announced, along with new contracts for eight other players, that Zebo had signed a fresh deal that would keep him in red until the end of the 2015-16 campaign.

That left head coach Rob Penney talking about “an excitement machine” who would fit in very well in his native New Zealand. High praise indeed for a nation that in recent years has produced wing talents of the calibre of Joe Rokocoko, Cory Jane, Hosea Gear and Sitiveni Sivivatu, to name but four, as well as current Munster captain and All Blacks record try scorer, Doug Howlett.

“Look, without blowing too much smoke, he is a genuine rugby talent, and I think we’ve all seen that he is an excitement machine,” Penney said of the wing he is resting for tomorrow’s RaboDirect Pro12 home game with Cardiff Blues.

“People have told me two years ago playing B&I Cup or All Ireland League, he has a talent that he just needed to rein in and harness and obviously he has gone a long way.

“For example, little things like body comps (body mass index), I think he had some really positive news about his body comps from probably the first time seeing the nutritionist.

“He is a young man who’s made massive shifts in a short period of time and he’s going to continue to grow and be an exciting footballer for Ireland and Munster. It is great to see a guy with his talent able to express himself and play so well. It is a great thing.”

Penney said Zebo had the X-Factor that had made the likes of Howlett and co. All Blacks legends.

“I think he would do well in New Zealand, he would be someone you could put into an environment over there and he would succeed.”

While Penney has had the benefit of Zebo’s best season to date, the former Canterbury coach admitted the Blackrock native had simply seen everything click into place during his tenure.

“For me, I haven’t had enough time to have any major influence on Zeebs, at all. All those people who have worked with him in the past need to take a lot of credit.

“There is a great saying ‘when the student is ready, the teacher appears’ and I think for Zeebs the light has come on, all of the information he has been getting from multiple people all of a sudden becomes ‘I understand what’s required’.

“For Simon, all we’ve hopefully done is given him a framework where he can use his best attributes to the full. And we start to see that at times when we get into a rhythm with our game. The try he scored the other day (against Ulster) was just indicative of the potential that that guy has got. We have secured him for three years and hopefully he can be here for 10.”

Aside from Zebo, Munster have also secured the services (on two-year deals) of back-rowers James Coughlan, Sean Dougall and Paddy Butler, lock Dave Foley and hooker Mike Sherry, while Dave O’Callaghan, JJ Hanrahan and Luke O’Dea are upgraded from development contracts to full professional deals of a similar length.

Aside from 32-year-old Coughlan, the young 20-something age profile of those signed reflects Penney’s development plans for an athletic and intelligent rugby-playing Munster squad but the head coach also said he hoped new deals for more experienced players such as BJ Botha and Ronan O’Gara, both of whom are out of contract this summer, would be finalised soon.

“I am rapped with the guys that have signed,” Penney said. “They are the core of the future of the group. And there is still one or two to go. I think, hopefully, those lads can get through relatively unscathed in the next 10 years and be great names for Munster.

“The overseas guys, we are working through that process as we speak. Some of those are coming up for renewal. It is not only my flavour, it is a coaching group flavour, given the philosophical shift that we have brought around the type of game we are looking to play and the type of athletes we need to play the game, it goes hand in hand with that.”

Specifically asked about Botha and O’Gara, Penney added: “Yeah, they are all in progress and like all, some contracts are black and white and really easy to deal with and some contracts are a little more challenging. They are all progressing in a really positive way.”