O’Connell: fear of failure at fortress Thomond driving Reds

MUNSTER captain Paul O’Connell has revealed ‘the fear factor’ which motivates his side every time they march into Heineken Cup battle at Thomond Park.

The province have been beaten only once in European action at home – against Leicester Tigers in January 2007 – and it’s not a sensation that O’Connell and his colleagues wanted to experience again.

Another Premiership side attempt to storm their fortress on Friday night. Northampton Saints arrive on Shannonside with an enviable record having never lost to Munster in the competition. That’s a record O’Connell wants to smash.

“It’s an interesting statistic,” admitted O’Connell, “and it’s also interesting to note they are on a run of 10 successive wins. They’re a very good side, every bit as good as the Leicester team that came over and beat us in Thomond Park three years ago. That memory always adds to the fear factor of playing big games in Thomond Park – especially against sides of this quality. It was a very disappointing day for everyone involved three years ago.

“In relation to fear, it’s a question of finding a balance, sometimes that fear of losing can be crippling and sometimes if you don’t have it, certainly when we don’t have it, you might tend not to perform,” he said.

But O’Connell was also keen to stress the upsurge in form which his side has shown since December and that stunning win away to Perpignan.

“We’re doing some things very well and other things not so well but I’m delighted with the way we have come back to secure those (recent) wins.

“For instance, I was pleased with the way we finished off things early on in Treviso, our ball handling and so many of the things we tried to do was so accurate. I think we’re headed in the right direction. But there is no fear of us getting ahead of ourselves; there’s a lot of work still to be done,” he said.

The scrums and rucks are, he insisted, works in progress, and O’Connell admits that errors in these sectors cost them dearly when the sides last met.

“In that first game, the outcome of the scrums and at particularly at the breakdown stopped any momentum we tended to build. Northampton were very good there, we won our first ball off the top of the line out and they poached it, we went out wide a couple of minutes later and they poached it again at the breakdown.

“We weren’t very good in that area first game; since then we have worked on it and improved and I would say that by the time we got to Perpignan it was a big strength for us,” he said.

“Subject to occasional lapses of concentration, our scrum has been improving. We did really well against Treviso and home and away against Perpignan; that has given us (as a team) more and more confidence.”