LINE CROSSED FOR CONWAY
Conway passed the test with flying colours
IT’S fair to say that post-match media duties are not one of the perks of being a professional rugby player. The time could be spent celebrating with teammates or catching up with old acquaintances over a beer instead of fielding questions about what went right or wrong during the previous 80 minutes.
Therefore, it was slightly unusual to see the smile plastered across Andrew Conway’s face when he emerged from the tunnel following Ireland’s 38-3 pasting of South Africa last weekend — but then again, why wouldn’t he be looking forward to talking about it?
After a long, difficult road to the international stage that was peppered with some gutsy individual decisions, Conway finally found himself where he has always wanted to be. When he was making his way through the youth system he would have relished scoring a try and playing a starring role in a record win over a nation that has caused Ireland endless headaches.
The most interesting point in his journey came in January 2013, when Conway turned down a new contract with Leinster and traded the RDS for Thomond Park as he looked to make a fresh start with a new team.
Not that Conway was excess baggage in Dublin 4, the former Blackrock College student clocking up 42 appearances and scoring 40 points during his four seasons with the Blues.
He first started to garner attention while playing on the Blackrock Senior Cup team, before seamlessly making the step up to Schools level with Ireland and then shining with the Under 20s — scoring 13 tries in 16 games across two seasons — with his hat-trick of tries against Scotland from full-back a highlight of a disappointing ninth-place finish at the 2010 U20 World Cup in Argentina.
It was that display which rubber-stamped the impression Leinster had a very special prospect on their hands.
The 18-year old signed his first professional contract after spending just one season in the Academy, putting pen to paper just as a certain Joe Schmidt was unpacking his bags at Leinster HQ.
The feeling was that it was a case of when, not if, he would nail down a place in the Leinster first 15.
That said, Conway didn’t have to look too far around the Leinster dressing room to lock eyes on a direct rival, with Luke Fitzgerald, Shane Horgan, Fergus McFadden, Isa Nacewa and both of the Kearney brothers all vying for a coveted spot at either full-back or on the wing.
A combination of injuries and the assortment of riches available to Schmidt meant that opportunities were limited, and after four seasons Conway decided he had had enough, despite clocking up 25 of his 42 caps in his last year with the Blues.
So, the young Dubliner decided to take the road less travelled and ventured south to join fierce rivals Munster, as the prospect of more years sitting on the bench jarred with Conway’s dream of representing his country — a goal he would later admit became a ‘monster’ in his head.
Of course, a change of scenery wasn’t enough in itself to boost him up the international pecking order.
After scoring his first try for Ireland against the Boks, Conway was honest about how he had to address his limitations as a player in order to become a more attractive option at Test level, adding some extra sessions with technical coach Felix Jones and defence coach Jacques Nienaber at Munster in order to avoid being viewed as ‘a one-trick pony’.
That dedication — which included high-ball and defensive work to compliment his attacking threat — soon began to pay off, and Conway entered the current international win- dow with a hit rate of 25 tries from 86 appearances in the red of Munster — roughly one fivepointer every three-and-a-half games.
Schmidt simply couldn’t ignore the form of his former student, and Conway was finally capped during Ireland’s 13-9 defeat of England in this year’s Six Nations, the head coach throwing him in at the deep end when Keith Earls was forced off after 40 minutes.
That solid showing resulted in more gametime on the summer tour of the US and Japan, but last week was the real acid test and Conway passed with flying colours as his family watched from the stands.
Despite being the second smallest player on the Irish team, his energetic presence proved a constant problem under the high ball for the Boks, and that opportunistic try was the icing on the cake of a standout performance.
With a hugely-important Six Nations campaign looming around the corner he’ll be hoping to add to his tally tomorrow, with the versatile Conway shifted to the No15 jersey for the visit of a traditionally leaky Fiji. Ireland’s winning margin in their three previous meetings is 36, 47 and 35 points.
Soaking up the good feeling after beating South Africa, Conway admitted he was hoping to catch up with one of the men who helped him reach that stage, with Nienaber having recently swapped Thomond Park for the Boks.
‘I texted Jacques to see if he will have a pint with me but I haven’t heard back,’ he admitted.
If Conway can keep on this upward curve, he won’t have to dig into his own pockets to buy a pint for much longer.