Madigan enjoying life away from long shadow of Sexton
AS Joey Carbery and Ross Byrne are discovering, it’s difficult to make career plans when Johnny Sexton is the man ahead of you. Ian Madigan could have told them that.
Not that Madigan’s career has been unfulfilled – far from it. For a brief moment during the 2015 Rugby World Cup, when Madigan replaced Sexton in the first-half against France in Ireland’s final pool game, he helped secure a famous win and a quarterfinal with Argentina, breaking down in tears at the final whistle. He has played in France’s Top 14 and helped Bristol return to the Aviva Premiership.
But Madigan (right) knows that – here at least - he will always be seen as the man thwarted by Sexton.
“I was probably envious of what Johnny had with Ireland and Leinster,” Madigan reflects. “I wanted to be that guy myself, to have that connection with the coaches, to be able to call the shots on the pitch, and that was a big reason why I left Leinster.”
Despite this exile taking the 29 year-old out of contention for Ireland, the distance and particularly the time at Bristol has given him breathing space.
For all the praise that has been recently afforded to the Irish provincial set-ups in driving Ireland’s Grand Slam success and Leinster to the Champions Cup final in terms of how players’ workloads are managed, it can also be claustrophobic.
“When you are playing for Leinster and Ireland, it is pretty unrelenting,” Madigan adds. “Your family are all Leinster supporters and they might bring it up at the dinner table and your friends are all Leinster fans and they want the inside scoop. I suppose you are a Leinster and Ireland supporter yourself, so it is nothing short of an obsession.”
He remembers a time where he could not even go for a walk without rugby being on his mind.
SWITCHOFF
“If the team has lost one or two games, you are feeling the pain of that and you want to straighten it out. You have massive ambition to be winning trophies, and you really feel that. While as a young player, it was hard to switch off and get away from it. That is something I have learnt to do better, being away from Ireland. Having that freedom at Bristol has definitely helped.
Bristol is also affording him the chance to rediscover his identity and cast off his “Madigan the maverick” reputation.
“When you are breaking into the system in Ireland, I was breaking in as a 20, 21 year-old and you can certainly get branded with certain tags,” he said. “It could be, ‘he is not a good tactical kicker’, or ‘he is not a good talker on the field’, or whatever. “While you might iron those parts out of your game as your career moves on, you can still be tagged with them if you have been at a club for six, seven, eight years. I do think going to a different club allows you to get a fresh start, I feel you can prove them in a new environment. Maybe I am not as much of a maverick as I used to be, maybe I’m more of a consistent fly-half as I have got older. It is something I’ve been allowed to do.”
Pat Lam, his coach at Bristol who handed him a three-year contract, has been emphatic about transforming the West Country club into a Champions Cup team, a vaulting ambition that appeals to Madigan.
“Bristol and Bordeaux have definitely opened my mind,” he said. “When I was in Leinster everything is laid on for you, it is a fantastic club, you are surrounded by a similar group of players, which roll on each year with similar management, your family are there, your friends are there, large parts of it are easy.
“Going away, having to be able to get set up in a new country, meeting 50 new players, a new coaching staff, a new support staff, a new supporter base and having to do it the following year, you do learn a lot about yourself. They were challenges but I think I am all the better for it.” (© Daily Telegraph, London)