NOT QUITE READY TO PETER OUT
Stringer still going strong
FORMER Ireland scrum-half Peter Stringer says he’s as fit now as he was 15 years ago and is determined to keep on playing as long as he has the opportunity.
He will be 40 by the time his short-term deal with Worcester Warriors comes to a conclusion at the end of December, but the former Munster stalwart insists he is enjoying it as much as ever.
Worcester, who have added former Ulster coach Alan Solomons to the management team headed up by another South African Gary Gold, travel to the Sportsground on Saturday to take on Connacht.
Both teams have five points in the bag after the opening round, with Connacht winning 43-15 away to Oyonnax while struggling Worcester got their first win of the season at home to Brive.
And while Stringer won’t be heading to Galway, he knows his colleagues, skippered by another Munster veteran Donncha O’Callaghan, will need a big performance to take the points.
‘Connacht have come on massively in the last few years,’ he remarked. ‘There are no easy games at all, in the Premiership or Europe. It’s a competitive season, we need a big squad.
‘We have a lot of good young guys coming through. But Connacht at the Sportsground will be a tough challenge again,’ said Stringer, who has played in five of the club’s six league games this season.
It’s been a tough start to the Premiership for bottom-of-the-table Warriors, but Stringer was delighted to get the call from Gold to pitch up at Sixways Stadium for the opening half of the season.
‘I want to be playing at the highest level and I want to be playing in a competition that I found it challenges you,’ he added.
‘I want to be competing for a starting place here. I want to be competing for as long as I can at a top level. As long as I keep striving for that, being able to play as many minutes as I can each week, I’m just trying to do what I can for Worcester at the moment.
‘Donncha O’Callaghan being here was a massive factor in me coming here. And Gary Gold as well, a coach I had worked with before, I have a huge amount of respect for the guy. I worked with him at Newcastle and Bath.
‘He brought me to Bath initially. It’s a great club from my experience in the last couple of weeks since I have been here.
‘I have loved it, a really professional set-up and I am really looking forward to getting stuck into the season.’
Stinger and O’Callaghan came up through the ranks together, but the Cork pair never thought they would still be ploughing away in their late thirties at the same club in the English midlands.
‘You never know the way things will turn out. For Donncha to be announced as club captain, it’s truly deserved.
‘When he speaks in the changing room and out on the field, the guys listen around him. He is a fantastic leader, I know that and I am glad the guys here have got to witness that.
‘Anything I can bring to the party as well, and help him along the way I am only happy to do so. It’s great to be back with him again.
‘We started out in 1997 together and to be here 20 years later, it’s fantastic.
‘I just completed my 20th preseason. I feel great, I genuinely feel as I did 10 or 15 years ago. You love the game, you work hard at it.
‘It doesn’t come easy, there are a lot of sacrifices and a lot of elements that go together to putting in performances and making sure you are in the right physical shape.’