Hansen ‘shell-shocked’ after Lions mauling
IrelandwingerMackHansensaidhewas “shell-shocked” after watching his Connacht side suffer a 38-14 mauling from the Lions at Dexcom Stadium.
The shock loss to a side who had never won in Ireland, and only scored one victory outside South Africa in the past year, puts a big dent in Connacht’s hopes for a URC knock-out spot and qualification for next season’s Champions Cup.
Hansen – out with a shoulder injury since January – was on punditry duty with RTÉ and was typically forthright in his comments after seeing his side go down heavily to a Lions side who played more than three-quarters of the game with 14 men.
“I’m a bit shell-shocked to be honest. It looked like every time the Lions had the ball they were cool, calm and collected and saw their offloads a lot compared to us who looked frazzled,” he said. “We looked like we were trying to push the envelope when we didn’t have to and they fairly flipped the script.
“Theywereactuallytheoneswhowere speeding up the game at some points, spreading it wide. They were throwing the ball around with ease. It was a great win for them and the fellas weren’t just up to it today really.
“The Lions looked so comfortable out there and when a team is that comfortable and putting pressure on you, you end up chasing the game and that’s what happened us and that’s never a good place to be.”
Connacht have now slipped out of the top half of the table heading into the final third of the campaign and face another crunch eight-/ten-pointer away to Benetton in Treviso next weekend, and Hansen believes there will be a response.
“Maybe it’s the rocket we need as well.
Everything is the way you look at it. We come away from this game knowing we put no pressure on them and then the pressure they gave to us we didn’t just deal with it. It’s very disappointing, especially at home, but it could be a really good way to take a lot of learnings from it into the back end of the season.”
Hansen (left) – who will be 26 on Wednesday – said he was targeting a return to play in May, which see him returnfortheawaytietoMunsteronMay11.
“It is coming along very well,” he added. “I still have about a month and a bit, hopefully looking at around the Munster game to come back. That would be exciting to get back playing in a derby game. To come back for a derby game would be the best-case scenario. Just have to wait and see, we are not going to rush it. I’ll come back when it is good and ready.
“It has been frustrating watching everything going on, not only with Connacht but with the Ireland team doing so well. Obviously, you want to be involved, you want to be playing rugby, that’s why we play the game. But I can see light at the end of the tunnel now.”