IT MAY HAVE taken him a little longer than he would have liked to get here, and when he did arrive it had been via a slightly alternative route, but Andrew Conway looks right at home on the international stage.
A fourth international cap against the Springboks on Saturday was furnished with a first international try. A moment he had waited years for.
“Yeah, it was brilliant,” he says.
“It’s kind of surreal for a bit and then you need to get back on the next job. It was a strange one. It was a bit of a hot potato and I went to grab it with a few of the South Africans and then it kind of just opened up and I knew from about 15 out that I was going to get it in the corner so it was a nice feeling.”
Conway had started the game brightly, with a booming clearing kick from deep helping him settle into the occasion of his first home start. Then came a couple of contestables under Johnny Sexton up-and-unders. Everything was coming his way.
And then the bounce of the ball fell perfectly.
Murray’s box-kick, Courtnall Skosan exposed and suddenly it opened up for the Munster winger. A dash for the line, and the moment to savour.
“I thought Johnny, who was calling for it inside, was a South African at the start,” Conway explains.
“I hit him an elbow and kept going. You don’t really hear much in those situations. I thought he was a South African. I grabbed it (the ball) off someone and spun out. I just felt someone on me. The jersey wasn’t the normal green jersey so I think I threw a little elbow, handoff thing and then I realised when he didn’t tackle me that it was probably one of the lads.
“I didn’t know it was him (Sexton) until he jumped on me when I dived over the line.”
Overall, a good evening’s work for a player who had been touted from an early age to be part of the Ireland back three for years to come. For one reason or another, it didn’t happen and Conway had to patiently wait until last March for his debut against England.
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PA Wire / PA Images
PA Wire / PA Images / PA Images
He then played twice during the summer tour of USA and Japan and following the loss of Keith Earls through injury, now looks likely to play a big part during this November schedule. And not a moment too soon.
“It has been a long time coming,” he admitted in the mixed zone afterwards.
“I have watched enough of the big games over the years with friends and team-mates and you are thinking you are good enough to be involved in them but I hadn’t the consistency of performance in my game.
“And I have probably added a few layers to my game which are important at international level. You can’t just be a one-trick pony. It was a big occasion, a tough build-up. Your head goes in all sorts of different directions. Are you able for this level? All these sorts of things. But once you are out on the pitch it is what you do three or four days a week to prepare of it.”
Last season proved to be a breakthrough year for the 26-year-old in more ways than one. He ended the campaign as Munster’s leading try-scorer and got that weight off his shoulders, all of which was just reward for a string of consistent and standout performances for the southern province.
But now that he has reached this level, Conway attributes the maturing process into a Test winger to a more focused, holistic and stringent approach to training and to rugby in general.
It was something of a coming of age and a growing realisation that it was now down to him to drive his evolution as a player and that raw talent alone would not suffice for where he wanted to go.
“Two or three years ago there was probably a shift in mindset. I always trained hard and did my weights but I probably didn’t have the holistic side of it where I broke down my game and got in touch with coaches and put a plan together to do extras and try and improve in loads of different facets. So it wasn’t that I wasn’t committed to it before. I just added a few different pieces to it the last few years.
“I try to train as smart as I can and hard as I can on a weekly basis. A few extra passing sessions, do some high-ball stuff with Felix [Jones] and kicking, stuff with Jacques [Nienaber] just being really consistent with it. As the season goes you pick up a few niggles, it is an rainy day in December and the easy option when you have been doing a few extras on the Wednesday and the body is tired is to think ‘ah no, I’m actually grand’.
“One of the big things is being diligent and disciplined enough to stick those things out. Always do the bits we’d planned and are in place and not go off task as the season goes on. That’s probably one of the things that has helped me a lot.”
Morgan Treacy / INPHO
Morgan Treacy / INPHO / INPHO
There wasn’t so much a defining moment for Conway but a gradual learning process during which he adapted that more holistic approach which helped him view his own game and performances from a subjective perspective rather than an objective one when emotions and frustrations were running high.
It makes him appreciate all of this that bit much.
“Definitely,” he continues.
“I’m massively grateful to be where I am now playing in a game like this but I’m not going to get too high because I know that next week or the week after when I play next is another 80 minutes.
“One of the things I have learned is not to get too uppity with the big wins and not too lows with the loss or the injury or whatever it might be, loss of form.
“As long as you are working hard and sticking to your processes it will come back. It’s as you grow with age. I’m delighted with how it went for us as a team and for myself. We’ll be building again next week.”
Is it a case of making up for lost time?
“I do sometimes feel like that and then the other times I’m like part of my journey is that I wasn’t involved in that way; that’s okay as well. It doesn’t have to be the normal route of being a schools star and getting capped when you’re 19 and having a great career for 10 or 15 years like some.
“Sometimes that’s great say for Lukey Fitz, he had a great career that unfortunately ended through injury. Everyone has different journeys that they are on themselves. I have thought about it in the past but then the other side of me thinks that’s just the way it is; it makes me appreciate being here more, definitely.
“But I haven’t gotten past the notions of I wish I had changed this when I was younger. I was like what I was like and now I am like what I am like. Hopefully I have a few years left in me.”
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Conway savouring the journey after hard work pays off on the long road to Test rugby
IT MAY HAVE taken him a little longer than he would have liked to get here, and when he did arrive it had been via a slightly alternative route, but Andrew Conway looks right at home on the international stage.
A fourth international cap against the Springboks on Saturday was furnished with a first international try. A moment he had waited years for.
“Yeah, it was brilliant,” he says.
“It’s kind of surreal for a bit and then you need to get back on the next job. It was a strange one. It was a bit of a hot potato and I went to grab it with a few of the South Africans and then it kind of just opened up and I knew from about 15 out that I was going to get it in the corner so it was a nice feeling.”
Conway had started the game brightly, with a booming clearing kick from deep helping him settle into the occasion of his first home start. Then came a couple of contestables under Johnny Sexton up-and-unders. Everything was coming his way.
And then the bounce of the ball fell perfectly.
Murray’s box-kick, Courtnall Skosan exposed and suddenly it opened up for the Munster winger. A dash for the line, and the moment to savour.
“I thought Johnny, who was calling for it inside, was a South African at the start,” Conway explains.
“I hit him an elbow and kept going. You don’t really hear much in those situations. I thought he was a South African. I grabbed it (the ball) off someone and spun out. I just felt someone on me. The jersey wasn’t the normal green jersey so I think I threw a little elbow, handoff thing and then I realised when he didn’t tackle me that it was probably one of the lads.
“I didn’t know it was him (Sexton) until he jumped on me when I dived over the line.”
Overall, a good evening’s work for a player who had been touted from an early age to be part of the Ireland back three for years to come. For one reason or another, it didn’t happen and Conway had to patiently wait until last March for his debut against England.
He then played twice during the summer tour of USA and Japan and following the loss of Keith Earls through injury, now looks likely to play a big part during this November schedule. And not a moment too soon.
“It has been a long time coming,” he admitted in the mixed zone afterwards.
“I have watched enough of the big games over the years with friends and team-mates and you are thinking you are good enough to be involved in them but I hadn’t the consistency of performance in my game.
Last season proved to be a breakthrough year for the 26-year-old in more ways than one. He ended the campaign as Munster’s leading try-scorer and got that weight off his shoulders, all of which was just reward for a string of consistent and standout performances for the southern province.
But now that he has reached this level, Conway attributes the maturing process into a Test winger to a more focused, holistic and stringent approach to training and to rugby in general.
It was something of a coming of age and a growing realisation that it was now down to him to drive his evolution as a player and that raw talent alone would not suffice for where he wanted to go.
“Two or three years ago there was probably a shift in mindset. I always trained hard and did my weights but I probably didn’t have the holistic side of it where I broke down my game and got in touch with coaches and put a plan together to do extras and try and improve in loads of different facets. So it wasn’t that I wasn’t committed to it before. I just added a few different pieces to it the last few years.
“I try to train as smart as I can and hard as I can on a weekly basis. A few extra passing sessions, do some high-ball stuff with Felix [Jones] and kicking, stuff with Jacques [Nienaber] just being really consistent with it. As the season goes you pick up a few niggles, it is an rainy day in December and the easy option when you have been doing a few extras on the Wednesday and the body is tired is to think ‘ah no, I’m actually grand’.
“One of the big things is being diligent and disciplined enough to stick those things out. Always do the bits we’d planned and are in place and not go off task as the season goes on. That’s probably one of the things that has helped me a lot.”
There wasn’t so much a defining moment for Conway but a gradual learning process during which he adapted that more holistic approach which helped him view his own game and performances from a subjective perspective rather than an objective one when emotions and frustrations were running high.
It makes him appreciate all of this that bit much.
“Definitely,” he continues.
“I’m massively grateful to be where I am now playing in a game like this but I’m not going to get too high because I know that next week or the week after when I play next is another 80 minutes.
“One of the things I have learned is not to get too uppity with the big wins and not too lows with the loss or the injury or whatever it might be, loss of form.
“As long as you are working hard and sticking to your processes it will come back. It’s as you grow with age. I’m delighted with how it went for us as a team and for myself. We’ll be building again next week.”
Is it a case of making up for lost time?
“Sometimes that’s great say for Lukey Fitz, he had a great career that unfortunately ended through injury. Everyone has different journeys that they are on themselves. I have thought about it in the past but then the other side of me thinks that’s just the way it is; it makes me appreciate being here more, definitely.
“But I haven’t gotten past the notions of I wish I had changed this when I was younger. I was like what I was like and now I am like what I am like. Hopefully I have a few years left in me.”
Better late than never.
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Andrew Conway flying winger Ireland November internationals November Tests seizing the chance