DAN MCFARLAND WAS quite a late addition to the Ulster backroom before the season kicked off as contract wrangling kept him tied up with the Scottish Rugby Union until August.
However, once in situ, he made his overriding message crystal clear to an Ulster squad emerging from arguably the lowest ebb in the province’s professional history.
He first used the phrase “fight-for-every-inch mentality” when he first sat down to speak with the media in Belfast. He freely admitted it was nothing new or revolutionary, but as matches ticked by with last-gasp wins over Scarlets and Edinburgh or a dramatic draw in Bloemfontein, the more McFarland spoke the credo out loud, the more it seemed to manifest on the field.
By the time it came time to face Leinster in the Champions Cup quarter-final, it was a non-negotiable baseline for anything that might come after.
“That attitude is only a foundation. It’s something you can build on. It has to be there, it will be there. But it has to be more than that,” he said the day before the agonising tight defeat at the Aviva Stadium.
Today, in a ‘season review’ posted on Ulster’s website McFarland referred to the cultural targets he had in mind before the season rather than any quantitative measures that may have been reflected in progress to Europe’s last eight and the Pro14 semi-finals.
“I didn’t have any specific expectations in terms of results. However, I had very specific goals in terms of what we wanted to achieve culturally and in the way that we played,” McFarland says.
We were really pleased with the work that the guys have done on the pitch and the development that we’ve made there. We demonstrated a passion and competitiveness that is so crucial to the fabric of Ulster Rugby.”
On the second-place finish, behind only Leinster, in Pro14 Conference B, the rookie head coach added:
“Those positions were fought for. I think there were 15 games in which we finished within eight points of the opposition, and we only lost two of those.
“So by no stretch of the imagination were we cruising into play-off games like Munster, Glasgow and Leinster. We had to fight for every inch, every point. That’s a massive positive but it also demonstrates that there’s a huge amount of work to do to ensure that we can do that year in, year out.”
Formerly a forwards coach with Connacht, Glasgow Warriors and Scotland, the 47-year-old admitted there had been a learning curve in taking the hot seat for the first time. And he is intent on continuing to learn.
Development is the keyword in McFarland’s aims for next season too. After he looked forward to welcoming Bill Johnston, Gareth Milasinovich, Jack McGrath, Sam Carter and Matt Faddes to the playing personnel and Roddy Grant as forwards coach the ex prop said:
“We want to develop our playing style, we want to develop our culture and we want to push forward with the aim of being a team that can consistently competes for championships.
“We’ll continue to assess ourselves on how well we’re doing that and the rate at which we’re doing that.”
2 La Ligas in a decade that sound like the best team of the decade?
To be fair 4 champions leagues in the last 5 years. As horrible a club like Real Madrid are in how their fans repeatedly boo their own players, treat their managers and truly believe they are above normal footballing rules as is standard across the board just because they are Real Madrid they are the best team of the last decade but Pepe is entitled to his opinion…maybe his view is biased with his Barca links as Mick McCarthy maybe be biased in how he views Gary Breen as one of the best Irish players that has ever walked the planet :-)
@Patrick McHugh: we all dream of a team of Gary breens a team of Gary Breens a team of Gary Breens
@Patrick McHugh: Guardiola is trolling of course. Barca have a superior league record recently but Real is also the first team to reach 4500 points in La Liga … the fans do boo players and it’s a shock for some to witness it but it only happens when they reckon the player isn’t giving a 100% effort , or is putting himself above the club . There are no sacred cows . And the results speak for themselves as does the fact that most players dream of playing for them … don’t write them off just yet in CL either . Ajax is the next rival up , a lot of injuries are clearing up and the fitness levels are back to where they should be after Lopeteguis departure .. it’s unlikely they’ll do a comeback in La Liga but the CL is still a strong option and let’s see what happens in Copa del Rey tonight
@Limón Madrugada: Visca Girona!!
@Karlos McGrath: let’s see what happens , won’t be an easy game but Real seem to have found their scoring boots at last . Hala Madrid !
@Limón Madrugada: To be fair to pep, he clearly thinks that winning the league consistently over the last ten years is a bigger feat than the CL.
And in that regard, Barca have dominated.
@Margarita Huanca: he clearly doesn’t because he signed for Bayern to win the CL for them , ultimately they didn’t need him to win their domestic league … similarly he signed for Man City who won leagues without him but are still way off a CL ..
@Limón Madrugada: True lad, but he did specify the domestic league when making this statement.
And to be honest, I think he has a point.
@Limón Madrugada: found this, didn’t think the all time record was that even https://www.goal.com/en/news/real-madrid-barcelona-clasico-record-head-to-head/hxdm74dgfby81w9bsiejduy05
@Dave O Keeffe: who did you expect to be further ahead ??
@Margarita Huanca: no he did not , he said ‘every year they win , the leagues , the cups’ so why do 4 of the last 5 CL not count ?
It’s a league ( of sorts) and a CUP … not to mention Real did the treble two years ago … and have been World club champions meanwhile too .. Guardiola is deliberately omitting Real Madrid , which in the end is a backhanded compliment … he’s a bitter and resentful man sometimes beneath his superficial saintly image
@Limón Madrugada: thought Real would be ahead by a good bit