SAM PRENDERGAST HAS the ability to be one of the great Irish 10s, James Tracy told Gavan Casey and Murray Kinsella on Wednesday’s subscriber exclusive Rugby Weekly Extra podcast.
“He’s just got an element of skill and confidence that we don’t really have,” Tracy said. “He’s very different to the out-halves that we have, and we would typically select in Irish rugby. The prospect of something different is always exciting.
“It’s the confidence that he brings. If he can be proven to kick his goals and manage a game, he has all the other attributes to be one of the greats.”
Tracy said the youngster immediately caught the eye of his teammates at Leinster.
“In his first training session, he probably had two wow moments. In his second session, he probably had another two wow moments. In the third session, he probably had one and in his fourth training session he probably had three. Whether it was a 50/22, an offload or a little touch.
“Straight away, everyone was like ‘Jesus, this kid has something about him’.”
While Prendergast has excited teammates and fans alike in his short career to date, the 21-year-old’s next challenge is to stake a claim for the starting out-half position in the blue of Leinster.
“His ceiling is very, very high but he has to prove that he can control and manage a game, manage a team during the week, be part of the game plan, be part of the leadership side of things. He has to do that before he can start pushing Ross Byrne or Jack Crowley by kicking on to the next level. But my God, is his ceiling high,” Tracy said.
The 42’s Gavan Casey noted that the youngster’s physical attributes will likely benefit from a comprehensive pre-season before the beginning of the 2024/2025 campaign
“One of the most exciting things about Prendergast for me is that when you look at him, for all of his flashes of brilliance and all of his very conspicuous talent, he’s still quite boyish physically. When Johnny Sexton first came to prominence he was 23 or 24, a grown ass man. He was quite a big guy at that stage,” Casey said.
“Prendergast still looks to me like an U-20 or maybe just beyond that and he’s still doing these things. He will get bigger and stronger so I’m just excited to see how the next couple of years go.”
Kinsella said: “He looks really comfortable to me. When he played The Bulls in South Africa I thought he was Leinster’s best player on a tough day for them. He made good decisions. When he played a couple of weeks ago, I thought he called good plays too. He was very mature in that regard for the Irish U-20s, along with those moments of magic.”
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