Ryan relishing reunion with old friend and rival Molony
After several years of playing alongside him in the province’s second row, James Ryan will find himself in direct competition with Ross Molony when Leinster take on Bath in the European Champions Cup at the Aviva Stadium this evening (kick-off 5.30pm).
Following a nine-year stint as a Leinster senior player that saw him accumulating an impressive appearance tally of 184, Molony made a switch across the water to the English Premiership outfit on a three-year contract last summer. Despite not always being a guaranteed starter thus far at the Somerset-based club, the Dubliner is named in the first 15 for the visitors today along with former Leinster, Connacht and Ireland lock Quinn Roux.
Having been part of the same St Michael’s College team that reached the Leinster Schools Senior Cup final in 2013, Ryan knows Molony better than most in the Blues set-up. Given how recently he was a member of their squad, he acknowledges Leo Cullen’s men will need to be wary of the intel the 30-year-old might provide to a squad that are coached by ex-Munster supremo Johann van Graan.
“He’s going well. It’ll obviously be between himself, Charlie Ewels [who is named on the bench] and Quinn Roux. The three of them. By all accounts he’s loving it over there, he’s really enjoying it. He’s someone who has an understanding of what we do here, in terms of lineouts and so on. We have to be conscious of that,” Ryan remarked ahead of being named in the Leinster team to face Bath.
Heading into today’s final round game at Irish Rugby HQ, Leinster are already assured of a home draw in the Champions Cup Round of 16 as a result of consecutive victories against Bristol Bears, Clermont and La Rochelle. The eastern province were forced to dig deep before claiming a 16-14 win away to the latter last Sunday and, from Ryan’s perspective, their clash with Bath is all about backing up what they did in that compelling battle with Ronan O’Gara’s side.
“We had a six-day turnaround after Bristol when we played Clermont. We were a little bit off, we felt, in that performance. We had a good win at the weekend, but again, it’s a six-day turnaround and we have to make sure that we get our mindset right for the week to perform on Saturday.
“That’s the thing about rugby. It goes well for you at the weekend, but Monday comes around very quickly and all of a sudden you’re thinking about who you have next.”
While they do have a home game to look forward to in the next phase of Europe, a Leinster team stacked with players who are set to feature in this year’s Six Nations Championship won’t be short on motivation this weekend. As well as wanting to extend their unbeaten run in all competitions this season, the Blues will be looking for another win to give them the highest possible ranking heading into the Champions Cup knockout rounds.
This could lead them to getting home and home-country advantage at the quarter-final and semi-final stages respectively – if they get that far – but even though they are aware of what could be on offer, Ryan stressed the Leinster players aren’t too fixated on what today’s result could mean in a wider context.
“If you start looking at the permutations, points and so on, you can get sidetracked a little bit as players. For us, it’s just making sure we focus on our performance this weekend and get the win. Let the management worry a little bit about all the permutations and so on,” Ryan added.