Hickey pleased at Cork Con form
RUGBY
Daire Walsh
CORK CONSTITUTION head coach Brian Hickey was pleased to end 2018 on a positive note last Saturday at Lakelands Park.
They claimed a convincing 34-14 victory against Terenure College in Division 1A of the All-Ireland League, giving the pace-setters a fourth win in as many weeks, moving them five points clear of the chasing pack.
“There’s a long way to go now,” said Hickey.
“The most pleasing thing as well is the fact we came to Dublin three weeks of the four and I thought that showed great discipline from the players, to keep their standards up right through the games. The Clontarf game, the UCD game, home against Young Munster and now away against Terenure.
“The thing about the break now is it’ll probably suit the teams who maybe haven’t been going so well.
“I think it’s a great way to structure the league like this and I’ve no doubt when we meet Terenure again on January 19 it will be full on.”
Their bonus-point triumph over ‘Nure was achieved with all of 12 minutes to spare – replacement Patrick Casey crossing over to complete a swift counter attacking move.
But while he was delighted to come away with maximum points, Hickey acknowledged it wasn’t a perfect performance by his charges on Terenure’s pristine all-weather surface.
“We’ve had some real tussles with Terenure the last few seasons, not least the two [regular season] games last year,” said Hickey. “I think we saw again today how dangerous they are.
“I was very pleased with some aspects of the game, but then there was one or two others where we were maybe a bit inaccurate.
“Even when you’re 14 points ahead, you’re always wary they can score from anywhere and very frequently do.
“One of them, we gave up a line-out on their own line and then about 25 phases later they’re down on our try-line. That’s something we’re going to have to look at.
“I think a couple of things went right for us today and conditions were difficult, but probably not as bad as we thought they were going to be.
“We’re getting a bit more comfortable on the astros than we would have been this time last year and that was pleasing as well.”
Nevertheless, there were some key individual displays across the board for Con on the day, with captain Niall Kenneally in excellent form at inside centre.
Hickey reserved special praise for his captain and also expressed his delight at welcoming Sean French back into the match day squad.
“He [Kenneally] has been huge for us. That’s the one thing about Niall, he’s a big game player and he does big things in the game,” said Hickey.
“It was great to get Sean French [game time], who signed with us over the summer.
“A very good up-and-coming player, and it was great to get him on the pitch today after his injury and his time away with Munster.
“It was good that we could move people around a little bit.”