Looking good: Harlequins
Harlequins are sitting pretty at the top of Pool Three after a near-perfect start to their Heineken Cup campaign, much to the delight of director of rugby Conor O'Shea.
Saturday's 30-22 victory on road to Connacht leaves the English champions four points clear of Biarritz ahead of Quins' home and away clashed with minnows Zebre.
"We are very comfortable to have nine points (after our first two pool matches). To have denied both Biarritz and Connacht a losing bonus point is a huge thing," said O'Shea .
"We have put ourselves in a very good position, but we learned a lesson two weeks ago in Exeter. If we mess around and don't come with our 'game heads' on, any team can do a job and we want to do a job in six or eight weeks' time (against Zebre).
"Do you come here and have an easy ride? I have been coming here all my life and you don't," he admitted.
"When a team base a lot of their season around one match, you see the build-up around it, you feel the crowd and you give them that bit of energy by getting your defensive line wrong in the first try - well, you are going to be in a game."
Connacht head coach Eric Elwood was left to rue an 11-minute spell before half-time during which Quins scored 15 points without reply.
"We were leading 19-9 at that stage and they got 15 unanswered points. One of them (the Care tries) was a soft set piece try. They are a good side and once you give them the ball they are just so good," said Elwood.
"At half-time it was 65-35 per cent possession and you cannot give teams like Harlequins that amount of possession. We had a plan that we wanted to attack from deep - there is no point kicking to a team like Harlequins.
"It was a full house and we wanted to challenge them and we showed that with the possession in the first half. Unfortunately we did not get enough in the second half.
"We fought to the bitter end. The only thing I am disappointed with is that we got nothing out of the game - a bonus point would have been something for their efforts tonight."
Comments
heart_of_oak says...
Care looking great. As for Easter, why couldn't he have produced this sort of form when he was younger ? Valiant effort by Connaught as well but Quins, as Elwood says, just too good for them.
Posted 08:34 23rd October 2012
pog_mahone says...
Great first half, disappointing second - from both teams. Game got a little flat, but I think both sides had run themselves into the ground in the first half. Nick Easter and Danny Care in particular were very impressive, as was Ben Botica stepping in for Nick Evans. I was also very impressed with the Connacht home grown young talent particularly in the back line, bolstered by some key overseas players like George Naopu, Dan Parks and Fetu'u Vainikolo.
Posted 19:15 22nd October 2012