Ronan O'Gara: No-one told me there'd be days like these

A January Sunday in Toulon in 2011 is like last week to me on a day it all got a bit too much. Munster were suffering at the Felix Mayol, and knew that failing to come out of the Heineken Cup group stages for the first time in 13 years was in our immediate future. That was hard to accept. I was yellow-carded for scuffling, there was a kango-hammer at my head and I just wanted it to be over. To go away. You don’t obliterate those times, Joey, but what doesn’t kill you makes you stronger.

Thirteen years on I am all-consumed by it still. I turned 47 recently. If I didn’t have a wife and wonderful family I could do fourteen hours a day without even thinking, fitting in the grub around the gig, seven days a week.

That is what it does to you.

Padel is a Mexican invention, but popularised in Spain, a cross between tennis, squash and badminton in a cage. The irregular bounces are like life itself, odd hops and curves thrown at you to negotiate in the moment. 

There are people who think it’s a power game, but it demands a lot of intelligence and clever thinking, avoiding silly errors. I’ll go three times a week from a core group of lads from the club who like putting me in my box. I didn’t play Wednesday, which is odd, and I am feeling it.

Last Saturday morning, it all felt quite good before our Top 14 game in Bayonne. I went for a long waddle along the water in Biarritz (others call it a jog). I didn’t set out to do anything like it but 14 kms later, after a brief stop for a coffee hit, I felt as fresh as paint.

You conjure up dozens of game scenarios and how you will deal with each of them. Putting French captain Gregory Alldritt back into the game was a risk coming off the Six Nations climax against England seven days earlier, but sometimes you are looking down stream with these choices.

We were coming off forty-points and thirty-point wins over Clermont and Stade Francais, conceding next to nothing. If someone had stopped me there and then and offered 13 points against us in Bayonne, I’d have grabbed wrist and arm.

I didn’t speak in the dressing room afterwards. It would have served no purpose. I was stewing. Bayonne are flinty and durable and they were ready for scalps. Work beats talent when talent doesn’t work.

The great levellers in sport are aggression, want and desire. Slice and dice it any which way, we didn’t need it enough. We had none of the essential attributes for 65 minutes, then when we put aggression and speed on the ball, we scored two beautiful tries. Too late though. We nearly escaped to victory but Antoine Hastoy hit the post with a penalty two minutes from time.

Maybe I was like this out of the womb, but lose anything in life but the battle. Munster cultivated that. I’m gone a while now but that never leaves.

I’ve got to take some heat too. They are my selection decisions. We have lost ten Top 14 games now. It’s not fatal but it’s not impressive. 

Antoine Hastoy, our driver, our tempo-setter, is struggling for stardust right now, but he’s got to play his way through it. He’s taken a hit with exclusion from the French set-up but he’s got to get up off the canvass. We are around the final bend, Round 20 of 26 on Saturday against Oyonnax, then our Champions Cup defence on the line in Capetown against the Stormers. Rocking up next Monday morning searching for the trip-switch won't get it done. It’s too late then.

Even from my playing days, re-entry into the club rhythms after a Six Nations campaign was tricky. People can underestimate the impact of test rugby, how much it takes out of you. For the French lads like Greg, England was a draining game after a difficult tournament. Losing at home to England is something you don’t do, even in Lyon. They won it with a last-gasp penalty from Thomas Ramos.

Then, Bayonne away is a hard switch. You think you are up for it, but Bayonne were feeding on the European champions coming to town and they will kick the shit out of you if you’re not ready and we were not ready for the fight.

Each player’s situation is different in this regard. Uini Atonio needed a break, but Alldritt had some months off after the World Cup. Players need rhythm too. Sometimes watchers wonder why such-and-such is playing minutes when the result is sorted, but they need to find their playing rhythm. 

Sometimes it feels hard to come down from the Six Nations. But if there’s not enough game time in the legs, it can be hard to get up too. The road to accelerating Greg’s impact for the big games approaching goes through Bayonne and Oyonnax. Get those ones in his legs, then he’s ready to rock.

The Stormers won’t be shy about making noise next Saturday week. So Bayonne was a tasty rehearsal. La Rochelle brought nearly 1,000 supporters, but 14,000 Bayonne roars prevailed. I have never accepted the received wisdom that home advantage is worth seven points, but it is to a large extent. We will sell out for Saturday against Oyonnax and that comfort blanket permits some selection decisions. It’s safer involving the wonderful young Hugo Reus at the Stade Marcel Deflandre than it would be in Bayonne, but where does he grow and mature more?

We don’t head to Capetown til next Tuesday which is a bit last-minute but we are prepared to trade that off against training properly at home earlier that day. First though we must cleanse Bayonne from our guts. Saturday’s nightmare didn’t end when we landed back in La Rochelle at 5.30am Sunday. I had to watch the game back on laptop on the journey up the west coast, and knew I’d have to watch it again Sunday. I could feel a bad mood coming long before it even arrived.

Where’s that padel racket?