By his own admission, Northampton’s Director of Rugby, Phil Dowson, is a history buff. This week he invited the club’s Irish strength and conditioning coach, Eamonn Hyland, to give his players an “incredibly powerful” lesson on the cultural and historical importance of being the first English team to play at Croke Park. The players were moved to goosebumps as the size of the challenge that awaits them against Leinster on Saturday became all the more acute.
It has been 104 years since the Croke Park massacre killed 14 spectators by the Royal Irish Constabulary, and Croke Park is, as Dowson points out, “a symbol of [Irish] independence”. Having recently spoken to Donncha O’Callaghan, the former Irish and Munster second division club, Dowson is only too aware that when England played at Croke Park, the result was “almost a given”. Ireland duly swept England by 30 points, and although Leinster has played there before, against Munster, Saturday marks the first time an English Rugby Club has entered the headquarters of the Gaelic Athletic Association.
There are other aspects of the story that Dowson is less interested in. He was part of the Northampton team that led 22-6 at half–time in the final in Cardiff, but Johnny Sexton made a barely credible comeback-Leinster won 33-22. He scored a try and received a yellow card in that game, but Dowson did not see fit to revisit that day this week.
Likewise, there are memories in Franklin’s Gardens that Northampton’s last big money table came ten years ago, when they smack Saracens in the Premiership final, which Dowson preferred not to be there. They have not been as well placed to finish this barren series as they have been this Season, although the prevailing idea is that the Premier League, where they are at the top of the league with two rounds of regular season remaining, is a superior chance than the Champions Cup, such is the discouraging nature of this match.
“I always thought this competition had the possibility of being a romantic competition,” says Dowson. “There is a great opportunity for great stories and trips and doing things differently and it’s a great example this weekend to be the first English club team to play at Croke Park, it’s epic. It’s something you can really get into and get your teeth into.”
Dowson does not subscribe to the theory that Northampton and Harlequins both fly the Premiership flag because they have been the most actionstartinging teams in the League in recent years – the theory is that the elite game now rewards ambition superior – but there is no doubt that both want to get silverware, they are dependent on their star rounds at N° 10, their Fly-Half metallurgists. Fin and Marcus de smith will be marked as men this weekend, but after putting in a coming-of-age performance against Munster at the start of the competition, the 21-year-old N°10 from Northampton showed a taste for the big occasion.
Indeed, it was after another impressive performance against Exeter and just before the Six Nations where Fin Smith made his first appearances for England. “We had a good win here against Exeter and I felt I played well, I had a good away win at Munster and I felt I played well, it was a real boost for the season for me,” Smith says. “But when I came out of it, there was actually a lot to do and where I was in these games, I would have good spells, some good touches and then I would make a mistake and in fact, it’s about being a little bit more consistent and happy to stay at seven or eight out of 10 for 80 minutes and believe that I have enough quality around me to bring these magical moments, I don’t have to chase them. I think I learned a lot from it.
“You can only understand this as a compliment that the teams notice you and that you are someone to watch. But I think it all comes back to what I said that I’m happy to be a seven out of 10 and to be consistent and to know that when I do my job, we have enough quality so that the guys can accelerate or take people into space.elsewhere.