IRELAND v ARGENTINA INTERVIEW WITH JUAN MARTIN FERNANDEZ LOBBE: Gerry Thornleytalks to Argentina's stand-in captain for today's clash, a player who believes passionately in the power of team spirit
THIS IS some week in the life and times of Juan Martin Fernandez Lobbe. On Wednesday he turned 27 and, as is the custom among Los Pumas, he was presented with a cake when the squad went out for a meal that night, but the biggest treat of his career comes this afternoon when he captains Argentina for the first time on his first visit to Dublin.
Tracksuited, he strides across the lobby of the Burlington Hotel on Thursday after some post-lunch downtime before training. With his implacable brown-eyed stare and unshaven chin, he could effortlessly double as a gunslinger in a spaghetti western.
He is also a typical Argentinian rugby player, who knows only one way of playing and that is to give everything. It's a measure of his durability and athleticism that he was the only member of the Argentinian squad to play all seven of their games at last year's World Cup in France.
IT'S ALSO A measure of his leadership abilities and his command of English that after two seasons at Sale Sharks, Philippe Saint-André chose Lobbe from his cast of stellar names to be their captain.
"I am a guy that likes to speak in the dressingroom, likes to build up the momentum of the team," he says. "On the pitch it's just about giving everything. It's when you see a guy beside you smashing his head against the knee of the opposition, you want to do the same."
He is unflinchingly polite and effusive, and even adamantly rejects attempts by their press officer to end our conversation. What emerges, unsurprisingly, is a passionate rugby man who knows he is fortunate to live a dream. He says this "new team" requires patience and are improving with each game.
"The team that got to the World Cup semi-finals was together for six years. It was a great experience and a great performance, but now we have to forget about that. This is a new team, we have a great captain in Felipe (Contepomi), great coaches, good players; we just need to build that spirit again."
That, you would think, comes almost as a given along with a few other basic ingredients whenever the Pumas step on to a rugby pitch. With the odds permanently stacked against them, they have made a virtue out of being excluded from the establishment, and overcoming the many obstacles that have been put in their way.
"It's impossible for us to only play six games a year, and when we play in June we don't have the players that play in France because they are always in semi-finals and finals. So for us it's hard to build like that. But there are no excuses. Right now we have been three weeks together and we have worked to be at our top level."
He mentions Munster's match against the All Blacks with clear respect. "They are very, very clinical. They play to your mistakes. They will make you do everything right. You have to do your set-piece right, you have to defend right, you will have to play in their half, you can't make any mistakes."
Eh, a bit like you Pumas?
"Yea, yea," he smiles. "I think it's playing a clever game. You have to be clinical, score every time you can and play perfect rugby. In a Test match, every detail counts. If you miss one detail, you're going to be screwed."
ARGENTINIANS PUNCH way above their weight in all manner of sports, which cannot be fully explained by eating the best steaks in the world. Their manifest patriotism and pride in their flag (with which Buenos Aires taxi drivers regularly adorn their cars) is another factor.
"Being part of the Argentinian rugby team is just the best. No one gives you that for free, you work really hard to get there, so when you get there you are representing your country, but mostly your family and your club, all the players you have played there. It's a great honour and being there, and listening to your anthem is amazing. An amazing experience."
He is steeped in rugby. "My father (Carlos) used to play rugby, but gave up early because he wanted to focus on his (engineering) studies. But my mother (Anna) is a really big rugby fan. She used to take me to every game, every training session, she's a big fan."
LOBBE HAS TWO older brothers, Carlos Ignacio (who played for the Pumas) and Nicolas (who played for the Argentinian sevens), and he started playing with his local club, Lico Naval, when he was four, though as he puts it himself: "I've been in the club since I was in my mother's belly. The first time I could pick up the ball I started playing. Since I was four years old, every second of every day that I could be in the club I was there."
Adjacent to the huge River Plate stadium, when he started Liceo Naval only had one pitch, now they also have a training pitch as well a much-improved gym and more members. He and his brothers regularly volunteered for ground work at a club which, he says, yo-yos between the first and second division and where one day he will regularly return in his dotage.
"All my friends play rugby. When I go back there, the only thing I want to do is be in my club, help with the kids or with the first team. All my family and all my friends are there. If something bad were to happen, they would be there for you. They are like my extra family."
Inspired by his brothers, he progressed through the Buenos Aires regional under-19 and under-20 teams, to the national sevens team, and made his debut against Uruguay in the 2004 South American Championships in Chile, before his career was interrupted by a shoulder injury. He doesn't regard his real debut until the 2005 November win in Murrayfield. "Then we beat Italy and we beat Wales twice. I had a good run," he says, laughing.
Like his father, he is a qualified engineer and completed his degree before turning professional by following his brother Ignacio to Sale Sharks in 2006, initially on a two-year contract.
The life of a professional rugby player? "I love it. I wake up and it's rugby for me, and at 1pm I am back at home with my wife, (Annie). The only thing sometimes is the weather, but you can't complain. It's not that bad in Manchester and I'm doing what I love. There is nothing better than that; just waking up, rugby, it's great."
THE HIGHLIGHT OF his career to date, was, of course, last year's World Cup. As he begins to recount it, four of his team-mates manoeuvre couches around our table. Juan Martin Fernandez apologises for the inconvenience as the captain suggests we move elsewhere, and we continue our conversation to the backdrop of a voluble daily card game in the otherwise tranquil lunchtime lobby.
"It was a team that was building, building, building to our maximum and our peak there. The team spirit was incredible. I really believe that you need to have a great spirit to win things.
"A team can have great players but if you don't have team spirit you will never achieve things in important moments. Because when things are going bad and you feel like you have a brother beside you, you will give that extra edge."
Before a more together and confident Argentina predictably beat Ireland by 30-15 Lobbe says he was very nervous.
"We knew that everything was in our hands but it could be taken away. But once we started the game and you saw the spirit and the concentration we had, I knew that 'we are there'."
After the crushing disappointment of their semi-final defeat to the Springboks, Argentina's third-place play-off win over France, ultimately destroying the hosts by five tries to one and 32-10, was arguably the performance of the tournament. It was also a more fitting end to both their odyssey and the infectious spirit they and their small but noisy band of supporters brought to France for almost two months.
One of the abiding images of the tournament was leaving Parc des Princes that night and coming across about 200 of them singing and dancing around a giant Argentina flag. You just had to watch. Another late-night crawl into the centre of Paris could wait.
"You know, we wanted to be world champions. We were really focused on that and it was really sad to lose against South Africa. But on the other hand, 'let's finish on a high'. Those names that we have mentioned (Pichot, Longo, his brother etc), they deserved to finish on a high. So that was the spirit and it showed that we were really focused on that game."
AS WITH ANY Argentinian of his generation, there was no more inspiring game than Los Pumas' breakthrough 28-24 win over Ireland in Lens at the 1999 World Cup. Lobbe vividly remembers watching it with his family at their home when he was 17.
"I was totally going craz-ee. I think that was the day that Argentina made the big step and Argentina became really respected. That was amazing. That game against Ireland was just cra-zee. Cra-zee amount of defence, cra-zee amount of spirit."
He knows full well the magnitude of this latest instalment. It is the final game of their tour and their year, and a decisive tie in terms of World Cup seeding, and, of course, there's history between the two.
"There's been some bad blood. In every sport sometimes you have some players who don't like the other one, and when you play (against each other) a lot of you know the opposition and you want to beat them. It's like a derby," he says matter-of-factly.
He says only "a great performance" will do against "a great team", and while Contepomi has informed him of how "amazing" Croke Park is, he makes it clear he regards himself as strictly a stand-in captain.
"First of all, the captain of this team is the right one. It's Felipe and I'm doing a favour for a game because unfortunately Felipe is not going to be able to play. But of course it's a great honour. Imagine, you love rugby, you like playing for a team and someone is saying 'okay, I want you to be captain of this team and lead this team'.
"I am very lucky. Someone is doing me a favour up there," he says, laughing gently as if almost in disbelief himself.
One can only imagine how proud Carlos, Anna, Ignacio and Nicolas, and all his extended family back in Liceo Naval will be when Juan Martin Fernandez Lobbe leads out Los Pumas this afternoon and lines them up for their national anthem.
As ever, their boy will then give it everything. It's the only way he knows.
