It’s an ill wind and all that. Initially rocked by Munster’s decision not to offer him a new deal, for three weeks or so JJ Hanrahan wondered what was to become of his rugby career as he entered an outhalf’s peak years. Whereupon opportunities for a new start arose in three different countries, and the offer from Clermont Auvergne was one he couldn’t refuse.
At the end of a fairly unsettling month in his life, he has come to terms with how events have unravelled. A bright lad and deep thinker about the game, while it will be a wrench to leave Munster, Hanrahan will do so without a trace of bitterness or ill-feeling.
“It definitely was very disappointing, I won’t lie to you, to hear that my contract wasn’t being renewed, because I felt like I’d gone pretty well in the last two years bar one or two incidents,” Hanrahan told The Irish Times on Wednesday.
“Sure look, no one can be perfect all the time. You are accountable for when you make mistakes but in general I was pretty happy with how I was trucking along.
“I’m only 28. Lads often slag me that I’ve been around a long time but I feel there’s a good bit of rugby in me yet. So that was tough to take. There were a few nervous weeks, I won’t lie, after I heard the news on March 1st, to get things sorted but thankfully it turned out to be Clermont.”
Hanrahan’s agent, Tom Beattie of TDB Sports, describes it as “a sensational move”, adding: “We waited for Munster because JJ is a Munsterman and we wanted to give them the opportunity to make the offer but unfortunately due to the Covid backdrop they were unable to do so.
“We then had conversations for a number of weeks with Neil McIlroy at Clermont, who’s a fantastic guy from Jedburgh in Scotland, and has been manager at Clermont for a number of years. There were other opportunities for JJ in the UK, Japan and France, but ultimately JJ wanted to make the move to Clermont.”
As an aside TDB Sports recently concluded a deal to take the St Michael’s, Leinster and Ireland under-18 backrower Will Hickey to the Ospreys, whose chief development officer is Mike Ruddock.
As for Hanrahan, opting for Clermont, and a one-year deal with the option of a second, tells us much.
“Just the name of the club itself,” Hanrahan explains. “When people hear the name straight away they just think of the incredible fan base, incredible rugby players and the good brand of rugby that they play. They’re one of the powerhouses of European and French rugby.
“For me it was a bit of a no-brainer to get that experience at my age. I was chatting to Billy Holland one day about it and I said: ‘The first thing for me is to still be playing competitive rugby at the highest level’. And I want to challenge myself at that Top 14/European level because I genuinely feel there’s more for me to give.”
Thinking of Eric Elwood, David Humphreys, Ronan O’Gara and Johnny Sexton, Hanrahan certainly wouldn’t be the first Irish outhalf to play his best rugby from his late 20s onwards.
“Playing 10, the more you start seeing pictures the more the game starts slowing down,” as Hanrahan puts it, “and that only comes through repetition from playing games and learning within games.”
Hanrahan describes himself as “very lucky” to have been afforded a run of games at outhalf in the 2019-20 season due to the injuries which sidelined Joey Carbery and Tyler Bleyendaal. While that was unfortunate for them, Hanrahan was due a break.
Prior to then, by which stage he’d turned 27, he’d only been afforded a run of three successive games at outhalf twice in his entire career, once with Northampton in 2016-17 and in the last three Pro12 games of the 2017-18 season with Munster. The December return meeting with Saracens marked the first time Hanrahan started three European games in a row.
The Currow native and product of Castleisland, shortlisted for World Junior Player of the Year in 2012, had by then only started 48 of his 151 games for Munster and Northampton at 10, a dozen at 12 and nine at fullback, along with 81 off the bench.
“I was getting to play every week and if I made a mistake I wasn’t taken off and I could learn from that the next week. Johann [van Graan] and Steve [Larkham] are great coaches and mentors for me and that was helping me to perform better.
“It does take time to learn about pressure moments and pressure cycles in games, how you handle things, how to get everyone going in the one direction.”
He cites one example from the 21-all draw with Racing at Thomond Park in November 2019, a game when Hanrahan and Finn Russell attacked the gainline thrillingly. Hanrahan engineered a late try with a long skip pass to Andrew Conway and landed the equalising conversion from the touchline only to then miss a drop goal to win the game.
“I missed that drop goal against Racing and to call a spade a spade I hadn’t really been practicing it enough. Once or twice a week I hit a few drop goals and then for the next year I was hitting three sets of five every day until the next opportunity against Benetton and you nail it. That’s what you have to do, refine areas of your game and keep constantly improving.”
In swapping the Red Army for the Yellow Army, Hanrahan admits he has to start taking French lessons immediately, but he also believes he can learn from his two-year trek to Northampton when just 23.
“When I went to Northampton, excuse my language here, but I didn’t know my arse from my elbow to be honest, who I was as a person or as an individual.
“I’ll be going to Clermont as a lot more assured individual and a lot more confident in terms of what I can bring to the club.”
In all of this, Hanrahan is also a realist regarding his dreams of playing for Ireland.
“I suppose when my contract wasn’t renewed here the writing was on the wall in terms of not being able to play for Ireland. That was still one of my massive ambitions and it’s something I will find tough to take but at the same time I had my opportunities and maybe once or twice I let them slip.
“I’d never close the door, but you have to be realistic. For now my focus is on finishing the best I can with Munster. We still have an opportunity to win the European Cup. Winning something with Munster is my dream. It’s my home club, it would be incredible to leave on that note and then go to Clermont and do the absolute best I can over there.”
