You couldn’t make this stuff up. Jonathan Sexton’s kicking coach at Racing Metro 92 next season will be Ronan O’Gara.
O'Gara met Jacky Lorenzetti, owner of the Parisian club and real estate magnate, in London yesterday to agree a two-year deal, spurning the offer of an extra season with Munster to begin his coaching apprenticeship.
It’s believed he will work with the espoirs (academy) while his place kicking expertise is sure to be tapped into by the incoming coaching ticket of Laurent Labit and Laurent Travers.
It makes sense. O’Gara and Sexton have been looking over each other’s shoulder in Carton House these past four years. A mutual respect always existed and a friendship gradually matured out of the fiercest of rivalries.
Strange days. So O'Gara and Sexton will be club-mates in Paris. The dominant Irish outhalves in modern times will be reunited, presumably lingering on the paddock after other Racing players head to the showers to work on the technical and mental aspect of successful goal-kicking.
Acutely aware
Coaching has long been O'Gara's intention. He recently revealed his intention to coach Munster one day. The best route to achieving this, he is acutely aware, is by gaining the necessary experience in the Top 14, a league that has become the epicentre of world rugby. It's where the money is. It also helps that he can speak French.
So, just like that, O’Gara the outhalf is no more. Retired at 36 after a truly epic, if at times flawed, career for Presentation Brothers, UCC, Cork Constitution, Munster and Ireland. He never made it to the Miami Dolphins.
His last and 128th Irish cap came as a replacement in Ireland’s 12-8 defeat to Scotland in March, before Declan Kidney dropped him from the squad. His last of 240 Munster appearances followed a month later in the valiant loss to ASM Clermont Auvergne in the Heineken Cup semi-final.
On such gripping European days "Rog" was majestic. The "miracle match" against Gloucester in 2003 at Thomond Park will never be forgotten, nor will his flawless kicking when Munster needed it most in the 2006 European final against Biarritz and in 2008, in Cardiff again, as he landed 11 points to see off the mighty Toulouse.
Treasured day
Cardiff's Millennium stadium was the scene of his most treasured day in a green jersey, which he impressively gave to Stephen Jones. Without that weighted cross-field kick for Tommy Bowe's try and the drop goal (so many drop goals) Ireland wouldn't have ended a 61-year wait for a second Grand Slam.
The 2007 World Cup was the blackest time of this rugby odyssey, and the three Lions tours will always rankle. The Waratahs Duncan McRae landed 11 punches, mangling O’Gara’s face in 2001, while his last act, in the second Test four years ago, was to give up the penalty that Morne Steyn landed to seal the series. He was concussed that day on the high veldt, but played on.
Michael Jordan once said: “I’ve failed over and over and over again in my life and that is why I succeed.” That’s the thing about O’Gara; his resilience knows no bounds.
It’s been a terrible week for Munster in fact, following Doug Howlett, the former All Black and club captain retiring with an injured shoulder.
Replacing O’Gara gets harder still as they would need special dispensation from the IRFU to recruit a foreigner should Ian Keatley or JJ Hanrahan fail to fill the void.
Leinster have already snapped up New Zealand’s Jimmy Gopperth, to replace Sexton, and under new guidelines that means Ulster and Munster cannot recruit from overseas in that position. Silver lining? Conor Murray has signed on for another 15 months and Anthony Foley and Ian Costello have agreed one-year deals as forwards and A team coaches respectively.
