BLACKROCK COLLEGE SESQUICENTENNIAL CELEBRATIONS:BLACKROCK COLLEGE, as part of their sesquicentennial (150 years of existence) celebrations, are hosting a unique rugby tournament this weekend with the best schools from Leinster, Munster, Ulster and England's elite institutions descending on Williamstown.
To promote the two-day event, entitled the “Investec Rugby Festival”, six of the greatest exponents of the game to graduate from the college returned yesterday as tournament ambassadors. Irish captain Brian O’Driscoll was joined by Leinster captain Leo Cullen and Luke Fitzgerald, while the earlier generations were represented by Fergus Slattery, Hugo MacNeill and Brendan Mullin.
O’Driscoll took the opportunity to reminisce about the beginnings of a remarkable career on the rugby fields of his alma mater. Strange as it now seems, he was overlooked for selection on the junior cup team, under-15, in 1994 and the current principal, then coach, Alan MacGinty, is regularly reminded of this decision.
“Alan never really dropped me,” said O’Driscoll. “He just never picked me. There is a slight difference. I was in and out of the team, whenever someone needed replacing. I pretty much knew I was a squad member rather than a guaranteed first-15 player at junior cup level.
“The disappointment of being dropped was something big, as a 17-year-old in my first year at seniors, but what doesn’t kill you . . .”
It is no harm for any aspiring rugby professional to revisit the course charted by Ireland’s greatest ever player into the professional ranks. O’Driscoll played under-16 club rugby for Clontarf as a fourth year in order to feature alongside his neighbourhood friends, returning to the Blackrock scene a year later without much of a reputation.
Granted, the 1996 senior team went on to produce four other internationals (Leo Cullen, Bob Casey, David Quinlan and Ciarán Scally) and an astonishing nine professionals but O’Driscoll still ranks his exclusion from the cup team as a major disappointment.
“Obviously (I have) the feeling of winning it in ’96 but not really being fully involved having been dropped come semi-final time, for Michael Price, and the following year hitting the post with a drop goal in the semi-final. In injury time.”
The 1997 semi-final defeat was to a Clongowes Wood College team that included Gordon D’Arcy. Does his long-serving midfield partner ever remind him about this match? “Not really because I just refer back to the weight that he was carrying when he was a senior cup player whenever he starts chirping up about winning senior cups.”
It was not Blackrock College that moulded O’Driscoll into an outside centre. “The first time I ever played in the centre (and it was inside centre) was in a Leinster schools trial. I suppose I was frightened not really knowing what I was meant to be doing but you have to adapt fairly quickly in those circumstances.”
But he sees the school structures, and youths, as an opportunity for players to develop the versatility that allows them survive in the senior ranks. Due to his size, O’Driscoll spent a lot of time as a scrumhalf.
“I was four-foot eight so it’s just where I played. I was on the wing as well. I dabbled a little bit at 10. The great thing about schools rugby is you don’t have to necessarily pigeon-hole yourself into one position. You look at somebody like Lukey (Fitzgerald) – he played in the centre, fullback and wing. That’s the way it should be. All the French players are capable of playing in numerous positions. I think it is something we as Irish players need to adapt to because it is not a case of being specific for the sake of getting your best players out on the pitch.
“If you have four of them as centres well two of them have to play somewhere else. I think that is a very important aspect.
“The schools game in Ireland is so huge that I suppose what they do get is a taste for what life will be like in the professional ranks with some of the crowds support that they get. It is phenomenal.”
With support from the IRFU and the Leinster Branch (Alain Rolland and Alan Lewis are due to referee the latter rounds) the competition has four groups of five schools with matches lasting 10 minutes a half (extended to 15 minutes in the final, scheduled to take place at 3pm on Sunday).
The competing schools from Leinster are Belvedere College, St Michael’s, Terenure, Gonzaga, Clongowes, St Mary’s and Castleknock with Pres Cork, CBC Cork, Crescent, St Munchin’s and Rockwell College travelling up from Munster. The three Ulster schools are Methody, Campbell and RBAI. The four English schools attending – Colstons, Sedbergh, Ivybridge and Wellington – are responsible for supplying a large number of English internationals, both past and present. The festival begins on Saturday at 10am, running throughout the day until 4.30pm.
To further mark the 150th celebrations a dinner will take place tomorrow in the Killiney Castle Hotel when the best ever Blackrock schools and international XVs will be honoured.
BLACKROCK COLLEGE (best ever SCT XV): Hugo MacNeill; Niall Brophy, Brian O’Driscoll, Brendan Mullin, Luke Fitzgerald; Mick Kelly, Ciarán Scally; Justin Lennon, Harry Harbison, Finbarr Griffin; Victor Costello, Neil Francis; Don Roe Kissane, Barry Gibney, Brian McLoughlin.
BLACKROCK COLLEGE (International XV): Hugo MacNeill; Jack Arigho, Brian O’Driscoll, Larry McMahon, Niall Brophy; Paul Murray, John Quirke; Paul Flavin, Shane Byrne, Job Langbroek; Leo Cullen, Neil Francis; Fergus Slattery, Noel Turley, Victor Costello.
