Impressive Connacht cut loose in routing poor Zebre

Connacht 52

Rob Murphy in Parma

WHAT a four weeks this has been for the men in Green. From an early season stumble, Connacht have emerged looking like a better version of their former selves. The Pro 12 champions are improving and the ceiling for what they can achieve as a group is still unclear. One thing is for certain, as a group, they seem to think there’s lots more scope for further progress.

This was their 13th encounter with Zebre in four short years, they’ve been in the same pool as them three times in Europe and have met them eight times in the Pro 12, (not counting last month's rain off). They’ve won all 13, sometimes in scrappy encounters, sometimes in loose shootouts and the odd time with plenty to spare. This was something new though, a ruthless, merciless second half display with a neat first 15 minutes thrown in. They came, saw and conquered.

From the outset Connacht were in command in Parma. Though the first ten minutes didn’t yield scores, the visitors completely dominated possession and territorial stats, attacking with gusto and hitting rucks with as much fire and power as we had seen eight days before in Galway against Toulouse. As expected, they mindset was right, much better than what has been on show a month earlier in the abandoned game here.

The hosts were quickly behind too. Stacey Ili had a dream first start after two appearances from the bench. He would make 12 carries in total for a 107 metres of gains and a hat trick of tries in the process. His first try was the most straight-forward, capitalising on a perfectly placed kick in behind the defence by the commanding Jack Carty at out half.

The conversion from Craig Ronaldson from the left hand touchline with his left foot, underlined the focus and within 60 seconds any doubts that Connacht had come to make a statement were completely gone. Rising young out half Carlo Canna was the poor unfortunate who took a pass behind the centre only to be met by a rampaging Peter Robb. The powerful hit dislodged the ball straight into the hands of Jack Carty who ran the in from ten metres inside his own half.

The floodgates didn’t open though and for the second quarter of the contest, Connacht made errors and lost their shape a little. Zebre had a foothold when Sean O’Brien was sin binned for straying offside and needlessly playing the ball, but missed an easy penalty seconds later.

If that was frustrating for their management, what Olivero Fabiani did minutes later must have had them outraged.  The hooker, bit Quinn Roux on the arm in a ruck and was spotted on video replay. The straight red is likely to be only the beginning of some serious disciplinary issues after that moment of stupidity. The hosts will point to that as the moment where the game was done but while Connacht had lost some momentum, they were still in total control of the contest.

For more, read this week's Galway City Tribune.