Ronan O’Gara Isn’t Happy About Having To Face Munster In Europe This Year

Ronan O’Gara will set foot in Thomond Park this season for the first time ever as part of the opposition.

The Corkman will make his long-awaited return to the southern province’s rugby home, but this time he’ll be coming as defence coach for Munster’s adversaries. Racing head coach Laurent Labit has admitted that O’Gara isn’t looking forward to the occasion.

It’s very tough to start the competition with Munster,” Labit said.

We have been watching them since the start of the season but we also have the best spy possible with Ronan O’Gara to know how they function.

Even if the staff has changed, we will have a lot of very useful indications, but Ronan won’t be on the pitch and only the players will have their say.

It’s funny because he’s got mixed feeling about meeting Munster. It’s his club of heart, of love. He feels like betraying them.

Of course, he wants Racing to win but, strangely, he’s not happy facing them [Munster], even if he’ll be thrilled to be back at Thomond Park.

Labit however reckons this will not stop O’Gara from being the consummate professional he has always been and getting a win over his former club will still be top of his list of priorities.

I hope he will give us lots of information.

He knows how the club prepares for this competition, he is a-two-time European champion with them and he knows how we will have to prepare mentally for this game.

He’s Irish, he experienced a lot of very nice things with Munster. He’s closely tied to his club but he will not let a thing pass.