Ken Owens says his side won’t be fazed by La Rochelle’s big reputation, or their even bigger pack, when the French side roll into Llanelli on Good Friday’s shoot-out for a Champions Cup semi-final berth.
La Rochelle have never been this far before in the tournament, while the Scarlets are returning to the knock-out stage of Europe’s top tournament for the first time since 2007. The prize is a semi-final clash against either Leinster or Saracens.
“It is going to be a challenge but it’s nothing we haven’t faced before and I’m looking forward to it,” said Owens, a survivor from the 2007 squad.
“They’ve got a talented front-row and loads of internationals and quality players. A few of them are World Cup winners. They’ve got quality but, you’ve got to have quality in your side to make the knock-out stages of Europe.
“La Rochelle will be very similar to Toulon – they both have massive packs. They offload more than Toulon do, but the principle will be the same. We are going to have to be patient in attack, go through the phases and we are going to have to be right at the top of our game defensively, just as we were against Toulon.
“We know the challenge that they will pose and we are going to have to front up. They’ve got quality players across the board and that’s why they qualified for a quarter final in Europe and took the Top 14 by storm last season.
“But we’re not going to be fazed by that because Toulon had loads of world class players when we met them in the pool stages. They are just rugby players at the end of the day and we’ve got to come up with a game plan to cope with them.”
Owens was forced to sit-out his side’s Guinness PRO14 final triumph in Dublin last season, but will be in the thick of the action against one of the most powerful teams in Europe this weekend.
“It’s definitely up there with the biggest games I’ve played for the Scarlets. I was involved in our Heineken Cup run in 2006/07, but it’s been a long time getting back to this stage,” said Owens.
“It’s our first quarter-final since then, and our first one at Parc Y Scarlets, and it’s going to be a huge night. We’ve waited a long time for this but it’s been worth waiting for.
“You are judged on what you do in Europe and, over the last few years, we haven’t done very well. When Wayne Pivac came in this was a target he set us and we have finally got to the quarter-finals again.
“We are here now and we are looking forward to the challenge on Friday night. Hopefully, we can make it a special night.”
A record, sell-out crowd of 15,000 will pack the ground for the first of the four quarter-finals as the Scarlets attempt to become the first Welsh side to reach the semi-finals in Europe’s top tournament since Cardiff Blues in 2011. If they make it into the final four they will have to travel to face the winners of the game between Leinster and Saracens.
“It sold out in about 40 minutes! We had some tickets back from La Rochelle and some cheeky Scarlet supporters have been buying tickets off La Rochelle themselves,” added Owens.
“It’s going to be a great atmosphere and it’s phenomenal for the region to have knockout rugby back in West Wales. I think that shows in the turn-out here for the Toulon game and now this game – Parc Y Scarlets is going to be bouncing.”
Despite losing their opening two games in Pool 5, Owens’ men recovered to earn a home draw. That recovery included wins over three time champions RC Toulon at home, Bath away and a double over Benetton Rugby.
“There’s been a lot of buy in from the players. The coaches have their vision of how they want us to play and the board have backed that as well,” said Owens.
“It didn’t start off with a bang, and it’s taken a bit of time, because there has been a lot of adding to the squad and getting players in. All our recruits have bought into what we want to do, as have the youngsters coming through.
“We have been a victim of our own success with the amount of boys we lose to international rugby. Boys have seen if they work hard they will get an opportunity and that has kept the competitiveness within the squad.
“It’s 40-50 boys working hard for each other. It didn’t start too well in Europe with two defeats but we dug in and got some bonus points.
“We then got three bonus point victories on the bounce and managed to get to the quarter finals with a big win over Toulon. It’s a great achievement for us as a squad but we don’t want it to end there.”
CHAMPIONS CUP QUARTER-FINAL – SCARLETS V LA ROCHELLE
Friday, 30 March – Kick-off: 17:30, Parc y Scarlets
Referee: Luke Pearce (Eng)
AR 1: Matthew Carley (Eng)
AR 2: Craig Maxwell-Keys (Eng)
TMO: David Grashoff (Eng)
Citing Commissioner: Eugene Ryan (Ire)
TV: BT Sport / beIN SPORTS
MATCH FACTS
- This will be the first time the clubs have met. One hundred and forty one of Scarlets’ 143 European games have been in the European Cup while La Rochelle have reached the knockout stage of Europe’s top flight at the first attempt.
- Scarlets have won their last four matches, as many as they had managed in 21 previous games and their best winning run since winning seven on the trot on the way to the 2007 semi-finals.
- La Rochelle have won three of four previous games against Welsh opposition, beating Caerphilly twice in 2001/02 and sharing a home win and an away loss against Ebbw Vale in 1997/98.
- La Rochelle lost two of their three away games in the pool stage, scoring just one try and 16 points in the process.
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The Scarlets are leading the way in Wales. Pic: Getty Images. - Scarlets and La Rochelle were two of three sides to maintain success rates over 90% at both the scrum and lineout in the pool stage; Scarlets had the best lineout rate of any side (94%).
- La Rochelle made the most clean breaks (67) and offloads (86) of any team in the pool stage with Jeremy SInzelle featuring in the top 10 for both categories (nine offloads and nine clean breaks).
- La Rochelle scored a competition high of seven tries from kick returns in the pool stage, 39% of their total tries scored.
- Tadhg Beirne has a competition-high 14 turnovers this season while Levani Botia leads the way for La Rochelle with eight.
- Only Bath’s Tom Dunn (119) made more tackles in the pool stage than Ken Owens (88), with the Scarlets captain maintaining a success rate of 90%.
- Leigh Halfpenny successfully kicked all 10 of his conversion attempts in the pool stage; no player attempted more and didn’t miss at least one.