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Former Ireland rugby great Ronan O’Gara has become an overnight sensation after a video of the La Rochelle coach delivering an impassioned team talk in heavily accented French went viral.
The clip of O’Gara – who won 128 test caps for his country and was an assistant coach with the Crusaders from 2018 to 2019 – has been watched more than 3.5 million times and shows the 46-year-old tearing into his players ahead of a crucial Top 14 match with Bordeaux.
It was taken from a behind the scenes documentary by French television channel Canal+ inside the camp of the two-time European champions, whom O’Gara has coached since 2019, and has quickly blown up on social media.
Described as “the most Irish team talk, while actually speaking French”, O’Gara’s attempt at mastering the Gallic tongue is more Del Boy than Descartes, but he has nevertheless won widespread praise for giving the language a crack.
“L’opportunité est f…ing énorme,” an animated O’Gara tells his players as they sit in stunned silence trying to decipher what he self-decrepatingly described as his “Cork French”.
“Je m’en f…ing fous d’adversaire”, O’Gara continues, which translates as “I don’t give a f…ing damn about the opposition”.
At one point, he asks whether his team are hungry to win the game or planning on taking a “f…ing … vacance?”
The foul-mouthed pep talk clearly had the desired effect, with La Rochelle beating Bordeaux 24-13.
”This is magnificent. It’s Henry V on St. Crispin’s day meeting The Thick of It, reimagined by Duolingo with an Irish accent,” tweeted former BBC journalist Jon Sopel.
SCREENGRAB
La Rochelle coach Ronan O’Gara delivers his heavily Irish-accented French team talk to his startled players.
”Accent notwithstanding, being able to give an inspirational speech in French is next level (and La Rochelle’s performance last year suggests that it worked),” added Emma Pearson, host of the The Local France, an English language French news site.
Jokes aside, O’Gara has enjoyed a hugely successful stint in charge of the Top 14 powerhouse, for whom former All Black Tawera Kerr-Barlow plys his trade, finishing league runners-up in 2021 and 2023 and winning back-to-back European Champions Cups the past two seasons.
He recently extended his contract with the French club until 2027, after being linked with the Crusaders vacancy when his mentor Scott Robertson took the All Blacks job.
Former Waratahs and Canterbury coach Rob Penney was subsequently hired by the Christchurch-based franchise, who have won the last seven Super Rugby titles.
First five-eighth O’Gara scored 1083 test points during a glittering career that included nine trophies with Munster and two caps for the British and Irish Lions. He retired in 2013.
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