Connacht coach Pat Lam backs more rugby in Siberia
Tuesday 17 November 2015 13:54, UK
Coach Pat Lam feels further matches should be played in Siberia despite the Connacht squad enduring a nightmare journey back from their game.
Staff and players from the Irish club only returned to their homeland on Tuesday, four days after their 31-14 victory over Enisei-STM in temperatures which went as low as -27C.
The game in Krasnoyarsk broke new ground for the European Challenge Cup as it was the first time a match had been played in Russia.
Connacht's return journey was not extended by the geography - a technical fault with their charter jet meant the group had to split into three and route their trips separately through Paris, Amsterdam and London.
But Lam does feel the Russian club should not be hosting games in November because of the difficult playing conditions.
"It was important that they staged a game in their home city, nobody planned for that plane to break down," Lam told the Irish Independent.
"But I definitely wouldn't have the game there again in November, we would need to do this in early September or October but that wasn't possible with the World Cup. It's tough to come in these conditions.
"It's a little bit of a dampener on a very good trip. We should have been home on Saturday night.
"Probably the worst news was trying to split the team into three, we didn't want to do that, but there was no guarantee the plane was going to be ready maybe till end of the week so it was the only way to get home and that was the priority.
"I am pretty proud of the management and players; everybody is just getting on with it. It's been one challenge after another. One day we look back at it and say it made us tougher."
Despite the lengthy delays and re-routing, the primary concern among the squad was not, however, boredom.
Instead the players' concerns were more sensory-based, as skipper John Muldoon illustrated on Twitter.
"No sleep, card games and prudo keeping us sane...Energy levels at all time low...BO levels at an all time high.. #StrandedInMoscow," he wrote.
