Paul Pritchard keen for Instonians to continue building on perfect All-Ireland League start

After victories over Naas and UCC, Paul Pritchard’s side finish the first block of games with a trip to Limerick to face unbeaten Garryowen.

The player/coach has been satisfied with their start and feels there is still more to come from his team, who are chasing a fifth consecutive promotion.

“We are really happy with the way things have gone for us in terms of results, and the performances have been good too,” he said. “The focus is still obviously trying to improve and make sure that we can continue on.

“We again face a big away trip this weekend and if we can add to that points tally we will be delighted.

“We felt against Naas we had the hand brake on a little bit. A new league, a new opposition, when you go up a league there is maybe that bit of internal doubt in some of the lads...once we got over that we were grand.

“UCC I think it was probably just a bit of that travel, you’re down the night before, you’re in late that evening and it is tough. You have to weather the storm early on in those away days.

“UCC came out strong, they are physical team and we probably just took a little while to calm ourselves down. We were probably a bit frantic early on, but once we got ourselves going, the confidence just grew through the game.”

Instonians know what it takes to win at Dooradoyle.

“I think they will be hurting from the Bateman Cup last year,” added Pritchard. “That was a very tight affair and we managed to win.

“They will have confidence from their start as well. We are looking forward to it, we think it is a big opportunity for us and we are hoping that we can go down and put in a performance for the full 80 minutes.

“There is never any fear. It is a game of rugby, we just have to make sure we can get ourselves in a place where we are really confident and that we are in a mindset that we want to enjoy it...that comes from our confidence from the last two weeks.

“The boys should absolutely be filled with confidence and we’re just focused on getting started and on our on jobs.”

The Shaw’s Bridge club have already booked their place in December’s Senior Cup final and Pritchard knows they need a strong squad for a long AIL campaign.

“It’s not easy either,” he said. “We have to try and manage the minutes of the lads, make sure the boys are getting the right game time and give them their opportunities.

“Thankfully there have been no injuries so far in the first two games, but it is a long season and that will change – we’ll need everybody.

“Each All-Ireland League season we end up using 40 or 50 players and it is just about us making sure that the next guy into the shirt is able to do the job.”

Pritchard starts in the back-row with Mark Lee and David Whitten whileAnton Lupari comes into the front row.