'Fast, relentless and adaptable' - 4G pitch a godsend for Connacht style, says Andy Friend

Andy Friend says Connacht's 4G pitch is a "godsend" and has enabled his side to be at their best.

And it might just be a telling factor on the final day of the BKT United Rugby Championship regular season.

Glasgow Warriors, who also play on synthetic turf at Scotstoun, stand between the Westerners and a place in next season’s Champions Cup.

Connacht have lost seven of their last eight games against the Warriors, a stretch going back to October 2020, and have never won at Scotstoun.

Friend’s side signed off from the Sportsground last weekend with a fine win over Cardiff that secured a play-off place but they are on the road from here on in.

Only Ulster and Leinster claimed wins in Galway this season and Friend hailed the impact of the new surface, which was laid last summer.

"For us as a team, every day we run out there and we can play at speed," the departing director of rugby told RTÉ Sport.

"If you go back to last year, we had three words to describe us: fast, relentless and adaptable. It’s very hard to be fast when you are playing on a quagmire and that’s what we were training on.

"The playing surface was always brilliant but it was brilliant because we didn’t train on it.

"We had to train down [in the grass pitch beside the Sportsground].

"The mere fact that every training session is done on that surface, the boys’ bodies and their speed of reaction, everything is much much quicker so it’s been a absolute godsend to be honest, hats off to Connacht Rugby for the foresight to make that surface available for us.

"You continue to get an exciting brand of rugby because that’s what we want to play and we are now able to play that.

"From a medical and athletic performance point of view there’s an enormous amount of work that has to go