Pete Wilkins: Wilkins: Much to reflect on after tough Connacht season

Pete Wilkins has had plenty of time to reflect on his first year in charge of Connacht.

A disappointing season fizzled out with a 26-point hammering at the hands of Leinster and they would eventually finish the BKT URC season in 11th place, missing out on Champions Cup qualification as a result.

Their European adventures weren't any better. They raised the roof at the Dexcom Stadium when Bristol came to visit last January but otherwise, were comfortably second best when they faced Bordeaux, Saracens, Lyon, and Benetton when they dropped to the Challenge Cup.

The Englishman may have felt they were cursed when new marquee signing Santi Cordero went down in his first training session, a bad knee injury keeping him until the final two games.

Mack Hansen’s shoulder injury in January threatened to get better each week but in the end, he wasn’t risked. The Ireland wing is due to make his comeback in the next couple of weeks.

Then JJ Hanrahan went down over in Wales against Dragons at the start of May and he won’t be back until the New Year.

As easy as it would be to blame all their misfortunes on that run of bad luck, Wilkins is honest enough to admit Connacht still should have done better.

Just six more match points across the season would have had them in eighth place. They lost two games in the last minute.

"There was still a feeling that we didn’t give the best version of ourselves," he said.

About to start his eighth year with the province, Wilkins took over the top spot from Andy Friend in summer of 2023. He had previously served as assistant and then senior coach.

He’s spent most of the break reflecting on what went wrong with a particular emphasis on his own performance.

The 44-year-old makes an unconvincing attempt to suggest