Niamh Briggs says she's expecting a much-improved Munster in this Saturday's Vodafone Women's Interprovincial Championship final at Musgrave Park, after her side suffered a "hiccup" in their defeat to Leinster last weekend.
Munster and Leinster will meet in this weekend's final in Cork, seven days on from Leinster's 26-19 win in their round-robin clash at Energia Park in Donnybrook.
The defending champions were already assured of their place in this weekend's final before the defeat to Tania Rosser's side, who had to win to qualify for the decider.
And while Briggs says there was no complacency on Munster's part, she acknowledges that Leinster's need to win played a big part in the outcome.
"They [Leinster] played really, really well, they were fighting for a spot in this final, subconsciously I think it gives you a bit more of an edge," the Munster head coach said.
"We never spoke about Leinster having to win, we just spoke about ourselves, and wanting to improve on things from the Connacht week.
"Subconsciously I'm sure it’s very hard to stay on it, I think four weeks in a row is very difficult for any player professionally, let alone an amateur player.
"We were always going to have a dip, every team has had it, it’s just about how you can come back out of it, and it’s just unfortunate at the weekend we couldn’t get over that hump."
Munster should be boosted this weekend by the return of full-back Eimear Considine and wing Aoife Doyle (above) from injury, with the experienced international pair having sat out last week's game with minor injuries.
Nicole Cronin is also set to be involved again, with the co-captain having made her return from a long-term knee injury of the bench last week.
"I think this is the first week we're good to go. The girls who picked up a few niggles last week and couldn’t play are due to come back into training this week which is great for us.
"From that end, I'm pretty sure we’re in good stead and are raring to go," added Briggs.
The defeat to Leinster ended a nine-game winning run for Munster in Interpros, but they'll have a chance at instant revenge in this Saturday's final, where they're looking to become champions for the 16th time and complete a three-in-a-row.
And Briggs (below), who also works as assistant coach with Ireland, says she's confident they can iron out the mistakes from last weekend's loss.
"We were definitely frustrated with elements of that game but on the flip of that we've got to concentrate on ourselves and think about what we’ve done well in the past few weeks, and get back to that.
"Playing at home is a massive thing for us, and it’s been a long enough summer, we’ve condensed a lot of work in. It’s important now we go out and enjoy it.
"I think there were areas we could have targeted and didn’t for some reason or another, stuff like the maul did really well for us and we just needed to hone in on a couple of things in terms of our decision making at key times.
"We definitely feel we didn’t hit the peak that we hit a couple of weeks ago and the beauty is we get to go rectify it. We wanted to win it, every time we go out we want to win. There’s a huge amount of competition in this group and they’re an unbelievable group of competitors, and they were feeling it after.
"There’s a huge opportunity to go and win something this weekend, but it’s about more than that, it’s about the process that we’ve tried every week to get better, and last weekend was just a hiccup along the road.
"It means nothing unless we learn from it, and I really have a huge amount of faith in this group and this coaching group that we can learn from it as a whole."
