Munster interim coach Ian Costello is challenging his players to make Saturday's Investec Champions Cup Pool 3 finale against the Northampton Saints "personal" as the province look to secure top spot and home advantage in the knockouts.
While Munster aren’t officially qualified for the next round, they do know a win against the Premiership champions would likely be enough to have a home tie in the next round, while they could even top the pool depending on results elsewhere.
Saturday’s game at Franklin’s Gardens will be an eleventh meeting of the sides in the competition, and their fifth in just over two years.
Munster won home and away against the Saints during the 2022/23 pool stage, but lost twice to the English side last season, beaten in their final pool game at Thomond Park, before losing again in the Round of 16 in Northampton.
And Costello believes that familiarity is sure to add some more heat to an already spicy rivalry this weekend.
"It’s always in the best sense of the word when we use it in Munster: Bitter is better," Costello said.
"It’s personal. We made last week [against Saracens] personal, it was personal in front of our fans, 22,000 people, we hadn't given the best in their eyes, we hadn't produced a performance worthy of that type of crowd on the 27th against Leinster, so we made it personal in terms of the battles on the field and what we wanted the crowd to see.
"It’s personal again this weekend; personal in that they knocked us out of the Champions Cup [last season], it’s a tough place to go and we know what’s at stake.
"The carrot if we win, we find ourselves back in Thomond Park in April in front of a crowd like we had on Saturday night, and everyone wants that, everyone craves it. We just want more of it."
While the sides already know plenty about each other from recent meetings, Munster are hoping to glean some inside information from their performance consultant Chris Boyd.
The New Zealander, who has been working with Munster on a short-term basis since December, spent four seasons as director of rugby at Northampton between 2018 and 2022, and was credited with building the foundations of the squad that went on to win the Premiership last summer.
"He’s been excellent, he’s a wealth of knowledge, experience, and has a manner that’s really easy to work with. I’ve found him to be a great sounding board," Costello said of Boyd, who is due to return to New Zealand at the end of the month.
"I think he knows them very well.
"We can see certain things in terms of reviews through video, but what Chris is able to do is he understands their identity, their DNA, which is a really important thing when you go head-to-head with an opponent.
"Having a better insight into them means we can target certain things to take away from them or certain things to capitalise on. That’s been gold, all those little one percenters. He’s made a really positive contribution."
If Munster lose, they may need to pick up a bonus point to be absolutely sure of qualifying in the event that Stade Francais win with a bonus away to the Bulls and run up a large score.
Fortunately for Munster, that game in Pretoria will be over before they kick off away to Northampton, meaning they will know their fate in advance. But Costello insists that while they will know what they require from Saturday, they can take permutations out of the equation with a win of their own.
"It is certainly in the background, we’ll know all that and we’ll know by three o’clock how the game has gone in South Africa.
"Obviously, it’s mathematically possible, but we’ll focus on our performance on Saturday. It’s in our own hands. That’s the best position we could have been in. We’d have taken your hand off for it going into Saturday.
"We didn’t expect Northampton to lose [against Stade Francais]. We probably felt very confident about having a strong performance and a result on Saturday but we found ourselves in that position where all things can happen, but it’s in our own hands to make sure we qualify and have a home Tound of 16 which would be outstanding.
"They [Northampton] knocked us out of the Champions Cup last year. They're the reigning Premiership champions, they probably play one of the most exciting brands of rugby across any competition, so it’s a whole different threat to what it was last week and one we’re really excited about.
"We also know that if we get it wrong against Northampton you get punished."
Meanwhile, the Munster head of rugby operations was coy when asked about reports they are close to agreeing a deal to sign Leinster loosehead prop Michael Milne.
"We’re close to being able to announce a lot of things in relation to next year, internal as well as signings," Costello said when asked if there was truth to the reports the Offaly man would be joining next season.
Watch Leinster v Bath in the Investec Champions Cup on Saturday from 4.45pm on RTÉ2 and RTÉ Player, follow a live blog on rte.ie/sport and the RTÉ News app, and listen to live commentary on RTÉ Radio 1's Saturday Sport.
