Conor Murray says Munster can get back to winning European Cups, but that senior players in the squad have to be listened to when it comes to recruitment.
Munster reachedfour European deciders in 10 seasons, but they haven't been back there since their most recent victory in 2008.
The southern province reached the penultimate stage a dozen times since then, most recently in 2019, but Leinster have overtaken them as the pre-eminent Irish force, with four European titles since their breakthrough in 2009.
Murray confirmed his retirement from professional rugby on Friday, having played his last game for Munster in May in a URC quarter-final defeat to Sharks in Durban.
The 36-year-old had hinted at playing on for another year, most likely on foreign shores, but a suitable deal never materialised.
Speaking on RTÉ's Game On about the launch of his autobiography, the scrum-half felt stressed that below-par recruitment has been holding Munster back.
"I think the player ability is there," he said. "From what I've heard, the new coach, Clayton McMillan, is doing a great job. It's obviously really early days, but the boys seem to be in good spirits."
"I know Leinster didn't get over the line in Europe last year, but the fact that they brought in big hitters like RG (Snyman) and Jordie Barrett is something you need to look at.
"I'm glad a couple of players I spoke to before put it out agreed with me that in terms of Munster's signings over the years, there's some of them that you'd be scratching your head being like, why weren't we consulted on this?
"Senior players now, as soon as you became established, I suppose we would have liked to have been consulted about some signings, just because we would know someone who knows someone who could tell us about this particular person.
"Whether ability-wise they're good enough, or personality-wise they'll fit into what we're about in our culture.
"Now, we did make some unreal signings over the years, but there was some where we were just like, why, who's making the final call on this?
"Because we're in the game here now, we would be able to offer our opinion or make one phone call and make it a bit easier."
"I get finances and things like that, but there were times where we'd sign a fella, probably wasn't up to the standard and we knew he was on fairly decent money, so you can't throw the finance excuse at us that way."
Murray acknowledges that Leinster have been the top provincial dogs in Ireland over the last decade and a half, although he points out that they have natural advantages. Yet some tweaking at Munster could make them truly competitive with the eastern province.
"I get it with Leinster and the conveyor belt they have of the school system and just the sheer volume of players, you're going to end up with more quality players in the long run. It's a numbers game.
"This comes from a place of loving Munster, this comes from a place of, I want Munster to do well, so I want to be honest.
"I'm glad since it's come out (the book), a few ex-players have been like, that's great, we were all kind of thinking similar lines with the recruitment side of things, so I'm not just the only bad guy."
