The latest round of URC matches saw contrasting results for the two provinces in action. Munster edged Cardiff in a nervy affair in Thomond Park while Leinster fell short against the Bulls, despite their improvements on last week.
Adverse weather conditions meant that Ulster and Connacht were unable to build on their positive opening rounds in the competition, which will be frustrating for both groups.
Despite Cardiff's inability to win in Thomond Park, they’ve been a thorn in Munster’s side over the past few seasons. Munster have found the Welsh side's attacking style difficult to manage on numerous occasions, and with Munster’s injury list spiralling once again, they will be pleased with their gritty victory at the weekend.
Craig Casey has been a standout performer and standard-bearer in the Munster group for the past couple of seasons. His absence would have been a worry for Munster. However, Ethan Coughlan had a very positive outing in his place and Jack Crowley took the reins at various stages to guide his team to a hard-fought victory.
Individual moments of brilliance in attack were far more sporadic in their second performance compared to their first. The free-flowing attack that was seen in Munster’s away win at Scarlets was less visible in Thomond Park on Saturday evening.
The pick of the attacking moments was a disallowed try for Dan Kelly, following two perfectly-executed kicks from Crowley, allowing Kelly to slide towards the try line in possession. He fell just short and Munster chased the game for a long period afterwards. Instead of going ahead and pushing on, Munster were a few blades of grass away from taking the lead.
They fell victim to Callum Sheedy’s spontaneous, and at times wholly unpredictable, kicking game. Both wingers pounced on kicks from their out-half with the first and last scores of the match coming from Sheedy’s assists.
While Cardiff unlocked Munster with moments of brilliance, Munster were comfortable for large parts of the game with physicality in their forward pack and in midfield.
They managed key periods of the game brilliantly too, using their kicking game to regain control and dominate possession while Gavin Coombes sat out for 10 minutes in the sin-bin.
While individual brilliance was scarce, Munster scored a well-worked team try from a two phase set-play.
Despite the shouts for a forward pass on the first phase, they launched their phase play with a breakaway from the maul, setting Kelly forward in the midfield.
A pre-rehearsed movement - with forwards running dummy lines around the corner - saw Crowley feed Seán O’Brien, before slick handling on the way back found Ruadhan Quinn who finished in the left-hand corner.
The game was littered with errors, some unforced. Kicking errors from both sides hindered the scoreline either through a gain in territory or directly missing kicks at goal.
Munster’s forwards did some damage in both 22-metre areas. Fineen Wycherley and Jean Kleyn stole possession from Cardiff when Munster were under pressure. Kleyn also aided Diarmuid Barron’s first-phase try from a tap penalty.
There were good performances around the pitch, you just had to look a bit deeper to find them. Both Munster second rows had dominant games, with others adding to the physicality.
Ben O’Connor looked assured at full-back and Munster’s centres showed up when needed, but Clayton McMillan stated that Munster lacked an edge and it’s hard to argue with that.
Player of the match, Crowley, brought the most edge from a Munster perspective. He kept the Cardiff defence guessing, despite a couple of his own errors, and had the foresight to kick a drop goal to give Munster the eight-point safety net.
It didn’t feel like Munster needed to go two scores ahead at that stage to seal the game. Cardiff had lost some of their momentum, but they still had one last moment in the tank to finish within a score of Munster.
Crowley’s decision to drop off and kick the drop goal shows how the Cardiff attack can cause nerves among any defence.
Their ability to score from nothing, sometimes in an unorthodox manner, is something that Munster have mismanaged in the past. The drop goal to push Munster into safer and much-needed territory earned Crowley the player of the match award and separated his performance from that of his team-mates.
Munster will head into next Friday night’s game at Virgin Media Park against Edinburgh with revenge on their minds. They were unexpectedly picked off by Edinburgh in the same fixture last February.
Munster face the unfamiliar territory of possibly going into an interprovincial derby against Leinster the following week as the form team and favourites. Of course, there’s another week of rugby to be played and form is difficult to predict at this time of the year.
Munster will have a chance to go three from three while getting payback on Edinburgh before facing a tough away fixture in Croke Park.
Leinster will face South African opposition for the third game running; this time it will be a struggling Sharks side at home. Leinster had their own struggles on their tour of South Africa against the Stormers and the Bulls.
They’ll be looking to reintegrate more players and use their two home games as an early springboard for their season.
It’s very early in the season, but Munster will be happiest of the provinces with two wins under their belt, heading into a home game against Edinburgh.
Edinburgh lost their opening fixture away to Zebre and had the weekend off following the postponement of their game against Ulster. They will be a week fresher, but possibly a week behind Munster in their readiness. It’ll be an interesting contest in Cork on Friday night.
