TOULON LIVING BY A DIFFERENT SET OF RULES
Munster are feeling good as they prepare to take on the wealthy French giants in Thomond Park
IMAGINE for a moment what life would be like if the club presidents such as Mourad Boudjellal or Jacky Lorenzetti, who dominate the Top 14 in France, were in charge of the Irish provinces?
The players would be clocking up seriously more mileage for their provinces for a start, while there would definitely be less tolerance of failure.
Leinster’s capitulation close to the finishing line in recent seasons might have received a different reaction, Connacht’s failure to build on their historic 2016 Pro12 title win would not be tolerated — although they would probably have a proper stadium by now.
It would take a brave coach down in Munster, still not at the end of his first campaign in charge, to walk into the big man’s office and declare he was departing a few months into next season, but that he would hang around for a few months until the position in South Africa was vacant.
And Ulster? Well, let’s not even start to estimate the carnage that would possibly unfold there.
Of course, Ireland probably wouldn’t be Six Nations Grand Slam winners and Joe Schmidt would have long departed for home.
But the French adopted a different system when the game went professional and while their national teams have undoubtedly suffered, it has become the moneybags league of the rugby world.
The sums paid to players are jaw-dropping, with most of the clubs owned by men who have money to burn.
They expect success, both financially and on the field and they rule with an iron fist. Sometimes the reaction can be petty.
Two weeks ago Toulon, who still have not nailed down a place in the knockout stages of the Top 14, headed north to play basement side Oyonnax, where former Munster scrum-half Mike Prendergast is backs coach.
Oyonnax did a number on them and Toulon president Boudjellal was livid. He suggested the players should travel the 450 kilometres home by train to give them a dose of reality, rather than the charter flight back to the Med.
Stand-in skipper Mathieu Bastareaud had a cut off his president in a live post-match television interview last Sunday after Toulon bounced back to humiliate reigning champions Clermont Auvergne 49-0. It might not have been the wisest move.
The past has a habit of visiting the future. Rassie Erasmus started this season as Munster coach but by Christmas he was in charge of South Africa. He started persuading Toulon captain Duane Vermeulen, who is out of contract in the summer, to reactivate his Springboks career.
Toulon reacted by offering Vermeulen a much reduced contract. Boudjellal’s reckoning was they should pay him on the basis that he would be away half the time.
But there is no doubting that Boudjellal has been a huge success for Toulon, a club with a proud past which saw them French champions in 1931, ’87 and ’92 before the money rolled in. And Boudjellal is one of the few club presidents in France who have targeted European glory and he is hopeful they are poised for a fourth title this season. In fairness, their success rate in the competition is staggering, winning 40 of the 54 games they have played in the competition, winning eight of their nine meetings with Irish sides — Munster’s 45-18 win in Thomond Park in 2010 the only blip.
Toulon have won the competition on three of the six occasions they have been in it, the three unsuccessful years seeing them dumped out away from home at the quarter-final stage. Johann van Graan and Munster will cling to such trends as they bid to nail down a semi-final spot away to either Clermont Auvergne or Racing 92.
Van Graan (left) has been building up to this one with noticeable enthusiasm, even allowing for the crippling injury list which has decimated his squad.
Thankfully for Van Graan, both Simon Zebo and Andrew Conway have overcome their injury troubles to make the starting 15, with Grand Slam winners Conor Murray, CJ Stander and Peter O’Mahony also returning to provide some vital big game experience.
The South African knows Munster will need to box clever with a stronger Toulon side, but he feels they have the tools to take down the only side to win this competition three years running.
‘I think you’ve got to pick your fights. Just in terms of the laws of physics they’re just bigger than us so you need to find ways to outmanoeuvre them in certain areas,’ he said.
‘Unfortunately, this is a collision game, you need to win collisions, you need to win body height and body fight against them. You’ve got use your fitness and move them around.
‘All of those things sound very nice but you’ve got to actually do it against world-class opposition.’
He doesn’t have the distraction of a club president breathing down his neck, but Van Graan knows the pressure from the expectant Munster supporters will be no less demanding.