FRENCH TOAST
Bordeaux heartbreak as Munster dumped out of Champions Cup
LEINSTER will carry Irish hopes in the Champions Cup final after Munster were mauled in Bordeaux by Racing 92.
The prospect of an all-Irish decider grew after Leinster’s splendid showing in defeating the Scarlets on Saturday, but Munster suffered that kind of fate themselves as Racing won the match inside the first 30 minutes.
Three tries in that time blew bewildered Munster away, allowing the French team to control the game thereafter.
Three Munster tries inside the final quarter made the final score much closer than the contest itself, and Racing will now prepare to face Leinster in Bilbao on May 12.
‘It’s a tough one to take,’ said Munster coach Johann van Graan afterwards. ‘We really believed we could pull this one off. They started off like a team on fire. We regrouped at halftime and we had some opportunities but you have to take them.
‘We’re really glad we got to this stage but it’s a tough one to take,’ he said, clearly emotional.
‘Racing have got some incredible
AS Racing ran amok in a nightmarish first-half for Munster, there was an eerie sense of déjà blue. The spring sunshine, the rampant French finding gaps at will before tooting, whooping home fans — it felt a lot like the humblings a succession of Irish sides endured in Paris in the 1980s and 1990s.
Or the World Cup quarter-final humiliation by the French in Melbourne in 2003, when Ireland were blitzed 27-0 in the first half before the French switched off and allowed coach Eddie O’Sullivan to waffle on about winning the second half.
Munster won the second half yesterday to bring the scoreline to a hugely misleading five-point deficit but, long before the final whistle, Racing were mentally practising their Spanish phrases ahead of their Champions Cup final showdown with Leinster in Bilbao three weeks from now.
Johann van Graan spoke emotionally afterwards about his pride in seeing his team battle right to the end but, pride aside, there has to be an inquest into why Munster were so utterly abject in the first half when this result was decided.
The first thought was that they had been thrown off by the conditions — the Bordeaux temperatures hitting the high 20s were at a level they would not have experienced all season, whereas their opponents might have found it easier to adjust.
However, that does not explain Munster being able to summon the energy to score three tries in a second period where they were utterly dominant in terms of possession and territory. Plus, the weather was not a surprise, it had been talked about in the extensive build up to this semi-final and was factored into Munster’s preparations which included a two-week tour of South Africa.
Nor should Munster have been caught unawares by the Racing tactic of trying to blow their opponents out of the game early on that had also been widely predicted.
What was a major surprise was how compliant Munster were in allowing Racing to do it. They were obliterated in the battle on the ground, shaky in the lineout and, most damningly, hesitant in defence.
And the greatest shock was the evidence of Munster’s main men being so far off the pace.
The sight of Conor Murray and Peter O’Mahony missing tackles they would normally execute withutes conscious thought was psychologically ruinous and, when Munster were in dire need of a rallying figure, their go-to carrier CJ Stander could not impose himself. It was discomfiting viewing that seemed to spread unease, verging on panic, throughout the team –— notably in out-half Ian Keatley who had a wretched opening 20 min- when control was demanded.
It permitted Racing to run the table and, when Teddy Thomas went over for what should have been his third try after just 22 minutes — the visual of him jokingly flipping the ball to his captain, the superb Maxime Machenaud, to touch down was mortifying from a Munster point of view.
If there was an ebullient air of ‘merci’ among the French, it was all about mercy for Munster and it was impossible not to draw unfavourable comparisons with their 2006 and 2008 European Cup-winning sides.
Van Graan and his men were attempting to make the final for the first time since that 2008 triumph in Cardiff but were nowhere near the levels required — individually or collectively.
Forwards coach Jerry Flannery played against Toulouse that day and must have wondered how the Munster forwards could allow themselves to be bullied to the extent they were in the first half yesterday — unthinkable in the days when he was packing down with O’Connell, O’Callaghan, Hayes, Wallace and Quinlan.
Similarly, the backline containing Ronan O’Gara, Rua Tipoki and Doug Howlett would never have indulged the wayward kicking, ‘Hail Mary’ passing and tepid tackling on show yesterday.
Despite having a clutch of proven leaders in the team, Munster looked rudderless and the spotout