Munster must learn their Leinster lessons
Lowe the difference as Van Graan’s men dominate possession but can’t land killer blow
THIS was the third time in a row that Leinster have been able to rest Johnny Sexton and beat Munster – Thomond Park, the RDS and now the Aviva.
Munster threw the kitchen sink at their old foes in the hope of landing a knockout blow; Leinster picked their punches and largely boxed cleverly, maintaining a healthy distance on the scoreboard that never let the result come into question.
They were helped by some questionable refereeing decisions, but Munster threw in a couple of crazy moments of ill-discipline that didn’t help their cause.
Efficiency was the difference between the teams. Having James Lowe helps as well. Munster had six visits to the Leinster ‘22’ and scored on three of them. Leinster only got within the same range three times, but managed a try on all three.
Dominant
With a dominant scrum, combined with a whopping 65pc of possession and 68pc territory, Munster had the opportunity to win this game, but couldn’t make it count.
Leinster’s defence was exemplary, but their visitors were guilty of forcing things at times.
It was a much-improved performance, probably their best of the campaign to date, but they still came away with nothing ahead of a daunting European opener in Exeter next weekend.
“We need to improve our discipline, convert our try-scoring opportunities that we created,” Johann van Graan said. “That’s why we’re actually so happy and excited about our attack. It was out there for all to see, even away from home, to come up with that and to actually test the opposition.
“They scrambled really well, they’re a quality outfit. So maybe score one or two more tries and finish one of those opportunities.
“I said from day one that it’s a long season, very disappointed to lose tonight, but very excited about the future.
“A loss is never good enough and we came here to win tonight and we expected from ourselves to win tonight. That’s what we aimed for and we came up short.
“But there’s such a lot of positives from this game. The guys were heads-up in there, obviously very dis- appointed for such a big game and such a brilliant occasion.
“As a guy coming from a different country, I was so proud of what was delivered out there tonight.
“Unfortunately we are pretty disappointed with the result, but a massive amount of positives and now coming up against a pretty decent opponent next week and a team that we’ve got a lot of respect for and also in brilliant form. So that was a good test for us.”
The game hinged on a couple of big calls from Welsh referee Ben Whitehouse and his 11th-minute decision to send Keith Earls to the sin-bin and award Leinster a penalty try for an early tackle on Lowe altered the course of the game.
With his marker off the pitch, the irrepressible Kiwi fought his way over and the excellent Ross Byrne converted to give Leinster a 14-0 cushion after 15 minutes. Against most teams, that’s game over,
To Munster’s credit, they refused to acknowledge the script and caused their hosts big problems at the maul and the scrum. Tadhg Beirne and CJ Stander scored to narrow the advantage, but Byrne’s boot punished poor discipline to make it 18-12 at the break.
The second-half opened with the second crunch decision by the officials. Earls was racing clear when Whitehouse’s whistle went, his touchjudge Mike English harshly called Sam Arnold for a deliberate knock-on for dislodging the ball from Robbie Henshaw’s grasp. Earls was in front of him, however, so could have been called for offside.
Rather than going in front, Munster were back defending their own line and, somewhat inevitably, Lowe scored again with a superb finish in the corner.
Again their scrum forced them back into contention, but after Alby Mathewson had scored off the back of it, Stephen Archer undid his good work by checking Fergus McFadden’s run and handing Byrne a handy penalty to secure the win.
It was a lesson in taking chances and defending well, but Leo Cullen would prefer his side to impose themselves.
“That is not the ideal scenario,” he said of the limited possession. “We need to be able to wear teams down by us playing a multi-phase attacking game. But sometimes that is the way games go and I thought the guys dug in well today. They hung in there well at different stages.”
LEINSTER – R Kearney; F McFadden (D Kearney 75), R O’Loughlin, R Henshaw, J Lowe; R Byrne (N Reid 71), J Gibson-Park (L McGrath 54); J McGrath (C Healy h-t), J Tracy (S Cronin 56), M Bent (A Porter 48); D Toner, J Ryan (M Kearney 77); R Ruddock (capt), D Leavy, S O’Brien (J van der Flier 63).
MUNSTER – A Conway; D Sweetnam (JJ Hanrahan 71), S Arnold (R Scannell 68), D Goggin, K Earls; J Carbery, A Mathewson (D Williams 75); D Kilcoyne (J Cronin 53), N Scannell (K O’Byrne 75), S Archer (C Parker 75); J Kleyn (B Holland 71), T Beirne; P O’Mahony (capt), T O’Donnell (C Cloete 48), CJ Stander.
REF – B Whitehouse (Wales)