Daily Mirror (Northern Ireland)
DIFFERENCE
Munster stroll to victory over ill-disciplined Connacht but van Graan knows they must step it up
JOHANN VAN GRAAN admits his team must fire on all cylinders to put a stop to Leinster’s unbeaten march in Friday’s big PRO14 semi-final.
Having packed up and headed home yesterday evening after a bizarre encounter with Connacht that yielded more than the one point required to be the last side into the play-offs, van Graan knows his players have little time to get rested and ready for the champions.
The Reds came close to overcoming their old rivals in Irish rugby’s return just over a fortnight ago. But they’ll somehow have to muster more this time in another semi-final shot at Leinster – and on the back of a five-day recovery.
That’s the outcome for them after losing out to Edinburgh at the top of their conference on matches won – 10 to the Scottish club’s 11.
Their review on this six-try win will be quickly put to bed, too.
An impressive start by Munster as they raced into a 14-0 lead inside 15 minutes was overshadowed by Connacht’s loss of discipline and Frank Ryan showed five cards in total by the end of a surreal first half.
And two of the five were red – the westerners lost debutant Abraham Papali’i for a high smash on Conor Murray and then Shane Delahunt to a high elbow on CJ Stander while the Connacht hooker was in possession.
They were gone by the 35th minute, followed by sin-binnings to Munster pair Peter O’mahony and Tadhg Beirne as the half came to a close and Connacht reduced the deficit to
21-7 at the break.
Once a storming start to the second half came to nothing
– and with Munster back to a full complement – Andrew Conway ran in a brace and Tadhg Beirne capped his return after being absent through injury since December.
Beirne’s return is very timely, given the ACL injury suffered by RG Snyman against Leinster last time out, while Munster could breathe a sigh of relief last night that Damian de Allende’s departure with 10 minutes to go after receiving a bang will not keep him out on Friday.
“You’ll have to be at your best to beat Leinster away,” said van Graan (inset), who was at least able to take off frontliners like skipper Peter O’mahony, Stander, Conor Murray and JJ Hanrahan early in the second half.
“In the semi-final last season we said after the game that our discipline wasn’t good enough and that was because of pressure that they applied.
“So it will definitely be a pressure cooker game. I think both sides performed really well last week when they played each other.
‘All parts of your game need to fire. You need to apply scoreboard pressure on them.
“In the semi-final two years ago, we were eight points behind with a few minutes left and we got to within a point.
“So the important thing is we learn from the past two semifinals and hopefully we can come and deliver a performance on Friday night.
“But you’re playing a team who will be well rested – and we have to come to their backyard again.
“But look, that’s something we set out at the beginning of the year, get to a semi-final first and hopefully take the next step – and what bigger challenge than Leinster away on a Friday night in the Aviva after we’ve played on Sunday.
“We’re looking at a great opportunity ahead of us. We’ve been training together as a group now for five and a half weeks, so there’s so much left in this team in terms of our development.”