Super Sarries head for Munster showdown
BRAD Barritt urged Saracens to embrace their daunting Champions Cup semi-final against Munster after Glasgow were overwhelmed at Allianz Park.
Chris Ashton spearheaded a fourtry rout of the Warriors with Barritt and Marcelo Bosch also crossing against opponents making their maiden appearance in the knockout phase of Europe.
The reward for a fifth successive visit to the last four is probably the toughest challenge they have faced yet at that stage – a clash with Munster at the Aviva Stadium in Dublin, the graveyard of English ambitions for both club and country.
“The pleasing thing is that over these five or six years we have thrived on going to places where we potentially have not won before,” club captain Barritt said.
“It started in our Vicarage Road days when we didn’t get much of a crowd and we thrived on going to Welford Road and Kingsholm.
“This is the next logical step - to go to a national stadium to play an iconic team like Munster.
“We will look forward to it. We don’t see it as a daunting prospect – we see it as an exciting opportunity.”
Barritt’s view was echoed by his director of rugby Mark McCall, who believes Saracens can profit from the presence of their England contingent in their quest to avoid the fate endured by Wasps at the same venue on Saturday.
A fortnight ago Eddie Jones’ men
SARACENS ...................... 38 GLASGOW ....................... 13
were denied back-to-back Grand Slams after losing 13-9 to Ireland at the Aviva Stadium.
“The players don’t realise it yet hopefully they will when they get there – but it’s going to be a very special day,” McCall said.
“We played Clermont a couple of years ago when there were 30,000 Clermont fans and us. This is going to be double that – there will be 50,000 Munster fans.
“We all know there’s an emotional element to this game and we have to make sure we’re able to cope with that. One of the benefits for us is that we have players who have been through it all before.
“They experienced what they did two weeks ago and experienced a lot of knock-out games over the last five seasons. We have a team that relishes these kinds of occasions.”
McCall described Saracens’ performance as “outstanding” and Glasgow head coach Gregor Townsend offered the same verdict after the Warriors’ European adventure ground to a halt.
“We’re obviously disappointed. We put in huge effort to get here and we didn’t deliver,” Townsend said.
“Saracens did a number of things very well, their physicality when carrying the ball being one of them. The pace they played at was excellent. They were outstanding.”