JOHANN’S INCREDIBLES —
Van Graan in awe of Munster steel after epic win
JOHANN VAN GRAAN is hardly in Limerick a wet week but he has no doubt Andrew Conway’s stunning matchwinning try on Saturday will be forever enshrined in Munster’s fabled history.
Late winning scores and Munster have been comfortable bedfellows in European rugby since the game went professional but never have they been outplayed for such long periods by a bigger side and still manage to snatch the game at the death.
‘It was an incredible try,’ said Van Graan (below).
‘It’s interesting the way rugby games work out, the ball went to him and it will go down as one of the all-time great plays of Munster.
‘You’ve just got to look at his face, he was in a real battle. To come through such a long injury, he wasn’t, by his own standards, that sharp in training this week. He’s one of the guys who regularly says “I just want the ball”. A great Munster man.’
Conway, out with a knee injury since the final pool game against Castres in January, was a doubt right up to the team announcement on Friday but, like so many of his team-mates, showed up with a huge performance when it mattered most on Saturday.
But nobody in the crowd of 26,265 could have envisaged what might unfold when he somehow managed to field a touch-finder from Francois TrinhDuc on the whitewash just over four minutes from time.
Conway only had eyes ahead, and with Toulon winger Josua Tuisova pushing up in anticipation of a quick pass infield, the gap opened up and the 26-year old didn’t need any further invitation. Chris Ashton and Anthony Belleau created the option to cut infield when both of them went wide presuming that Conway would attempt to sprint down the tram-line and with only Malakai Fekitoa at home, he skirted past the former All-Black to send Thomond Park into raptures. ‘The fact is, it’s about life lessons, it’s not always how you start, it’s how you finish. ‘Hopefully this team can give a lot of people hope and hopefully we can keep this legacy of Munster going forward in the future. ‘There have been so many eras before us and I hope some of these players become real legends in the Munster jersey,’ added Van Graan. But Conway wasn’t the only hero. Conor Murray’s sharp intelligence nabbed the opening-half try which got them back in the match and left them leading 10-6 at the break, while Peter O’Mahony was superb in a backrow where Jack O’Donoghue stepped up in a big way in the absence of Chris Kloete at openside and CJ Stander produced a typically robust performance in the No8 jersey. The biggest fear for Munster was that they wouldn’t contain the midfield threat from Mathieu Bastareaud and Ma’a Nonu but it was here that the foundation for success came with Rory Scannell and Sammy Arnold producing stunning displays.
‘From when I announced the team, I called Sam and Rory in and I said to them both, “it’s not about who you’re playing against, it’s about you”.
‘It’s interesting how life works out, from the first game I was involved in against Zebre, Sam and Rory were the centres and against Leicester in December.
‘I said to them “life works out the way it should and you two in the 12 and 13 Munster jerseys, I don’t want anything special, just do what you normally do” and I thought they were incredible,’ added Van Graan.
Munster captain O’Mahony also praised the two centres but said that his side’s against-the-odds victory against one of the financial heavyweights of European rugby was down to the collective rather than the individual.
‘Our defensive system worked really well. Billy Holland does a huge amount of work on our lineout defence and attack. It paid off for us massively today, all the hours he puts in on the laptop,’ said O’Mahony, in reference to the pressure the home side put on the Toulon throw.
‘It’s one thing stopping Mathieu Basteraud and Ma’a Nonu when they have the ball. But if you can take it away from them at source it makes things a lot easier for everyone. And we did that at times which was good as well. A lot of hard work goes into a performance like that, certainly,’ added the Munster skipper.
The focus will now switch to the semi-final showdown with Racing 92 in Bordeaux, the third time they will meet this season with both sides having won their home pool games.
Munster will be away from the hype, heading to South Africa today for the next two weeks ahead of Pro14 clashes with the Southern Kings and Cheetahs.
‘It will be hugely difficult but it’s nice to be able to say we’re there now,’ added O’Mahony before he learned that he would be meeting former team-mate Donnacha Ryan in the semi-finals.
‘We need to be right, we need to be in the right frame of mind. That was probably our best performance of the year, certainly defensively. And, if we want to win the semi-final, it’s going to have to be a step up again.
‘Guys have to understand that and it is not always easy to do. These performances take a lot of guys, a huge amount. Not just physically, but emotionally, the whole lot.
‘So guys have to have the ability to recover and play once, if not twice over the next couple of weeks and then get themselves mentally, physically and emotionally ready for the next biggest game of their career.
‘I thought going into last year’s semi-final we were well-prepared. We’ve taken steps forward. There are parts of our game in which we are much further down the line now.
‘We will have to do a lot of work doing our video on the opposition, alongside playing the two games., And obviously the week of the semi-final will be hugely important. You can’t just skip past all the processes that we need to get ourselves right. They’re very important as well.’ MUNSTER: S Zebo (D Sweetnam 25); A Conway, S Arnold, R Scannell, A Wootton; I Keatley, C Murray (J Hart 77); D Kilcoyne (J Cronin 53), R Marshall (N Scannell 53), S Archer (J Ryan 53); J Kleyn (G Grobler 76), B Holland; P O’Mahony, J O’Donoghue (R Copeland 59), CJ Stander. Scorers – Tries: Murray, Conway. Pens: Keatley (2 ). Cons: Keatley (2). TOULON: C Ashton; J Tuisova, M Bastareaud, M Nonu (M Fekitoa 59), S Radradra; A Belleau (F Trinh-Duc 53), E Escande (A Mathewson 59); F Fresia (X Chiocci 46-74), G Guirado (capt, A Etrillard 74), M van der Merwe (E Setiano 77); J Kruger (R Taofifenua 46), D Attwood; R Lakafia, F Isa, D Vermeulen. Scorers — Try: Ashton. Pens: Belleau, Trinh-Duc (2). Con: Trinh-Duc. DG: Belleau. Referee: Nigel Owens (Wales)