ROWNTREE IS CHUFFED FOR SUPERB FANS
GRAHAM Rowntree saluted the ‘Brave and the Faithful’, the 350or-so Munster fans who beat serious travel disruptions last Saturday to watch them beat the Bulls in South Africa.
There were planes, trains, automobiles utilised to negotiate storms, closed airports, Egyptian visas and Pretoria’s battered infrastructure to make the iconic Loftus Versfeld venue.
“As usual, there were hundreds of Munster fans there,” said the Reds boss.
“There was a whole block in the far stand and credit to them with the bad weather and everything.
“With Dubai being shut some of them got in very late, some of them went through Egypt as well, we are blessed, truly blessed with our travelling support and we caught up with some of them afterwards.”
Special
There was something special, something very Munster, about Saturday’s four-try win.
“I’ve got ‘it’ for a long time with this club, what this club means, what they are about,” added Rowntree.
“They roll their sleeves up, deal with adversity and move on, we speak a lot about moving on when things don’t go our way.
“That start of the second-half we were under the cosh, weren’t we?
“There were a couple of good tries in that third quarter but keep moving forward, stuck to our game and when the opportunities arose we took them.
“It was a brilliant kicking display from Jack Crowley, for John Hodnett’s try in particular, we got the power game going for RG Snyman’s score and Shane Daly’s try was on the back of good patience and good skills.
“Mur’s (Conor Murray) try was just incredible, we were looking at it in the review and we didn’t keep picking and going, the backs pulled the trigger quite early ... they scored so in the end we weren’t unhappy at their decision!”
Back-row Jack O’Donoghue, a veteran of a few away days, was impressed also.
“To see all the red jerseys on the far side of the field trying to make themselves heard and then when they were singing along as Zombie came on the speakers — it was just incredible.
“It just shows the dedication our supporters have, they followed us down to South Africa.
“To be able to go over to them at the end of the game is always a nice touch and this time there was a Waterford contingent there that I was talking to and I found out I shared a godfather with one of the guys!”.