MUNSTER are without their starting internationals for today’s Magners League clash against Newport Gwent Dragons.

Three Irish provincial players are due before disciplinary hearings later today following last weekend's Magners League ties.

BEFORE looking forward to what is the crucial game of the autumn series against Argentina tomorrow, it is important to reflect on New Zealand’s brief but electrically-charged visits to Croke Park and Thomond Park over the course of the last week.

MUNSTER coach Tony McGahan must feel like a man trying to play poker with the aces removed from the deck this morning, following yesterday’s selection of the Ireland team to play New Zealand on Saturday.

DEFENCE coach Tony McGahan is one of the least known members of the Munster backroom staff but after the magnificent performance in preventing Gloucester from scoring a try in Saturday’s Heineken Cup quarter-final at Kingsholm, his name should be up in lights.

IN their record tenth successive Heineken Cup quarter-final appearance, Munster stormed the historical fortress of English rugby at Kingsholm to register a third victory away from home at this stage of the competition — another cup record.

ON the eve of the publication of the Genesis report into Ireland’s dismal performances at the World Cup in France, the Heineken Cup afforded a further opportunity this weekend to bury the negative impact of that experience.

EVERYWHERE you go it’s the same. Since the tremendous victory over Leinster, interest in Munster’s quest for European fulfilment has been phenomenal.