Gloucester not resting on their laurels

NIGEL MELVILLE, the Gloucester director of rugby, and coach Dean Ryan are adamant that Munster remain a major force in Pool 2 of the Heineken Cup in spite of their comprehensive defeat at Kingsholm on Saturday.

When I put it to Melville that he must have been expecting a tougher match from a team of Munster’s reputation, he quickly responded: “Wasn’t that tough enough? I thought it was a very tough, physical game, especially in the first half. We did expect a tough game and I think we got one”.

He then went on for some strange reason to dismiss both the enormity of the scoreline in Gloucester’s favour and the manner in which they dominated the game from start to finish. No matter how much praise was heaped on their team, Melville and Ryan accepted the plaudits but were far from getting carried away.