Perpignan send out a warning to Munster

PERPIGNAN, Munster’s opponents in the all-important Heineken Cup Pool 2 tie on January 11, once again demonstrated their potential on Sunday when running up 39 points without reply against Narbonne in the French Club Championship.

Perpignan have run into an impressive vein of form in recent weeks highlighted, of course, by their comprehensive victory over Gloucester in the Heineken Cup ten days ago. Narbonne, it will be recalled, went down by a point on aggregate to Connacht.

It is now unlikely that Munster’s backroom team will have the opportunity of seeing Perpignan in action at first hand before January 11th but coach Alan Gaffney points out that he is in possession of the video of the French side’s most recent outing against Gloucester and, of course, they have also been over there earlier in the season as well.

A week after tackling Perpignan at the Stade Aime Giral, Munster meet Gloucester in the final match in the pool at Thomond Park on January 18. The English side have gone from looking almost unbeatable to being relatively vulnerable in some of their most recent outings, prompting former English out-half, turned newspaper and television pundit, Stuart Barnes to observe in advance of their eagerly awaited Premiership game against Northampton Saints on Saturday next: “The Cherry and White back line continues to splutter as a unit for all the coruscating antics of individuals like Marcel Garvey. Against Perpignan, home and away, the warning signs were evident. The French team attacked Gloucester in the scrum and battered Phil Vickery and friends. The defeat in France was no surprise”.

The Irish squad returned yesterday from their week-long warm weather training session in Lanzarote. The Munster members were then making their way to Kilkenny where their provincial colleagues indulged in what Alan Gaffney described as “a fun session” before letting their hair down for 24 hours or so. They will be back in serious training on Friday and the majority (excluding national panel members) will be available to their clubs in the week-end’s AIB League programme.

Jason Holland (Midleton), Mossy Lawler, Eddie Halvey and Colm McMahon (Shannon) and Dominic Crotty, Jeremy Staunton and Simon Kerr (Garryowen) lined out for their clubs in Cork and Limerick Charity Cup ties at the week-end. Doubtless, Shannon and Garryowen along with Cork Constitution are hoping that a similar situation prevails on Saturday and Sunday next when the trio are involved in important AIB League encounters.

“As we won’t have a warm-up game before meeting Ulster in the Celtic League semi-final on January 3rd, I have no difficulty with some of the guys playing for their clubs but the national panel are ruled out,” said Gaffney last night.

The big news on the national front is that Keith Wood came through twenty minutes of a tough Powergen English Cup match for Harlequins against Leeds Tykes. He made his presence felt most forcibly in helping ‘Quins to come from behind to snatch a late victory and happily showed no ill effects of his long lay-off with a neck injury.

FIXTURES: Saturday, AIB League Division One, Belfast Harlequins v UCD; Blackrock College v Terenure; Clontarf v Lansdowne; Co Carlow v St Marys; Dungannon v Ballymena; Shannon v Cork Constitution. Sunday, AIB League Division One, Garryowen v Galwegians.