Sting in the tail as Munster take on Tigers

IF we can dispatch the Tigers, tails between legs, then we may just be thrown to the Lions.

Anything seems possible after the performance of the mighty Munster machine in Saturday's breath-taking victory over Gloucester.

So the unstoppable Red Army marches on, doing the seemingly undoable and readies its armour for a fight to the death against old foes the Leicester Tigers.

And if that isn't tantalising enough for rugby fans, there is also the possibility of Munster playing the Leinster Lions, also through to the quarter finals, in a semi-final or even the final.

What an event that would be an all-Ireland final in Lansdowne Road in the merry month of May.

As pool winners, Leicester won the right to a home game for the quarter-final, so Munster will have to travel to Welford Road, where in last year's final, the helping hand of Neil Back put the home team home and dry. Munster and their band of travelling fans are hungry to settle that score.

Meanwhile, the 6,000 tickets for the Heineken Cup final to be played in Dublin on Saturday May 24 sold out within a matter of hours after going on public sale last Friday.

The marketing manager of Ticketmaster, John Maguire, described the buying frenzy as 'amazing'.

No further tickets will go on general sale to the public. The remaining 42,000 tickets will be split between the two finalists and tournament organisers European Rugby Cup Limited's commercial partners.

The other quarter-finalists are Toulouse, Llanelli, Perpignan, Northampton Saints and Biarritz. The quarter-finals will take place on the weekend of April 11 and the semi-finals on April 26 and 27.