Not much to take from Thomond

NOT for the first time does a Munster victory leave us with more questions than answers.

Rarely, if ever, can a Heineken Cup win at Thomond have felt so flat.

The proud European winning record was maintained, the four points needed to remain atop the group attained, and neither of those achievements should be understated. Yet this was not a good Munster performance. It was very far from it.

There were positives. The pack, as we've come to expect, was again magnificent, as Anthony Foley leading by example, conceded.

Closest to Foley in red for determination and fighting spirit were his two backrow outriders, the terrible twosome from Tipperary, Alan Quinlan and Denis Leamy.

Afterwards the captain had a word of praise for both and for youngster Leamy especially.

"For a young player coming through, you're always looking for a breakthrough season; this is Denis's season. He has been unfortunate with injuries, but he's come back this year and been our best player by far. He's just a dog on the ground, gets through all the hard work and graft.

"Quinny is Quinny stuck in everything. I suppose when you look at the three guys who were left out, Wally, Jim Williams and Stephen Keogh, you don't want to be giving fellas chances, so there's a lot of pressure for places there, everybody has to be on their toes."

Indeed the entire fifteen defended brilliantly for the whole game and Paul Burke's goal-kicking was perfect. But there endeth the good news.

The major knock against the Munster team of the past several seasons, this one included, is that once the ball leaves the half-back position, it goes nowhere.

They lack a game breaker in the mould of O'Driscoll or D'Arcy. Worse, where previously we had at least an assured and talented half-back pairing, that was not the case in this game. I bow to no-one in my admiration for Peter Stringer, and much that he did in this game was again first-class.

His work-rate and tackling were superb, his passing again on target (for the most part), one beautiful, high, long pass to set up Anthony Foley to create Munster's second try, was truly visionary, but he seems to have taken too seriously much of the ill-informed and unwarranted criticism of his overall game.

Where his first instinct previously (and the correct instinct, for someone with his lightening hands) was to pass, Stringer is now taking options he would never before have considered, wrong options, trying to force things.

A couple of efforts apart, his kicking was poor and gave away hard-earned ball on several occasions. It could be that he had lost confidence in his half-back partner, because Paul Burke's line kicking was also poor.

We did, however, see one moment of pure magic out along the line, and it came from Christian Cullen. It followed that long Stringer pass, then a lovely little grubber kick from Foley, just before the quick-thinking number 8 was about to be forced into touch.

It looked to be a defender's ball, but Cullen came steaming through, picked up from his toe-tips without losing stride, dived across the line, all in one sublime movement. Genius.

The pre-game atmosphere in Thomond was electric, capacity crowd in good voice. There was no sign either, on or off the field, of any of the rancour predicted, given the recent bitter history between the two sides, laced further with some of the spicy comments by Ospreys manager Lyn Jones.

Quite the opposite in fact, and despite the result, the visitors actually seemed to have enjoyed the outing.

"Great choir," quipped Jones, of the Athenry-singing hordes; "we'd like to be back here again next year, in the Heineken Cup."

"I enjoyed it," said Ospreys captain Barry Williams; "there has been a lot of bad press, but the boys take no notice of that.

"Hopefully the crowd will have enjoyed our game, the Irish people will have enjoyed the way we play. A pity we couldn't come up with the win, but we have a little agreement going now, Munster win the Heineken Cup, we'll win the Celtic League!"

Not all shared that opinion. Ospreys' Welsh international centre Gavin Henson claimed: "We felt that we were the better team.

"Munster had their spell of 10-15 minutes at the end of the first half, and that was the winning of the game, but we are very disappointed."

Unlike Munster, who were generous to a fault, in the second half particularly, when the Ospreys had the ball they valued it and wouldn't give it back.

Phase after phase they owned the oval for the first thirty minutes of the first half and the last thirty of the second. For such a young side, they showed great maturity and great patience in possession.

Fortunately for Munster, and despite the presence of the likes of Stefan Terblanche and Shane Williams on the wings and Gavin Henson and Sonny Parker in the centres, they showed almost as little imagination as Munster with ball in hand, never really threatening a try, the Shane Williams touchdown magic apart.

Out-half Matt Jones in fact appeared to be under the impression that the touch-line was the try-line, he spent more time racing side to side than north/south. Testament, I suppose, to the Munster defence.

In mitigation, it should be noted that O'Gara was a massive loss, as were Rob Henderson and John Kelly.

Thus, the less than euphoric feeling as we left the ground. A win is a win is a win, the four points are in the bag, but this could yet prove a very costly win, and that's not a contradiction in terms.

Bonus points will now prove crucial in deciding who gets home advantage for the playoffs, and given Munster's performance in the closing minutes of the first half of this game, when they scored their two tries, there was a bonus point there for the taking.

It went a-begging, and fault for that lies not with a pack who again proved themselves, to a man, one of the best in the business, but to a still-stuttering back-line.

They won't be admitting it officially of course, but what it all means is that there will be additional pressure on Munster next Saturday in Twickenham, against Harlequins. Four points won't be enough to guarantee that crucial home advantage; four points, four tries, bonus point.

Nothing less will do.