O’Leary’s season lies in tatters

Munster 29 Scarlets 10

The fear is that he has suffered a broken ankle and if that proves to be the case, he is out of the Lions tour and, of course, will miss the remainder of Munster’s Heineken Cup and Magners League campaigns. He was taken immediately to Cork University Hospital and the omens were not good.

Should the worst come to the worst, it will be nothing short of a tragedy for a young player who earned recognition by the Lions and a place among the immortals of Irish rugby on the back of a series of outstanding performances for club and country throughout a long and demanding season. Typically, he was just after bringing off a brave tackle on a Scarlets opponent when he fell awkwardly and was clearly in a lot of pain.

The rest of the side got on with the job as best they could and in the end, an under-strength Scarlets side with little to play for were completely overrun and could count themselves distinctly lucky not to lose by a much greater margin than 19 points.

Munster threw the ball around at every feasible opportunity with each of the back line full of running and always willing to test the tackle. The forwards, too, were in tremendous fettle with Lions captain Paul O’Connell constantly nodding his head in approval and admiration from his seat in the stand.

With the game won and the five points safely in the bank, coach Tony McGahan introduced all seven substitutes as he safeguarded the remainder of his front-line players ahead of next week’s Heineken Cup semi-final against Leinster.

They will be even better when O’Connell returns at Croke Park, and if there is a concern about the well being of the side at present, it is that they haven’t finished off a large enough percentage of all that they have created in impressive and exciting fashion against both Connacht last week and the Scarlets last night.

McGahan admitted that “they lacked detail” and hooker Jerry Flannery stressed that “a repeat of this performance will not suffice against Leinster”, but when they do manage to string everything together, some team could well take the hell of a beating.

Munster’s first try came on five minutes when they turned over ball on the halfway line and hard, straight running by the red-hot centre pairing of Keith Earls and Lifeimi Mafi set up a ruck on the Scarlets line, from where O’Leary’s perfectly-flighted skip pass made the score a formality for Ian Dowling O’Gara converted and Munster were on their way.

However, the injury to O’Leary occurred from the kick-off and led to the introduction of Peter Stringer. Scarlets out-half Rhys Priestland kicked a close range penalty, O’Gara replied in kind but the seemingly inevitable second Munster try took longer than expected to arrive. They looked inventive and dangerous in a series of sweeping attacks, but just as against Connacht on the previous week, the decisive pass invariably went to ground.

That was until the 38th minute, when a clever change of direction by O’Gara opened up the Scarlets defence before David Wallace applied the finishing touch. O’Gara converted but the half still had some life left in it The Welsh attacked up the left flank and Scottish referee Neil Paterson adjudged that they were stopped only by an infringement by Earls, who was duly sent to the bin.

He was still off the field when scrum-half Martin Roberts touched down for a smashing Scarlets try immediately after the break, Lions out-half Stephen Jones signalling his arrival on the pitch by adding the points. However, Roberts quickly found himself in the bin, and after that it was plain sailing for the home side Earls cruised over for try number three on 55 minutes which O’Gara converted and a pushover try credited to Denis Leamy followed.

To be fair to the Scarlets, they did defend resolutely, helped by a sympathetic referee (who binned Mafi late on) and the wholesale changes to the Munster set-up as McGahan rang the changes. Munster could be crowned Magners League champions today should Ospreys lose to Edinburgh, but either way the first leg of the double is now surely in the bag.

Sadly, however, last night will, in the fullness of time, inevitably be remembered for the sad injury to Tomás O’Leary that threatens to be so damaging to his career.

MUNSTER: P Warwick; D Howlett, K Earls, L Mafi, I Dowling; R O’Gara, T O’Leary; M Horan, J Flannery, J Hayes, D O’Callaghan, M O’Driscoll (capt), A Quinlan, D Wallace, D Leamy.

Replacements: P Stringer for O’Leary (6 mins); N Ronan for Wallace (64); D Fogarty for Flannery (65); T Buckley for Hayes (67); D Ryan for Quinlan (71); B Murphy for Howlett (75).

SCARLETS: D Evans; M Jones (capt), R Higgitt, J Davies, L Williams; R Priestland, M Roberts; I Thomas, M Schwalger, S Roberts, V Cooper, D Daly, J Turnbull, R McCusker, D Lyons

Replacements: S Jones for Priestland (h/t); P John for S Roberts (44); M Rees for Schwalger (44).

Referee: N Paterson (Scotland)