Wary Murray says Scarlets have thrown down the gauntlet

CONOR MURRAY’S elevation to the Irish World Cup squad was one of the fairytale stories of the year and the talented scrum-half gives Munster clubmate Ronan O’Gara most of the credit for helping him integrate into the squad.

After a whirlwind six months on the international front and an exciting start to the Heineken Cup, the pair join forces again as Munster get back on the cup trail against Scarlets on Saturday.

Murray is confident of an extended campaign, declaring: “We’re going pretty well, obviously we’re doing okay in the Rabo, we’re in amongst the top four and the last two weeks in the Heineken Cup were very important, getting the late wins. We would be in a very different situation if we didn’t get them with the last minute drop goals.”

The youngster also acknowledges the wide ranging influences that have helped his career these last few months: “Yeah it’s good to those lads around,” he says, “it kind of makes me relax a bit, having that experience outside you, and in the pack as well.”

Murray hadn’t fully prepared himself for the high drama of the last two Heineken games when winning or losing came down to fractions.

“There’s huge relief, obviously,” said the scrum-half, “the Heineken Cup is huge to Munster and we want to be in and around the top of the group at the end of the pool stages. You just have complete faith in Rog anyway; you know he’s going to make a decent effort at it if he has to put over a drop goal. Maybe in the next few weeks we won’t have to rely on him like that anyway, but he’s there and I’m sure he can do it again and again.”

This week is bound to be a huge challenge, now that Scarlets have thrown down the gauntlet to all in this group.

Murray wasn’t surprised the Welsh outfit put Northampton to the sword at Franklin’s Gardens, however.

“Scarlets are a very good side, they’ll clearly be hard to beat and we will have to be at our very best to beat them.”

He sees it as another opportunity for Munster to make their mark: “No matter who you play nowadays there are quality players up against you; the standard is very high in all competitions.”

However, Murray still has no doubts he must maintain those standards and will be judged on each and every performance.

The World Cup campaign was a boost and his relative success within the squad is motivation in itself: “I think I’ve learned a lot,” he says. But he is under no illusions that opinions from on high can change.

In relation to New Zealand, he says it was a sink or swim situation. “I suppose I had a good run at it over there, but had it gone the other way, I might not now be in the Munster squad.

“The main thing I took out of the experience was to focus on myself; even when you’re playing against the world’s best players you shouldn’t change what you do, you just try to do what you do best and take that forward into every game.”

* Conor Murray was interviewed during an open day with Munster’s drinks partners Lucozade Sport