‘One pass away’ from contenders

THE boxes have all been ticked and a return to the Heineken Cup quarter-finals after the misery of last season has been secured with five pool wins out of five.

And Munster being Munster, the focus has already switched to ensuring the victory that will make it six wins from six and a home quarter-final berth when the two-time champions travel to Milton Keynes on Saturday and bid to inflict more heartache on Northampton Saints.

Compared to a year ago, when Munster flew out of Marseille in the depths of despair following a thorough pounding at Toulon, this weekend’s defeat of Castres to book a 13th trip to the knockout stages of Europe’s premier club competition was a moment of triumph.

Even the team plane home from that Toulon loss gave up that night, forced to return from whence it had come due to a technical hitch that further underlined the nadir the province had reached.

So, all in all, and given the casualty list endured by Tony McGahan and his coaching staff this season and the successful integration of replacements, there is much to be thankful for in the camp.

Yet a quiet dressing room, paradoxically, speaks volumes as to the mindset of a squad and after this victory, Munster are clearly deeply frustrated by another disjointed performance in Europe in which they failed to put a dogged Castres away and missed out on a bonus-point victory that would have eased the pressure on them delivering a result against the Saints next Saturday.

“Nobody’s harder on the group than the group itself,” McGahan said. “They know they have things to work on. It wasn’t a jubilant dressing-room afterwards. We recognise the challenge that awaits in Northampton next week, looking for revenge. We need to make sure we step up a few gears.”

There are two ways to look at Munster’s current level of performance in Europe. First, people see the wasted opportunities and unforced errors, and fail to see excellent individual contributions gelling into an effective team performance and reach the conclusion that the team is a way off being a viable Heineken Cup contender in comparison to defending champions Leinster, Toulouse and Saracens.

The flip side of that is the strong feeling, particularly within the Munster dressing room, that McGahan’s team is only that mythical “one pass away” and that they are on the verge of clicking into top gear and producing a dominant, 80-minute performance.

McGahan hoped that display would come against Castres, when his players would make a statement to their rivals. Instead, through a mix of wasted opportunities, unforced errors and a dogged and committed performance that few believed Castres had in them on the road in Europe, Munster fans are still waiting.

Munster, the only team in Europe to have won their first five pool games this season, have yet to declare to the Heineken Cup elite they have what it takes to win the title, but don’t expect that statement to come next Saturday among the concrete cows and riled Saints in Milton Keynes, to where a resurgent Northampton will decamp with vengeance in mind to greet Munster in front of a sell-out crowd at Stadium:mk.

The focus there for Munster will not be on declarations of intent but what matters more: securing that most crucial of assets in this tournament, a home quarter-final draw.

It looks likely, given the points totals of the other pool leaders and their respective final opponents, that only a Munster win in Milton Keynes will do that and McGahan acknowledged that his side need to start making those final passes and becoming more clinical if that is to be achieved.

“Yeah, we’d want to get better. We’d like to get that final part of what we’re looking for and we’re striving exceptionally hard to do that. We recognise that if we want to go through next week and if we want to go even further, that you really need those parts of your game to make sure you can finish off those chances.

“That’s the last part of it. We’ve got the work-rate, we’ve got the shape and we’ve got the go-forward. We just need the final part of it.”

If they can find that final part, though, and Thomond Park can be booked for yet another last-eight European clash then perhaps the frustrations of management and playing staff can be left behind.

For now, though, amid the angst and the frustration, they should take more than a little satisfaction in the distances already travelled from that torrid night in Toulon 12 months ago.

MUNSTER: D Hurley; J Murphy, K Earls, L Mafi (D Barnes 77), S Zebo; R O’Gara (I Keatley 73), C Murray (T O’Leary 65); W du Preez (M Horan 72), D Varley (D Fogarty 72), B Botha (S Archer 73), D Ryan, P O’Connell, (c), P O’Mahony (B Holland 77), N Ronan (D O’Callaghan 13), J Coughlan.

CASTRES OLYMPIQUE: R Martial; V Inigo (M Nicolas 72), P Bonnefond, P Garcia, P Lakafia; P Bernard, T Lacrampe (R Kockott, 73); S Taumoepeau (M Coetzee 55), M Rallier (M Bonello 65), A Peikrishvili (K Wihongi 55), M Rolland, (c), R Capo Ortega, Y Caballero, I Diarra (P Roussel 75), J Bornman.

Referee: Andrew Small (England).