Mission accomplished on a perfect day for Munster

Munster 29 Racing Metro 6

Qualification for the Heineken Cup quarter-final was the priority, of course, but it was achieved at the expense of defending champions Leinster, and referee Wayne Barnes got whacked in the head with the ball as an added bonus. It was pretty much the much the perfect trifecta for members of the Red Army, although those particularly hard to please may have preferred it was Romain Poite rather than Barnes in the direct line of Ian Keatley’s drop kick, but you get the idea.

Satisfaction oozed out of Thomond Park as Munster squeezed into the last eight with a bonus-point win over Racing Metro.

That the province will have to plan for an away quarter-final in early April against Conor O’Shea’s English Premiership-leading, European top seeds Harlequins and a potential semi-final in France against either Clermont Auvergne or Montpellier will not overly concern head coach Rob Penney and his management team this morning.

Nor will memories of that 20-12 Thomond Park reverse to Harlequins in the Amlin Challenge Cup semi-final two seasons ago haunt the dreams of the players just yet.

For now, there is the satisfaction of a job done, on the back of a good performance that vindicated the persistence of players and management alike in sticking with a game plan that was coming under fire from all directions.

We had seen the potential of Penney’s vision, happily adopted by the players, of a game plan where individuals from one to 15 were capable of playing what they saw in front of them, whether it took them up the middle or out wide, and having the skill sets to execute their decisions. Yet they had only come in glimpses, flashes of inspiration overshadowed for the most part by high error counts, poor decision-making and a lack of cutting edge.

And since a narrow loss at Saracens in round four in mid-December, even the glimpses had disappeared, as Munster failed to apply a killer blow to a second-string Ulster side, ground to a halt against Cardiff Blues and managed to fashion only two tries on a sticky Murrayfield pitch against a down on its luck Edinburgh side.

In Limerick yesterday, with European survival on the line and the clear objective of scoring at least four tries, Munster put a little more flesh on the bones of that game plan.

It did not come instantly, even when Racing’s flanker Antoine Battut was sent off in the fifth minute for raising his knee towards Tommy O’Donnell’s head, and Munster huffed and puffed for a further 15 minutes.

They had abandoned the policy employed in Edinburgh the previous week of taking their points at every opportunity, with fly-half Keatley — standing in for the suspended Ronan O’Gara — ordered to kick to the corner whenever Racing strayed from the laws of the game. Despite that happening several times, Munster were undone by their own anxiety and overeagerness, at least until the excellent Conor Murray pounced off the back of a ruck to get the opening try in the 25th minute.

Once Murray had struck, Munster sparked to life, in all manner of variations.

Man of the match Simon Zebo made the first of three huge repayments on his freshly-inked three-year contract just three minutes later to add some flair out wide to a move started by a wonderful charge upfield from Dave Kilcoyne.

Munster were three tries to the good before half-time when Kilcoyne’s front-row comrade Mike Sherry piled over the line to finish off a powerful drive from a lineout after Keatley had kicked to the corner.

It made for a relieved crowd of 25,600 as the home side went in at the break not just with a 17-6 lead but with their mission to oust Leinster from the eight and final qualifying spot 75% successful.

That mission was accomplished in the first eight minutes after the interval as Munster scored the fourth, again courtesy of the rampaging Kilcoyne with the finishing touches applied out wide by that man Zebo, who kicked ahead down the left touchline, sprinted past two defenders and collected a ball that sat up perfectly for him to gather as he raced over the line and towards the posts.

The roar was massive and the celebrations from Zebo as exuberant as his play as he kissed the Munster crest on his jersey and joyously pointed to the stands.

And there was more to come as Zebo repeated his feat of 12 months ago against Northampton by completing a second round six hat-trick of his young career, as Munster’s lineout again supplied the platform for Murray to spray it out left, through Keith Earls, to the Ireland wing for try number five.

Now all that was left to do was wait for Toulouse and Leicester to play out their own drama at Welford Road and avoid the mathematical formulae required to unseat the Irishmen.

And the day that it was, even that went Munster’s way.

MUNSTER: F Jones; D Howlett — captain, K Earls (JJ Hanrahan, 73), J Downey (C Laulala, 49), S Zebo; I Keatley, C Murray (D Williams, 73); D Kilcoyne (W Du Preez, 76), M Sherry (D Varley, 56), BJ Botha (J Ryan, 73), D O’Callaghan, D Ryan (B Holland, 73), P O’Mahony (P Butler, 69), T O’Donnell, J Coughlan.

Yellow Card: Butler (80).

RACING METRO: G Germain; J Jane (B Fall, 62), G Bousses (J Qovu Nailiko, 76), A Dumoulin, S Bobo; O Barkley, M Belie (S Descons, 19); J Brugnaut (A Lo Cicero, 46), B Noirot (T Bianchin, 56), B Sa (J P Orlandi, 33); K Ghezal, F Metz (S Dellape, 57); A Battut, B Le Roux (S Matadigo, 53), J Cronje — captain.

Red card: A Battut (5)

Yellow card: S Matadigo (77).

Referee: Wayne Barnes (RFU).