‘Sometimes you have to win a bit ugly’

Munster 26 Gloucester 10

If any of the 23,510 of Munster persuasion who departed Saturday’s night Pool 6 clash with an understrength Gloucester side felt frustrated by a less than fluent display from their team, it was understandable.

Yet in the context of what had gone before at Murrayfield seven days previously, when Munster’s world had come crashing down around them with a thoroughly miserable opening pool defeat to Edinburgh, getting a European campaign back on track with any kind of victory was the over-riding priority.

Bonus points can wait for another day. Champagne rugby and tries may follow as this young team develops over the season but on this occasion, with backs against the wall, winning was everything and Munster got it done.

“Sometimes you have to win a bit ugly,” head coach Rob Penney said. “That’s the nature of the competition. If we hadn’t have won tonight, this room would be asking very different questions. I’m just proud the boys managed to work their way through some challenges.”

It took time to make victory certain but Penney’s side, led wholeheartedly from the front by captain and man of the match Peter O’Mahony, finally saw off a stubborn Gloucester side in a two-minute spell midway through the second half.

Until then the game had hung in the balance after a converted try apiece in the first half had left the teams separated by three Ian Keatley penalties to one from Jonny Bentley.

It left the home side leading 16-10 at the interval following an opening period featuring, for Munster, one major defensive mishap for Charlie Sharples’ try and some stuttering attacking play.

Munster had failed to adequately defend their blind side at a five-metre scrum as Gloucester scrum-half Dan Robson exposed his solitary opposite number Conor Murray to send in England wing Sharples at the corner after 16 minutes before the Reds hit back with some set-piece dominance on 34 minutes.

With normal service resumed at lineout time after a serious malfunction in Edinburgh, Damien Varley threw from the Gloucester five-metre line, joined a powerful maul and was driven over the line.

But it was not until well past the hour mark that Munster finally shook off the dogged English visitors. Twice, the Munster scrum turned the screw and gave Ian Keatley a penalty opportunity he gratefully received. And from the restart, Murray sent up a defence-testing box kick from which Donnacha Ryan retained possession following a mid-air collision with substitute full-back Rob Cook. Fly-half Keatley then produced an inch-perfect kicked pass from midfield out wide into space for wing Johne Murphy to grab Munster’s second try, Keatley nailing the conversion to open up a 16-point lead.

And that was that. Munster put their lone defensive “blip” as Penney described it, behind them and kept the game Gloucester scoreless for the second half.

It all added up to a massive improvement on the previous week’s fare and the avoidance of a European qualification calamity after just two games. There may be still some building blocks to put in place, not just for Heineken Cup qualification but also the overall Penney project, but this was a welcome step in the right direction.

“It’s a process,” the Munster head coach said. “We got a bit flat at times, our ball control wasn’t quite as good as it should be and some of our passing was a bit off. All the things you get when our team was a little bit anxious.

“But what I was rapt about was their endeavour. They didn’t go into their shell, really. They kept trying to play; our guys have got licence and we want them to express themselves and back themselves and even though it didn’t always come off, I think there’s some nice seeds being sown for further down the track.”