Penney expecting ‘a real cauldron’

Rob Penney has dismissed the relevance of Munster’s victory in Glasgow earlier this season as they prepare for Friday night’s RaboDirect Pro12 semi-final but has warned his players to expect a "cauldron" at Scotstoun.

Glasgow’s open-ended home ground in the western suburbs of the Scottish city, with a running track around the pitch, can rarely have been described in such colourful terms but Munster’s 13-6 regular season victory there, engineered by a brilliant solo try from JJ Hanrahan in late October, ended in controversy, with Munster’s Donncha O’Callaghan claiming he was bitten by an opponent and tempers flaring at the full-time whistle as the players returned to their dressing rooms.

Penney said there was little to be learned from the performance in the return fixture in Limerick last month.

This time, however, he is expecting a warm welcome in Scotland. “It will be a real cauldron,” said Penney.

“There were arguments and so forth on the sideline after the final whistle last time we played there which is an indication of how passionate they are over there and how much they want to succeed.

“The two previous meetings, you really sweep it under the table. You take a look at it, but at the end of the day it’s a brand new fixture, a brand new event with one of the best referees who has been around the Rabo this year in the Italian man (Carlo Damasco). You know, we’re just rapt to have him and we’ll see what happens.

“There was a little bit of push and shove (on our last visit). There was a bit of banter between their supporters and some of our reluctant players as they came off, trying to shepherd themselves into the alleyways and that’s the sort of the cauldron that Scotstoun is going to be this week. They have strategically picked the time so that there is going to be plenty of fuel on board, 7.35pm, and it is going to be an interesting environment for us, no doubt. That just goes back to the home advantage, we’re just going to have to deal with it and so are the officials.”

Penney blamed his players’ lack of emotional attachment for their sorry performance last Saturday in going down 19-17 at Thomond Park to an understrength Ulster side and while the New Zealander said he hoped that would not be a problem this weekend in a knockout semi-final, and potentially his final game in charge of the province, he could not dismiss that as a possibility.

“Let’s hope it’s not,” he said. “I suppose history is a great predictor of the future and you’d have to say that at times we’ve had to battle to get that level of attachment that is required to perform.

So, ‘hopefully’, only because I just can’t predict the future. Nobody knows what’s going on in the boys’ heads leading into games and it’s very hard to predict, pre-game, where they’re at. It only manifests itself once the contest starts and sometimes then it’s too late.”

Penney described last weekend’s performance, riddled as it was by numerous handling errors, poor passing and substandard game management, as a “shambles” and made evident his frustration at the lack of consistency shown by his players in the run-in to the league campaign. “No, (the potential lack of emotional attachment) is true of every team, or every team I’ve been a part of. You get them well connected to the game and to each other and the emotional attachment takes care of itself because it becomes an obligation to perform well. But I suppose the inconsistency is something that’s a bit challenging here, that’s unique. You have got to be emotionally connected to the event before you can even think about technical and tactical stuff and I think we were devoid of our emotional connection last week. There’s quite a bit of hurt around which is expected and we will just see if we can get a response. The players are capable, they know what they are meant to do and they know when they are meant to do it. It is now about getting the brain ticking over in the right way.”