Wayne Pivac would have loved another shot at Munster

Tricky things, Guinness Pro12 semi-finals, especially when you’re the away team.

Scarlets boss Wayne Pivac would not have minded being drawn with Munster given his team’s success at Thomond Park during the Six Nations in late February, when they turned over a 21-3 half-time deficit to inflict a rare 30-21 defeat on Rassie Erasmus’s men.

So if you were looking to make history and become the first team in league history to win a play-off semi-final on the road, Thomond Park would have been the Scarlets’ preference.

Instead, their third-place finish in the table and Leinster’s last-round lost at Ulster combined with Munster’s walloping win over Connacht last weekend means the West Wales region will be off to Dublin a week tonight instead of Limerick.

“We probably would have liked to have gone there again but we’re not, we’re off to the RDS,” Pivac said of the semi-final draw.

“Anything’s possible. We’re in some good form at the moment. The pleasing thing is that we’ve had injuries this year and the guys that have come in have stepped up and played well and we’ve built steadily as the season’s gone on. We probably learned a lot from last year, where we ran pretty hot for the first half of the competition but we couldn’t keep that going for the duration. So we’ve timed the run probably a little bit better this year and not having so many injuries has helped.”

Scarlets have lost just once in the Pro12 away from home since the turn of the year, the lone defeat coming at the RDS Arena in a sobering 45-9 demolition by Leinster a week after their Thomond Park triumph, with both sides again missing their international contingents.

Yet wins in places like Limerick, Galway, Glasgow and Cardiff do breed confidence.

“It brings a lot of confidence, being able to win on the road. We certainly won’t be talking about the records and for us it’s a one-off game. We’ve earned the right to get there and now it’s about expressing ourselves and not going into our shells. We’re just going to have to prepare well, make sure we handle the physicality of a semi-final and the pace of the game which Leinster’s going to bring. It’s a massive challenge.”

Scarlets are hoping to have back rower James Davies back from injury for the trip to Dublin as well as former Leinster lock Tadhg Beirne, who suffered a rib injury in the final-round 40-17 hammering of derby rivals Ospreys at Parc y Scarlets last Saturday. Pivac signed Beirne, 24, last summer after seeking the advice Lansdowne head coach and former Wales boss Mike Ruddock, also the second row’s former Ireland U20 head coach.

“He was the type of player we were looking for to cover the second row and six,” Pivac said. “He does that. The skill set for those positions to play the type of game we want to play, he ticked the boxes.

“He may not be the perfect fit for other teams but for us, the way we play the game, he fits in really well. He’s had a massive impact. If you said value for money he’d be right at the top. He came over for a chance and he’s taken it with both hands and it’s one of the success stories of our side this year.”