Bookie intervention heaps pressure on Munster

For all the talk of an away team never winning a Guinness PROI12 semi-final, the flip side is naturally that no home team has ever lost one and Munster will not want to be the ones to let that statistic slide this evening.

Pressure is a given as far as Munster are concerned when knockout rugby arrives at Thomond Park and Rassie Erasmus’s side will not have looked kindly on an internet bookmaker already issuing odds on the outcome of a final between them and Leinster, a development seized upon by Welsh media yesterday afternoon.

The Ospreys, widely written off following the loss of five of their last six games to emphasise their underdog status, were already travelling as if they were playing with house money.