Debutants Patrick Campbell and Scott Buckley on the scoresheet as Munster thump Wasps

Patrick Campbell and Scott Buckley scored tries on their Munster debuts as the province overcame their Covid nightmare to hammer Wasps in the Champions Cup opener

Patrick Campbell of Munster is congratulated by team-mates after scoring his side's second try during the Heineken Champions Cup win over Wasps. Picture: Stephen McCarthy/Sportsfile

Wasps 14 Munster 35

Munster delivered a famous European away victory on a par with their greatest Heineken Cup moments as a scratch team featuring five debutants scored a bonus-point victory over Wasps on Sunday.

There was little doubt the Covid-hit province, who also had seven players on their bench without a senior appearance, had their fair share of luck, Wasps’ injury crisis deepened by the loss of five starters to positive PCR tests on the eve of the match and then losing captain Brad Shields to a red card in the opening half of this Heineken Champions Cup pool opener at the Coventry Building Society Arena.

Yet Muster’s rookies rose to the occasion, stepping up to the plate in their side’s hour of need with so many senior players missing, 19-year-old full-back Patrick Campbell and 21-year-old hooker Scott Buckley scoring second-half tries to add to scores from Keith Earls and Andrew Conway.

There were also key interventions from lock Eoin O’Connor and a rousing performance from academy No.8 Daniel Okeke, all supported by a backbone of nine seasoned internationals led by the exceptional Peter O’Mahony to provide a heady mix of youth and experience for a management team lead in Coventry by academy head Ian Costello with head coach Johann van Graan watching from Ireland.

Munster had been battling against the odds in this fixture from the moment their United Rugby Championship games in South Africa had been postponed due to the emergence of a new Covid variant that had prompted governments in the UK and Europe to impose a travel ban on the region. Their departure from Cape Town had been delayed by three days as a number of their 48-strong travelling party began to test positive for Covid, the result being that 14 of their number were forced to quarantine in the city as 34 were allowed to leave, only to face a further 10 days of quarantine on their return to Ireland.

The upshot was that when van Graan named his matchday squad on Friday from the self-isolation of a hotel room, there were five debutants in the starting Xv alongside nine internationals who had not travelled to South Africa, plus a further seven debutants on the bench with the team having travelled to Coventry under the management of academy head Ian Costello and his team of coaches.

For all Munster’s travails, Wasps had run into Covid problems of their own, making five changes to their starting line-up and forced into restructuring both their backline and forward pack as a result following pre-game testing.

Head coach Lee Blackett had planned without 17 players unavailable through injury and then lost some key figures from the team he had named on Friday, including fly-half Jacob Umaga, No.8 Tom Willis and both his locks.

On a grey afternoon in the English West Midlands, it was Munster’s supporters who added the colour, their red jersey outnumbering those of Wasps in the sparsely populated stands and lifting the visitors with an early burst of the Fields of Athenry, There was further joy after Peter O’Mahony had halted a Thomas Young break from midfield, dislodging the ball from the Wasps back-rower right in the corner as Munster went up the other end and Joey Carbery opened the scoring on five minutes with a penalty.

Yet with an inexperienced forward pack, Munster’s front row was always going to be under pressure and Wasps applied it best at scrum-time. The Reds were under the cosh time and again and relying on a missed Jimmy Gopperth penalty on eight minutes and some excellent defence to get them out of jail, Tadhg Beirne executing an excellent strip of the ball from Brad Shields on the Munster line on 13 minutes.

It quickly became apparent that this game would not follow any pre-ordained script and the unstructured nature of the contest took another wild turn on 25 minutes when Wasps skipper Shields was shown a red card for a high tackle on Dave Kilcoyne as the Munster prop probed inside the home 22, Shield was upright and made shoulder to neck contact with the tackled player but it was a decision that could equally have been considered a yellow-card offence, Either way, Carbery made a mess of a straight-forward penalty virtually in front of the posts when he struck an upright and the unpredictability of the match turned another corner, though the Munster fly-half made amends with a more difficult kick two minutes later to open a 6-0 lead for the visitors.

It did not last long, Wasps hitting their straps soon after as centre Michael Le Bourgeois capitalised on a Thomas Young kick ahead, his break supported by No.8 Alfie Barbeary, who received the offload and stepped debutant Campbell to score the opening try on 29 minutes, Gopperth adding the conversion to give Wasps a 7-6 lead.

There was still plenty of drama to come in a pulsating opening 40 minutes, Munster responding with a try of their own on 35 minutes as Conor Murray dinked a kick with the outside of his right boot over the tryline with a penalty advantage, the ball taking a wicked bounce that evaded both Chris Farrell and a scrambling Wasps defender to fall invitingly for Keith Earls to touch down. Carbery added the extras and there was an extra boost just before half-time after Eoin O’Connor made it a debut to remember with a charge down of Sam Wolstenholme’s box kick, the debutant lock gathering the ball and feeding second-row partner Beirne whose charge to the line saw Wasps hooker Dan Frost dive on top of Murray with a tackle deemed cynical by referee Romain Poite that reduced Wasps from 14 to 13 men for the start of the second half.

Munster made the two-man advantage count and in some style, attacking down the right after Beirne made a break off the back of a ruck, Andrew Conway advancing team into Wasps territory before the ball moved across the attacking line. It fell to full-back Campbell with two men on his outside shoulder but the teenager did not their assistance, the former Cork Minor footballer splitting the home defences to steal in for a famous try on his senior debut.

There was more to come as Munster exploited the mismatch and Wasps overplayed their hand running the ball out of their half, a loose pass pounced on by Andre Conway to dart home for Munster’s third try on 47 minutes, Carbery adding the conversion from in front of the posts having missed his earlier close-range kick for Campbell’s try.

Wasps were back to 14 men with Frost’s return from the sin bin but it was too late to make a difference as Munster warmed to their task, a deliberate knock-on from the home side putting the visitors into the corner, with their penalty and off the five-metre lineout hooker Scott Buckley made his mark on debut as Beirne delivered a reverse pass that the Kinsale front-rower collected to burst through a gap and over the tryline for the bonus-point try.

Wasps staged a minor recovery through a well-finished :Le Bourgeois try converted by Gopperth but Munster had the luxury of handing further debuts to Declan Moore, Cork Constitution’s John Forde and Young Munster’s Conor Moloney for the final 10 minutes.

There was one sobering moment in the end game for Munster after Carbery was helped from the field with his left arm in a sling after a late hit from Robin Hislop, Tony Butler handed his debut as a result just a month after joining the academy. It was that kind of day.

WASPS: M Watson (C Anderson, 70); Z Kibirige; J Bassett (T Mathews, 72), M Le Bourgeois, L Mehson; J Gopperth, S Wolstenholme; T West (J Toomaga-Allen, 40), D Frost, B Alo (R Hislop, 51); B Shields- captain, T Cardall; N Carr (K Curran, 57), T Young, A Barbeary (G Oghre, 40, (M van Vuuren, 66).

MUNSTER: P Campbell (J Wren, 72); A Conway, C Farrell, D de Allende, K Earls; J Carbery (T Butler, 73), C Murray (E Coughlan, 76); D Kilcoyne (M Donnelly, 64), S Buckley (D Moore, 70), J French (R Salanoa, 55); E O’Connor (J Forde, 70), T Beirne; P O’Mahony - captain, J Hodnett (C Moloney, 70), D Okeke.

Referee: Romain Poite (France).