Leamy eager for Munster to embrace challenge of continuing unbeaten run
CONNACHT PREP: Joey Carbery, right, with Jack Crowley and Mike Haley during Munster rugby squad training at University of Limerick in Limerick. Pic: Brendan Moran, Sportsfile
Munster have been urged to embrace the challenge of securing a top-two finish in the URC standings with a victory in all three of their remaining regular season fixtures.
Six league wins in a row, five of them with a try bonus point, have catapulted the defending titleholders into third place, and Graham Rowntree’s have returned home from South Africa with confidence boosting victories at altitude against the Bulls and Lions ahead of this Saturday’s derby clash with Connacht at Thomond Park.
Munster now lie just a point behind second-place Leinster and five behind leaders Glasgow Warriors with three rounds to play ahead of next month’s play-offs and while a top-four finish would secure a home quarter-final, a top-two placing will ensure the 2023 champions will remain at Thomond Park for the semi-finals as well, should they progress.
That is an altogether more palatable option for a team whose fifth-place finish in the standings 12 months ago sent them on the road to Glasgow, Leinster and a Grand Final in Cape Town against the Stormers, Munster famously winning all three knockout ties on the road to enable Peter O’Mahony and Keith Earls lift the province’s first piece of silverware in 12 years.
Defence coach Denis Leamy does not want minds to stray beyond this Saturday’s objective of beating Connacht, yet he wants his players the challenge of finishing the regular season with wins all the way. A trip to Edinburgh follows a week on Friday, before a final-round fixture back in Limerick against Ulster on June 1.
“You can’t shy away from the fact you want to win every game,” Leamy said.
“The reality is that’s always going to be difficult, you’re playing against very good sides. But absolutely, if winning the next three games, if we’re good enough to do that and that’s good enough to get us a top two, well absolutely brilliant, that would be fantastic.
“That certainly is a challenge we won’t and we shouldn’t shy away from. But it’s about getting that block right. It’s about this game in isolation then we move onto the next one.
“But this game is a big, big game in itself. There’s a huge amount on the line. Connacht are pushing hard for a top eight, they are a really good side who are definitely a top-eight side. And obviously ourselves, we want to back up what we’ve done in the last couple of weeks.”
Munster squads have long been schooled in the art of not falling in love with themselves and though everything in their garden is currently smelling of roses as thoughts turn to the run-in to the play-offs, no-one at the province’s High Performance Centre is taking anything for granted as far as their league position is concerned and Leamy called for composure at the business end of the campaign.
“You’re never as good as they say you are and you’re never as bad as they say you are. That would be my mentality anyway. It’s really important, you’ve just got to keep an even track and certainly we’ve had a bit of a rollercoaster… just try to stay calm through all that is really important. Yeah, on we go.”
The calm Leamy seeks is more easily attainable when there is a relatively fit squad to work with week in, week out.
“There’s an old saying, ‘good players make good coaches’, you know, it helps with a lot of your experience back, there’s no doubt about that. Over the course of the season you’re going to run into sticky patches, especially with some of the injuries that we got.
“At times, you just have to get on with it, it’s not ideal. But when we have players like RG Snyman coming back, Oli Jager, these guys are internationals, they’re power, they’ve got great ability in terms of being rugby players but also the experience of how to win in difficult places. That’s just to name two.
“So it definitely helps, hugely.”
The defence coach has marveled at the contribution of a fit-again RG Snyman, who returned from a bout of pneumonia that forced him out of the Champions Cup Round of 16 loss at Northampton Saints on April 7 to score two tries at Loftus Versfeld a fortnight later as Munster became the first European club to win against the Bulls at the iconic Pretoria stadium.
Snyman will join Leinster this summer but while he remains a Munsterman, Leamy is more than happy to have the freewheeling Springbok in a red jersey, on either side of the ball.
“He’s an outrageous rugby player, an incredible rugby player. Just his ability for such a big man and he’s a dual World Cup winner and there’s not too many of them on the earth. So just that alone, we’re really, really lucky to have him.”
Turning to Snyman’s defensive assets, Leamy added: “I think just his ability to move and get himself into positions is something that is a continuing work-on for him but just his ability to understand the game, his ability in the tackle, he’s a massive asset.
“He’s brilliant around second-effort stuff, he’s excellent around that Springbok mentality of second efforts so you see him make a tackle, then back to his feet, pressure the ruck and a ball spills out or he turns it over through a barge or whatever.
“I think that’s probably his superpower in D.”
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