Glasgow have no intention of moving away from their not-so-secret weapon

Glasgow players celebrate. Pic: Craig Watson

Knowing there is a threat on the horizon is one thing, dealing with it is quite another and Glasgow Warriors are making no secret of their intention to try and replicate their driving maul success against Munster at Thomond Park this Saturday.

Glasgow’s lineout drive has been Munster’s kryptonite in the past two seasons, with one significant exception in the 2022-23 URC quarter-finals, but even that setback for the Scots will not stop Franco Smith’s team deploying their not-so-secret weapon this weekend, if hooker Johnny Matthews is to be believed.

Although Munster won this season’s league meeting of the two sides in Cork on December 1, it was Matthews who scored one of Glasgow’s five maul tries, one of which was a penalty try, on his path to finishing the league campaign as the URC top try scorer with 14.

And it was fellow hooker Fraser Brown, now retired, who touched down the Warriors drive for their opening score at Thomond Park in March 2023 that sparked a four-try first-half rout of Graham Rowntree’s side as they romped into a 28-0 half-time lead before winning 38-26.

Add to those examples of Munster’s trouble with Ospreys’ driving maul in last Friday’s last-eight match-up and why wouldn’t Glasgow see the lineout set-piece as the perfect template for success once again in this Saturday evening’s URC semi-final back in Limerick?

“I certainly think so,” Matthews said. “But when we look back on the quarter-final last year Munster did an excellent job of nullifying that threat. We need to make sure we’re at the top of our game to cancel that out if they come without another weapon against it.” 

Asked specifically if Ospreys’ success up front against Munster had shown the way to get under the defending champions’ skin, Matthew joked: “No comment!

“In previous games, we’ve maybe had a bit of joy with the maul although the quarter-final last year was maybe the one game where they stifled that. So we’ll need to find a way to get on top again there and if we could do that we should be in for a good day.” 

Glasgow’s 27-10 victory at home to South Africa’s Stormers in their quarter-final last Saturday has given Matthews and his team added confidence they have what it takes in terms of the physical contest to avenge last season’s last-eight defeat to Munster at Scotstoun.

“Stormers are a team that prides themselves on their physicality so to front up and neutralise that in the way that we did is a positive for us. 

"It gives us that belief that we can go and do it to anyone.”