Beirne: Europe is part of Munster's identity. Missing out would have been difficult

The Ireland lock was relieved to put pressure of qualifying for next season’s Champions Cup to bed.

Mon, 19 May, 2025 - 01:00

Simon Lewis

Tadhg Beirne switched from escape artist to trophy hunter as the Munster captain looked ahead to the URC play-offs with the pressure of qualifying for next season’s Champions Cup happily put to bed.

The Ireland lock has plenty to look forward to this summer as he looks forward to his second British & Irish Lions tour having been named in Andy Farrell’s squad for the Australia tour but there were more pressing matters to attend first and securing a place in Europe’s elite club competition for 2025-26 was the priority last Friday night in Cork as he led Munster to 30-21 victory over Benetton and up the final standings to sixth. That is good enough for a place in the Champions Cup pool draw and this season’s URC knockout rounds, sealed with back-to-back bonus-point wins at home to Ulster and Benetton after starting elimination in the face following consecutive losses to Bordeaux-Begles (in the Champions Cup), the Bulls and Cardiff.

Munster now face a quarter-final at the third-seeded Sharks in Durban but the captain believes his squad now has some momentum behind it ahead of three potential knockout rounds on the road, just as they had when winning the title in 2023.

Beirne said: “It’s two big weeks in a row for us on the back of three poor weeks. We needed a little bit of confidence.

“They say winning is a habit and I think on the back of two wins it will give us a good boost into these last, hopefully, three games.

“We know the quality that is there. We’ve done it before and we’ve confidence in ourselves to do it again.”

The implications of not securing a top-eight finish this season had not escaped Beirne, he admitted.

“It was mentioned. A couple of weeks ago it was mentioned and then it became a real reality over the last two weeks. Particularly in this club we proudly say we love Europe and we love being in Europe and it’s a bit about Munster’s identity being in Europe so not to get there that would have been really difficult.

“But we stuck in it. We knew how important today was not just for the league, but for Europe, for the leaving players and I think we’ll look at the second-half performance, not the first half, in being proud of what we achieved today.

“I suppose that was in the back of everyone’s heads that if we didn’t qualify we didn’t get Europe. But we’re here now and we know we’ve qualified for Europe so we’re chasing a trophy now and no matter how difficult it is we’ll give it 100 per cent and make sure we give it a proper crack.”