Proud Clayton McMillan takes positives from opening-night defeat to Glasgow

The Thomond Park chief says he saw green shoots in the URC opener.

Munster's Jack O'Donoghue after the game. Pic :P INPHO/Tom O'Hanlon

Clayton McMillan saw enough in Munster’s performance to give him confidence for the rest of the season despite seeing his side open their United Rugby Championship campaign with a 26-20 home defeat to Glasgow Warriors in Limerick on Saturday evening.

Munster had led 17-7 against a Glasgow side which had won the URC in 2025 and were last season’s regular-season table toppers, yet they spent much of the second half under goal-line pressure which eventually told as three tries from the visitors after the break brought up a try bonus point for the Scots and left McMillan’s side with a losing bonus point.

On a weekend which saw all four Irish provinces lose their opening round fixture for the first time in 17 seasons, there could be cause for concern but as far as the Munster head coach was concerned there were plenty of positives despite the New Zealander conceding his players had run of out steam by the end of a defensively demanding second half.

“Look, in the end, I think it became a game of territory and position and generating pressure off that,” McMillan said. “And in the second half, definitely they had the lion's share of that and probably took away a little bit of our legs.

“But, yeah, I was pretty proud. I think we made 100-odd tackles more than them. We kept bouncing up and going forward and fought right to the end. It wasn't good enough, but some green shoots.” Starting with veteran JJ Hanrahan at fly-half with Jack Crowley, Will Harrison and academy star Tom Wood all injured, Munster started brightly, the number 10 kicking the opening points with a third-minute penalty and then converting tries from wing Ben O’Connor and prop Michael Milne as the home side enjoyed dominance at scrum time with summer tighthead signing Kieran Brookes, a 16-cap England international, impressing on his debut following a move from Perpignan.

Munster had defended superbly to limit the previously free-scoring Glaswegians to one first-half try from Jamie Dobie, and McMillan's men finished the opening period with a turnover scrum inside their 22 to take a 17-7 lead into the interval.

Yet only three points, from a Hanrahan penalty on 57 minutes, accrued to Munster after the break as Glasgow turned the screw, Dobie’s second try of the night following scores from replacement prop Nathan McBeth and scrum-half George Horne, who also kicked three of his four conversions to move past the home side n the final 10 minutes.

Yet there was still plenty for McMillan to feel justifiably optimistic.

“Early on in the game when we had our position in the right part of the field we were able to stress them with our strikes and phase play.

“That's a reflection of new guys (assistant coaches Jared Payne as co-attack coach and Jimmy Duffy in charge of forwards) coming in and being really clear around how we want to play.

“Position dried up a little bit, which we've already talked about, so we weren't able to do a hell of a lot more in the second half. But that was nice to see.”