Preview: Leinster clash will provide accurate gauge of how Munster’s season may pan out
JJ Hanrahan during a Munster training session this week. Pic: ©INPHO/Nick Elliott.
Fresh subtexts abound, underlying Saturday evening’s reprise of the Leinster-Munster rivalry at Aviva Stadium and adding to the already lengthy list of interprovincial grudges.
The home side’s comprehensive defeat to their rivals 12 months ago has been at the forefront of Leinster’s thinking this week while Ireland boss Andy Farrell’s rejection of all but two Munstermen from his Nations Championship squad announced on Wednesday for next month’s Tests will have the men in red bristling with motivation to prove the national head coach wrong in Dublin.
Yet the recent history of this fixture cuts to an essential truth, that it has taken once in a blue moon, high-level performances for the southern province to claim the bragging rights in this URC derby and though last season’s corresponding fixture at Croke Park was one of those, normal service was resumed in the return at Thomond Park two months later when Leinster won 13-8.
That Munster supporters can count their victories over the boys in blue on one hand – five in the last 27 meetings dating back to December 2015 - is a sorry indication of the diverging paths taken by two provinces over the last 11 years.
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The late Anthony Foley was the last head coach to achieve a league double over Leinster, in 2014-15 and if Clayton McMillan is to emulate his distant predecessor and achieve what Rassie Erasmus, Johann van Graan and Graham Rowntree could not, it will be under the toughest of circumstances this weekend.
Despite back-to-back losses at the start of the URC campaign in South Africa, Leo Cullen’s Leinster have found their groove with their internationals back in harness after their summer breaks.
Last Saturday’s Champions Cup pool win at Clermont was confirmation of that and this weekend’s team looks even strong, even with hooker and matchday captain Dan Sheehan starting at No.8 for the first time.
This is an all-Ireland XV with Joey Carbery getting a first start at 10 since re-signing for his home province from Bordeaux and set to face his old club.
Yet as challenging as Munster will find their hosts, McMillan’s side will travel with confidence, not only from their Croke Park win but with the way this season has started.
The injury absences of frontliners such as Jack Crowley, Tom Farrell and Calvin Nash from the backline, Edwin Edogbo, Michael Milne and now Jeremy Loughman from the forward pack, account for the low representation at Ireland level but Munster have coped just fine without them following an opening-day URC loss at home to Glasgow Warriors.
It has been a tough start to their second season under McMillan but the green shoots spotted in that defeat have sprouted further as the season has progressed and a new coaching set-up has reaped rewards.
The set-piece has improved exponentially under incoming forwards coach Jimmy Duffy while Munster’s attack appears to have benefitted from the dual approach instituted by the head coach to have new assistant Jared Payne dovetail with Mossy Lawlor’s augmented role from last season.
Munster have beaten Bulls and European pool rivals Racing 92 on home soil either side of a draw at Ulster, which, though having ceded a dominant half-time position, constituted a valuable two league points given the 29-3 loss they experienced on their previous trip to Belfast, last January 2.
That they have continued to develop while short-handed, and with a rookie fly-half in first-year academy playmaker Charlie O’Shea at the helm is to the management’s credit and meeting Leinster for the first time this season will provide an accurate gauge of how Munster’s season may pan out.
This time last year, Munster knocked off their admittedly undercooked rivals with a bonus point, 31-14 win, game four in a five-match winning start to life under McMillan.
It had Munster supporters believing the good times were just around the corner, though their campaign began to unravel with their first defeat a fortnight later, surrendering a 21-6 interval lead to the Stormers in a 27-21 reverse at Thomond Park.
Was Croke Park just another blip in a timeline of erratic peaks between demoralising troughs or could it be that the Leinster-Munster rivalry is finally starting to rebalance?
Munster centre Alex Nankivell believes his team is in better health and feeling more optimistic now than it was in the middle of that unbeaten start.
“Croke Park was amazing, but it was this time last year, a lot's changed. Like a lot's changed here, a lot's changed there, so we're just trying to focus on this week and we'll probably take a few things from what worked the last time, but you can't really dive too deep into the past because it's a completely different game now.
“I think where we're going and the growth that we've had even from the start of this season, lots of new guys have played, we've got a lot of injuries and a lot of guys have had an opportunity to step up and I guess the growth is the exciting thing around that.
“I can't really remember, but that was a good feeling when you win five in a row but looking into the future, having the new coaches come in change the way we're playing away a wee bit, that's really exciting.
“So to see us, not do it perfectly, but just to see us grow week to week at training and things like that, that's what really excites me.
“Then obviously those young guys like Charlie O'Shea, there's been a lot of chatter around him, but he's an easy one to single out. To see him come in and just be amazing for a young fella, play like a seasoned pro, is pretty cool. Long may they continue into the future.”
Hugo Keenan; Tommy O’Brien, Jamie Osborne, Robbie Henshaw, Jimmy O’Brien; Joey Carbery, Jamison Gibson-Park; Andrew Porter, Rónan Kelleher, Tadhg Furlong; Joe McCarthy, James Ryan; Ryan Baird, Josh van der Flier, Dan Sheehan - captain.
Gus McCarthy, Alex Usanov, Thomas Clarkson, Conor O’Tighearnaigh, Scott Penny, Fintan Gunne, Caspar Gabriel, Charlie Tector.
Ben O’Connor; Shay McCarthy, Seán O’Brien, Alex Nankivell, Shane Daly; Charlie O’Shea, Craig Casey; Josh Wycherley, Marnus van der Merwe, Kieran Brookes; Fineen Wycherley, Tadhg Beirne – captain; Jack O’Donoghue, Alex Kendellen, Gavin Coombes.
Max Clein, Mark Donnelly, Michael Ala’alatoa, Seán Edogbo, Brian Gleeson, Ben O’Donovan, JJ Hanrahan, Gordon Wood.
Andrew Brace (IRFU).
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