Munster 28
Leinster 13
MUNSTER WERE DOMINANT in victory over Leinster at Thomond Park, scoring three tries in an intelligent display against Matt O’Connor’s out-of-sorts team.
The home side employed a kicking game that worked ideally on a cold, windy evening in Limerick, as Leinster struggled badly under the high ball. Munster’s effectiveness in narrow channels was an important factor too, as O’Connor’s side failed to defend convincingly in that area.
Man of the match CJ Stander, Andrew Conway and Dave O’Callaghan all crossed the whitewash for Munster, while the impressive Ian Keatley kicked 13 points and generally outshone his opposite number, Ian Madigan.
Leinster managed a late consolation try through Shane Jennings, but their attacking display was blunt overall. Not until the closing quarter did O’Connor’s side get any real territory, while their phase play was unimaginative.
A sold-out Thomond Park was in-form too, enjoying the focused, aggressive performance from their team.
Leinster’s unease under the high ball was evident from the very first minute, when Andrew Conway rose above Zane Kirchner to win a Munster bomb, before Ian Madigan and Dave Kearney crossed wires after a swirling Ian Keatley garryowen.
The second error saw Kearney dragged into touch, from where Munster drew the Leinster pack into dragging the maul down and Keatley slotted his first penalty attempt of the night with just three minutes gone.
John Ryan’s failure to roll away after a tackle in the Munster 22 allowed Madigan to level the scoreline shortly after, but the home team continued to trouble Matt O’Connor’s men with their clever kicking game.
Keatley combined the bombs with some deft grubbered diagonals in behind the Leinster frontline, while the likes of Tommy O’Donnell and Billy Holland brought impressive physicality up front.
Munster missed two try-scoring opportunities in the first half, but their 17th-minute effort was unstoppable. O’Donnell and co. picked and jammed repeatedly around the fringes close to the Leinster tryline from an initial scrum platform, before a short pass sent the jersey-less CJ Stander diving over to the right of the posts.
Keatley’s conversion was off target, but Munster continued to prosper despite the best efforts of Leinster’s defence. A huge linebreak from Ian Keatley deep inside the Munster half should have led to points as the out-half’s surge helped Anthony Foley’s side into the Leinster 22.
However, O’Connor’s men recovered to win a turnover penalty and went down the other end to get out their own bludgeon close to the tryline. Unlike Munster, they couldn’t convert as Darragh Fanning’s offload attempt was picked off by Felix Jones.
Madigan did get his second penalty soon after though, kicking the three points from the left of the posts after Munster were caught offside from a scrum. Keatley was on target again in the 32nd minute to open the five-point gap back up, punishing Kane Douglas for failing to roll away from his tackle.
Leinster out-half Madigan has an immediate chance to cancel out that Keatley score, as referee Nigel Owens harshly pinged Paddy Butler, on for the injured Robin Copeland, for not releasing after being tackled.
Madigan was wide, however, and his teammates continued to struggle in the air. Jones’ brilliant kick and gather from inside his own half put Munster on the front foot, eventually leading to a notable overlap inside the Leinster 22.
Denis Hurley just couldn’t get his pass away under intense pressure wide on the right, and again Leinster got over the ball to earn a turnover penalty, going into the break 11-6 down.
Munster enjoyed a strong start to the second half too, the hard-working Conway bursting onto a cleverly-delayed Keatley pass to go through Fanning’s tackle and score Munster’s second try.
An offload from Hurley to Pat Howard had provided momentum at first, before Munster again looked to their narrow pick and jams to make further yardage. The combination to finish was sweeping and Keatley tacked on the conversion.
As in the first half, Leinster struggled to use the ball effectively, highlighted by a 15-phase attack going nowhere close to the Munster 22 with 50 minutes on the clock, Hurley ending the passage with a turnover penalty.
Foley’s charges returned to their narrow game and from one such thrust, Fanning fell on a ball that appeared to have left the ruck. Owens decided otherwise and yellow-carded the Leinster wing for playing the ball.
Keatley’s penalty rubbed salt in the wound and sent Munster into a 21-6 lead. Paddy Butler broke in midfield as Munster’s dominance became pronounced, while BJ Botha won a scrum penalty with his first action off the bench.
This time, Keatley’s attempt from 48 metres dropped short, but Munster were not discouraged. Again, they went on a thundering narrow attack, ending with replacement flanker Dave O’Callaghan ducking under Douglas’ tackle to score.
Keatley was on target to give Munster a 28-6 advantage that was hard to argue with.
Leinster rallied heading into the final 10 minutes of the clash, building a 20-phase passage of attack to eventually dot down through Shane Jennings, courtesty of an offload from number eight Jack Conan. Madigan’s conversion was accurate for 28-13.
That was to be the extent of their fightback though, as Stander ran in a disallowed try and Munster repelled the final Leinster attack helped by the topless Botha. The home fans went home warmed by an encouraging display from their team.
Munster scorers:
Tries: CJ Stander, Andrew Conway, Dave O’Callaghan
Conversions: Ian Keatley [2 from 3]
Penalties: Ian Keatley [3 from 4]
Leinster scorers:
Tries: Shane Jennings
Conversions: Ian Madigan [1 from 1]
Penalties: Ian Madigan [2 from 3]
MUNSTER: Felix Jones (capt.) (Johne Murphy ’71); Andrew Conway, Pat Howard, Denis Hurley (JJ Hanrahan ’59), Ronan O’Mahony; Ian Keatley, Duncan Williams (Neil Cronin ’77); John Ryan (Eusebio Guinazu ’64), Duncan Casey (Kevin O’Byrne ’66), Stephen Archer (BJ Botha ’59); Donncha O’Callaghan, Billy Holland; CJ Stander, Tommy O’Donnell (Dave O’Callaghan ’52), Robin Copeland (Paddy Butler ’27).
LEINSTER: Zane Kirchner; Darragh Fanning (Jimmy Gopperth ’64), Luke Fitzgerald, Gordon D’Arcy, Dave Kearney; Ian Madigan, Isaac Boss; Michael Bent, Richardt Strauss (Aaron Dundon ’71), Tadhg Furlong; Mike McCarthy (Tom Denton ’71), Kane Douglas; Dominic Ryan (Jordi Murphy ’15), Shane Jennings (capt.), Jack Conan.
Replacements not used: Maks Van Dyk, Jamie Hagan, Luke McGrath, Colm O’Shea.
A fantastic article Paul. If anybody has not read Scraton’s book, I urge you to do so.
There was complete disregard for life that day, but what happened afterwards was a sign that even the most free democratic nations could be the most evil… Hope Thatcher woke up in her coffin…..
Guardian just revealed today that the owner of Bradford in the 80s was involved in 8 fires prior to the Valley Parade fire which killed 60. Wondering if thejournal will run an article on this?? Could be a big story, guy was apparently up to his neck in debt too
We’ve a piece on it here, Donal: http://jrnl.ie/2050104
Yeah, will never forget that one fan running on fire… terrible….
@Graham Kavanagh
It was South Yorkshire Police Chief Constable the late Peter Wright, not Thatcher, who orchestrated the cover-up.
You know very little. What happened that was a gift to her. Read some more, this went all the way to the top. Do not mean to offend you.
@Graham
No offence taken whatsoever.
She was advised that South Yorkshire Police were “close to deceitful” but that isn’t proof that she was involved in the cover-up. I doubt that she or any of her ministers was involved in the day-to-day running of police forces in the UK.
http://www.mirror.co.uk/sport/football/news/hillsborough-cover-up-margaret-thatcher-1321049
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/football/article-2307178/Baroness-Thatcher-death-Why-wrong-blame-Hillsborough-tragedy-cover–JEFF-POWELL.html
She knew enough, and like Birmingham 6, Guildford 4, authorities turned a blind eye. She turned her back on her people. But then her people did not live north of South London. She saw footie fans as socialists, like miners. She was trying to force ID’s on every football fan… As Prime Minister, I am sure she made sure somebodies else’s hand did her dirty work, but I have no doubt she was implicit in everything that was going on… Ffs, she thought Pinochet was a fine human being, he was a mass murderer, probably genocide scale….
@Graham
It was up to judges to make decisions in court cases, e.g. the Birmingham 6. Did you read Jeff Powell’s article, to which I provided the link?
As for Pinochet, Britain joined forces with him because of the Argentine invasion of the Falklands. He caused the deaths of 3,000 people but Thatcher’s co-operation with him is small beer by comparison with Churchill’s co-operation with Stalin, who had the blood of millions of people on his hands, from 1941 to 1945. By the way, the number of people killed by the Argentine junta is ten times the death toll caused by Pinochet.
Yes, I read your links, also read others, including from Jack Straw, pointing the finger at her too. She is too smart to have her own name linked directly to anything, but she knew something bad had happened, but because it was common fans from the north, she no interest in ever doing the right thing. She knew all the way to her deathbed. That makes her as guilty as the South Yorkshire police disgrace, as guilty as the Sun… I also know judges made the decisions based on what they knew back the other 70′s, but again, when the truth was there, it was ignored….it took a lot to get the right thing done, in a country that tries to tell the rest how to live fairly…
@Graham
There is no indication that she gave the order for a cover-up. Even if she was aware of the cover-up, her failure to do anything about it was not a criminal offence. By the way, she was senile in her last years. So she probably had no recollection of the Hillsborough disaster as she was dying. Britain would have suffered if she hadn’t faced down the miner’s unions. Western Europe was under threat of Soviet attack in the early 1980s.
Britain did suffer as she faced down the miners. She might have been right to break unions, but she sent normal folk back to the 18th century… Western Europe was under threat…. Whats your point? Many other countries faced the same threat, but they still respected it’s citizens….
@Graham
The miners’ union movement had Soviet support. That’s my point. Capitulation to the unions would have destroyed the British economy.
She threw her people under the bus…. When the economy recovered, it was those in the south who fared well…. The North suffered in poverty….. She was never tolerant of anyone below her kind…. She was evil….
That was a wicked thing done there and the violence visited upon protested is hotting up as we speak. The democratic right to simply complain is being frightened and bullied out of us in many countries.
Elderly, asthmatic, those with heart conditions and many more now cannot go to any as pepper sprays and takers would be the end of them. All for simply slowly going about waving a card maybe and speaking of a different opinion.
Nothing violent there. Little stops for rest and tea in order to manage some. But, death will visit many going and it is back to the blue light!
TAZERS not takers, this m/c? Bit of a battle just sitting here!
They only went to a match but never came home.
JFT96 YNWA
Very good piece Paul.
It will be important to remember the 30th anniversary of Heysel next month also.
The lack of Robson Keane comments in here is disappointing.
Cost not quantifiable?
That was evident the day it happened, unfortunately
People never get over these tragedies, some get on with their lives better than others but be sure these are never forgot.