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Munster seal delicious double in Joburg

rugby27 April 2024 18:00
By:Johan Coetzee
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Munster sealed a remarkable Highveld double in the Vodacom URC with a comfortable 33-13 win against the Emirates Lions in Johannesburg on Saturday.

This bonus-point win, following up on their hard-fought 27-22 win over the Vodacom Bulls at Loftus Versfeld last week, boosted the Irish title hopefuls to third on the Vodacom URC log - and well within striking distance of the two current top dogs, the Glasgow Warriors and Leinster.

They did the remarkable Highveld double because they played like a Highveld team - a well-drilled Heyneke Meyer team if you want.

The secret to winning at altitude is to preserve energy, and Munster's tactics of letting the Lions make all the plays inside their own half during the first half, saw them run off for their break-time oranges with a comfortable 23-6 halftime lead and without a bead of sweat on their foreheads.

In contrast, the Lions approached the match with the plan to run the Irishmen off their feet. Good in theory, but only if you score tries. In the first half, they were stopped too readily out wide, and their two maul attempts from 5m lineouts also came to naught.

On defence things could barely have gone worse. It was not that the Lions couldn't tackle, it was more that they couldn't match the power of the RG Snyman-led Munster pack coupled with the fact that the ball bounced in favour of the visitors every time it touched the ground.

And that penalty try. The penalty try came on the stroke of halftime (the result of Marius Louw taking out a chaser off the ball) and made the comeback task almost impossible.

It's tough to pinpoint the actual object, but something hit some sense into the home side as the second-half battle started in earnest. Instead of forcing only one defender to make a tackle out wide, they started aiming their attacks toward the closer channels, and with that, every pick-and-drive or one-off runner started committing two or three defenders per contact point.

LACKED CLINICAL TOUCHES

The Munster players now had to work, and if the Lions weren't forced to play desperate catch-up rugby, that energy drained could have been enough to lose the visitors the match. They are all done physically as they are sitting in the changeroom gulping down a beer right now.

In reality, the Lions just lacked the clinical touches needed to get a result from what ended up being an Ali-ish rope-a-dope tactic. Had they scored off every chance their close-in attacking game created it could have been much tighter.

But tonight was about Munster. They beat the Lions at Emirates Airline Park after beating the Bulls at Loftus. They know how to cope in thin air. They deserved every single log point they got because very few club sides in the world can copy their breathless feat.

It is also a double that can change the mindsets of European teams as they start planning future tours to the Republic. You can win here, you just need to be deliberate in how you save oxygen, and ruthless in how you keep out eager and brimfully talented backlines.

They've done it, and while it will take a monumental effort, other European teams now know that they can too.

The sizable travelling army of Munster fans made the most noise at The Park tonight, and it is guaranteed that they will be back at the very next opportunity. If you like rugby, you'd have loved this tour.

SCORES:

Munster - Tries: Jack O'Donoghu, Shane Daly, Gavin Coombes, Penalty try. Conversion: Jack Crowley. Penalties: Jack Crowley (3)

Emirates Lions - Try: PJ Botha. Conversion: Jordan Hendrikse. Penalties: Jordan Hendrikse (2).

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