“You want to go to war with warriors. I saw warriors this morning and everyone is ready to go.”

If you look at enough GIFs, read enough jargon about “ruck resourcing”, “work-ons” and “learnings” you can sometimes forget that rugby is an emotional game that is played best when it’s tribe against tribe, iron against iron and bone on bone. The games I remember the most are the ones that felt like war before, during and after. I hated the build-up to them, even at the popcorn fart level they were at, but that fear – of losing, of being embarrassed, of being laughed at – was a real motivator. It sharpened the mind, got the heart pumping and promoted a laser-focused on what you had to do when Saturday came.

That kind of performance-enhancing fear let you know that what you were about to do wasn’t just a regular game. It made you hit the bag a little harder, a little quicker, and with a little more “fuck you” sprinkled on top of it. You hate that fear but you want it too. When it wasn’t there, you knew there was something wrong, off.

“Why am I not shitting it?”

It was almost always because I wasn’t fully plugged into what was happening. Or because I didn’t care. I don’t remember much from my days playing but I’ll always remember the fear. I was only really afraid when I had something to lose; be it my pride, be it to a group of guys I hated (in a sporting sense and sometimes not) or an opportunity to get a medal, lift a trophy and call myself the best, even for a few hours before the glory faded. When I had that urge to turn “right” into the carpark and home, or “left” onto the pitch with vomit in the back of my throat, I knew I was ready. This was only underage rugby in the late 90s and early 00s!

Imagine the Munster squad this week. Toulon coming to Limerick. Superstars everywhere. All Blacks. European Cup winners. World Cup winners. Huge men everywhere. “Thomond Park?” they’ll tell each other, “let’s shut them up.”

This is war by other means. All out war.

When I saw Johann Van Graan speaking emotionally about “The Munster Way” yesterday, I knew instinctively that he “got” it. Most Munster fans will have seen the same thing. This is something that goes beyond arrows on a board and chopped up bits of an opposition lineout on a laptop screen. This is something spiritual. Something bone deep. Are your eyes rolling? Then you don’t get it.

Maybe you never will.

“The Munster Way” isn’t a style of play. It isn’t “winning big games” because we haven’t always done that, believe it or not – unless the only Munster you watch is the 2006 and 2008 DVDs. It’s not words on a collar, or on sleeves, or on posters.

The Munster Way is, and always has been, about fear and love. Loving what you do, where you are, who you’re playing with and who you’re playing for. Fearing the emptiness of defeat, of leaving yourself down, your friends down, your family. When you have that fusion of love and fear in you, there are very few teams in this game that you can’t beat. That love makes you work harder, hit harder, play harder. The fear gives you a savage adrenaline to fuel everything else.

They’re big – better make sure they stay hit when I hit them. They’re good – better punish them any chance we get. They’ve got more experience than us – let’s make them feel something they haven’t felt before.

Love and fear. Fear and love. This is the Munster Way. I know it sounds like a clip from Donnie Darko, but I promise you that it’s the most powerful feeling in the world when you get that mix right. It’s won every battle you’ve ever heard of and most of the ones you haven’t; be they on grass, mud, sand or rugby pitches in the cold.

Will Toulon have that fear? They’ll be talking all week about how unafraid they are. Thomond Park? What’s the big deal? They’ll say it until they think they believe it.

It’ll be up to Munster to shake that belief in them early. Thomond Park is a special place on special days. It looms over you with the malevolence of a living, breathing monster in its own right. It turns big teams into small teams and unfancied Munster teams into giants. Into warriors. They’ll need to be.

Yes, Munster have injuries. Yes, they’ve been to guys who would probably be playing in this game. Yes, we’re up against it.

You need to feel the fear and do it anyway. Go deeper than they will. Go harder than they can. Hurt more than they’re capable of and keep going. Do that, and the result will come.

This is Thomond Park.

This is Munster.

The Munster Way will see us through, as it has before and will again.

“Rugby games are won in the hearts of men. We’ll back the people of Munster to pull us through. I get goosebumps when I say things like this but sport is about doing the unthinkable, about going to where other teams aren’t prepared to go.”