Grass up to your ankles, mud to beat the band and a game on the edge of a punch-up in the forwards.
Just like rugby used to be. And should be.
In a lot of ways, this game was a throwback to a type of rugby that people like us will be intimately familiar with. Any game where the pitch is as much of an opponent as the team in the other sheds demands a certain set of rules and decisions. Immediately, a lot of the flashier plays that you might have planned during the week go out the window when you walk onto a pitch like the one in the Stadio Sergio Lanfranchi on Sunday. It was heavy, it was slower than a wet week and it was absolutely not the venue for “running rugby”. This was a game that the forwards would play in close quarters while the backs dictated the venue.
Whoever did that the best would probably win. Turns out that was Munster. It wasn’t glamorous – some of it was as dirty and agricultural as it gets – but it was as satisfying a win (and bonus point!) on the road as we’ll pick up all year long. These kinds of wins in the shit, quite literally, are the ones that really stand to a group of players. Forget that this was Zebre, who’ve been more than decent this year regardless, to get a bonus point win in the last play of the game away from home in conditions like this – the game was almost called off – takes a lot of guts and a lot of balls.
A game like this can be like playing snakes and ladders where the base game is only ever you rolling ones and twos.
Linebreaks are relatively rare in this trench warfare version of snakes and ladders due to the compacted nature of the phase structure so tactical kicking to dictate where the game is played is vital. These kicks are like rolling 4s and 5s. Penalties you win are ladders and penalties you concede are snakes.
Munster won the penalty count, kicked smarter and put Zebre’s skillset under more pressure. The structure in this is straightforward. Play simple ball in hand with the forwards and look for a defensive mistake. Don’t play it too wide unless it’s really on because the pitch is so heavy, any pace advantage you have is null and void. Kick all day long. Pressure their set-piece into a mistake or a bad exit. Maul their exit ball until they infringe in the conditions and then attack from that penalty position.
Some of those kicks are for the position, some are to roll the dice, some are just to eat up space and “move the chains” up the field where you can either win the ball or force a useful mistake. Talk of doing anything else on that pitch was the stuff of nonsense and bollocks.
Whenever Munster got green grass to aim for, they kicked with good accuracy and got their fair share of results. This one – a left legged special from Murray – put Munster in position to win a penalty off a sacked maul that would ultimately lead to the bonus point.
Sure, they could have “put it through the hands” and “showed some ambition” or whatever buzzwords you like but this was a game for the boot and big boys. Munster’s boots were better and their boys were bigger – the win came as a result.
Everything from Wycherley’s close-range banger to open the scoring…
…to Arno Botha’s brick wall tackling…
… to Gavin Coombes and Jeremy Loughman killing this maul…
… was exactly the type of physicality needed to get the win on this pitch.
It was narky, it was ugly but it was exactly the type of win you want on a manky November night in Italy. We can go into the tactical details – and I will this week on these pages – but night’s like this are less about the technical stuff and more about whether or not you actually want to slug it out to get the win.
Munster did, and came away with a fiver. Job done. Dry off. Go home. Munster moved back into second place in Conference A with this win and narrowed the gap on Glasgow to eight points – two wins, essentially – with three of the six toughest away days in the PRO14 out of the way in November. Not a bad return for round 9.
The Wally Ratings: Zebre (A)
The Wally Ratings explainer page is here.
As per usual, players are rated based on their time on the pitch, if they were playing notably out of position, and on the overall curve of the team performance. DNP means the player did not feature and N/A means they weren’t on the pitch long enough to warrant a fair rating given the way the game went.
| Names | Rating |
|---|---|
| Jeremy Loughman | ★★★ |
| Kevin O'Byrne | ★★★★ |
| Stephen Archer | ★★★ |
| Fineen Wycherley | ★★★★ |
| Darren O'Shea | ★★★★ |
| Gavin Coombes | ★★★★ |
| Chris Cloete | ★★★ |
| Arno Botha | ★★★★ |
| Neil Cronin | ★★★★ |
| Bill Johnston | ★★★ |
| Alex Wootton | ★★★ |
| Tyler Bleyendaal | ★★★ |
| Rory Scannell | ★★★ |
| Ronan O'Mahony | ★★★ |
| Mike Haley | ★★★ |
| Mike Sherry | N/A |
| Brian Scott | N/A |
| Ciaran Parker | ★★★ |
| Sean O'Connor | ★★★ |
| Conor Oliver | ★★★ |
| Conor Murray | ★★★★ |
| Jaco Taute | ★★★ |
| Chris Farrell | ★★★ |
Notable Players
I thought Kevin O’Byrne deserved his Player of the Match award. He was busy around the field, took his try well, scrummaged really nicely, threw nice and tight and maintained a narky edge as all good hookers should. Good performance.
Conor Murray came off the bench and was just class, as you’d expect. His work in the last 10 minutes facilitated the two scores needed for all five points. His kicking, passing and presence looked as sharp as ever. Neil Cronin, who Murray replaced, was really sharp with his work around the fringes and, while his passing was a little off at times, made up for that with good energy and tempo.
Arno Botha was an absolute bull in this game. He carried with authority and was destructive in defence. He’s the type of forward that’s a nightmare to play against because he’s just so unrelentingly physical in everything he does. Really deserves a contract extension.
I was most impressed with Fineen Wycherley and Gavin Coombes. The West Cork Mafia were right at home in this slugfest and were tucking into the rough stuff like it was a breast in a bun in Hillbillies at 2 AM.
Both men are 21 on December 11th, which is hard to believe looking at the size of them. This was the type of game that can cow young forwards but these two West Cork hard bastards weren’t going to be cowed by a bit of muck and long grass. Zebre merely adopted mucky conditions – Wycherley and Coombes were born in mucky conditions, shaped by them. They didn’t see sunlight until they were already grown and they didn’t like it.
Both have huge potential from a technical perspective but this was a game for the rough stuff, and they showed they’ve plenty of that too. Impressive stuff from both.
There’s much to cover in this game and I’ll be doing that in TRK Premium all week long with GIF and Video Articles.
