Emmet Moloney writes for the 'The Irish Farmers Journal' and is a former sports columnist with 'The Kerryman'.

Life is all about swings and roundabouts and sport is no different. Munster will come again, writes Emmet Moloney...

No player or team spends an entire career at the top. Watching Tom McGurk trying to turn Munster’s inability to get out of their group into a disaster on Sunday night on RTÉ, ably assisted by George Hook (notable mention and exception for the clear-headed Brent Pope), brought to mind the old Dad’s Army stalwart, Corporal Jones: “Don’t panic, Mr Mainwaring. Don’t panic,” he’d shout as he ran around like a headless chicken. He reminded me of McGurk.

Expectation is a very dangerous thing in the modern era of the internet and with TV cameras at literally every match. Gravity is attached to events way beyond their importance. These are just swings and roundabouts.

Take Leinster, for instance. They are the Munster of the mid-noughties now. They look superb and must be favourites for the European Cup. Their style of rugby is thrilling, their support base grows stronger by the week and their squad has class and depth in all areas. They don’t want the Six Nations’ break that’s coming in three weeks because they are playing as well as they ever have. Saturday’s demolition was conceived without the undoubted star of Irish rugby at the moment, Jamie Heaslip, while another Lion, Gordon D’Arcy was also a late withdrawal.

How good are they? The Munster of 2006-2008 would struggle mightily to beat them. That’s how good they are and that’s how good Munster were. Joe Schmidt (their new coach since the start of the season who’s kept a low profile) will now have nervous weekends watching Ireland, hoping that his stars don’t start falling like flies. It has happened before. Heaslip, Sexton, O’Brien and, of course, O’Driscoll are their totem poles. All four will probably be needed come April and May.

The comparisons between our two strongest provinces is a very valid one. The year directly after winning a Heineken Cup is always a difficult one, winning two in three years is definitely easier than winning two in consecutive years. So it will be with Leinster – as it was with Munster.

The Red province will lick their wounds and go out in style this weekend when London Irish are put to the sword in Thomond. The Magners League and securing a home semi-final will become the priority. Who knows, we could see Munster against Leinster in the Aviva in the Magners final – a week apart from the Heineken Cup final. Munster’s season is far from finished.

Their invincibility is dented. It had to happen sometime. It’s not the end of the world. The end of the world was above in Tyrone earlier this week. This is only sport.
Paul O’Connell looked the part during his time on the pitch on Sunday in the south of France. Ireland will get the benefit of his freshness – as will Munster come season’s end. His presence on the field at London Irish and the Ospreys could have made the difference. Poor as Munster were this campaign, they still could have won both games. Swings and roundabouts.

So, the baton is handed to Leinster. Themselves and Ulster will get our support and good wishes. Irish rugby is not in the hole Hook and McGurk would dig us into either. A dodgy scrum does not an entire World Cup year wreck. We’ll be fine. Time to look at the glass half-filled with Heineken.I know it is their job and intention, but Hook and McGurk must tone down the hyperbole.

As a sure sign of spring, I went to see the Clare hurlers play Tralee IT in the Waterford Crystal League in Sixmilebridge on Sunday afternoon. (Nice timing, by the way. The match started at 2pm, meaning the first half of the rugby was missed. Could we really not have figured that out?)

Anyway, the game was typical of a wintry day, despite a decent pitch, with the first touch obviously lacking – along with fitness, match practice and everything else you could throw in for the first day of the year. Clare won, just – but hit about 15 wides. As we walked from the ground (in a hurry to see Munster), I overheard a couple of gentlemen chatting about the game. None were spring chickens. “We’ve no forwards, we’re going nowhere this year. Yer man is useless. The sideline were far too slow to make changes ...”

No doubt it was a scene repeated all over the country on Sunday as unfit, untrained, unfamiliar and incomplete teams played these exalted challenge matches in the name of the Waterford Crystal, McGrath Cup, FBD and O’Byrne Cup ties, etc.

It’s January, lads. Managers and players are only getting started. Twelve months ago we were down in Tipperary to play them in a midweek February match in the Waterford Crystal League. Under lights, it was a stirring contest that Clare won and deserved to win. I heard the same Tipp lads walking out that night, saying they’d win nothing with that team.

This is what the age of instant gratification has brought us. Only one team can win the All-Ireland. Only one team can win the Heineken Cup. Does that make the rest of them failures? Of course not, it only makes that winning day, whenever it arrives, all the better for the waiting. That’s what sport is about. The journey.

Munster will be grand. They’ll come back and how sweet that will be. Who knows, they might even get a soft pool draw in next year’s group stages for a change. Some personnel will change but the Munster fire will still burn, Thomond will remain a fortress and just when you least expect it, you know what will happen.

Leinster spent their share of days in the shadows and now the sun is on them. Good luck to them and let’s hope they savour it. They deserve everything that comes their way. For a change this springtime, they won’t have Munster in their rearview mirror. But, wait a second, what’s that Red Hand doing in the quarter-finals? Ah, swings and roundabouts.




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