Munster earn huge respect

So the Heineken Cup runneth over to four countries until late April and sponsors and organisers alike will have been high-fiving each other into Sunday night. Toulouse instead of Castres might have been ideal, but with the best supported teams in England and Ireland, coupled with some non-Cardiff sightings of the Millennium Stadium final in May from a passionately backed Llanelli, this is pretty much a dream semi-final line-up.

To have one seat at the table is fair enough. As the weekend reminded us, perhaps more so than ever, this is a bloody tough competition to win. And you invariably have to bleed along the way.

You don't just saunter into one of these competitions, breeze past everyone and collect some silverware at the end of it. True, Northampton did win the trophy at the first time of asking but they were the exception to the rule.

Ulster, Bath and Leicester suffered along the way and even the mighty Tigers experienced the disappointment of losing in a final, a quarter-final and then eviction in the pool stages before winning the competition at the fourth attempt.

In the circumstances, Munster's effort in emulating Toulouse by reaching the semi-finals for three years in a row - the French aristocrats achieved the feat in the first three years of the competition - is a phenomenal tribute to their character.

Whatever about being the best, there is surely no more redoubtable or resilient outfit in Europe. To rebound from their latest disappointment of losing home venue in the quarter-final in the sixth minute of injury-time, and then the allegations that were cheaply thrown in their direction ever since, ranked up there with anything they've done so far.

Watching them dig deep and guts out another deserved win abroad yet again, the feelgood factor they generate for the Irish public cannot be measured. Everyone in Dublin seemed to be angling for a bar stool to watch Saturday's semi-final and would have been on the edge of those seats long before the end of the match.

But whatever intangible qualities Declan Kidney brings to the equation, the man has the Midas touch alright.

Matt Williams put it best in the aftermath of his own side's defeat to Leicester when asked who were favourites to win the cup now. "You've got to say Munster or Leicester. I would say Leicester are favourites, and Munster will be quite happy with that.

"I was delighted to see them win. We've been there (Stade Francais) and it's a tough place to win, but Munster have got a lot of character and we know better than anyone else how much character they've got and how hard they are.

"Year in, year out they've had their heart broken, and still get up. I've got nothing but admiration for them. So I think the draw for the semi-finals is going to be a cruncher."

The respect emanating Munster's way from Leicester was palpable and genuine, and having threatened to murder Leinster it seemed they were intent on killing Munster with kindness. "I thought Munster looked fantastic yesterday," said Austin Healey on Sunday.

"I watched them on TV and I really enjoyed it. It was a fantastic performance by the Irish team, especially playing with the elements in the first half and then turning around into the wind. That was one of the best performances I've seen in the European Cup and I saw my old mate Roger (Ronan) O'Gara play a brilliant game. If we see them in the semis it will be a great game I'm sure. They're in the last four on merit; they've always been there on merit for me."

Martin Johnson, a man who's entitled to appreciate sleeves-rolled-up wins better than most, simply said: "I thought their performance in Stade was one of the best, and maybe even the very best, in the history of the competition."

Yet prevailing disappointment over Leinster's slightly anti-climactic departure should be tempered with the knowledge that before their run of three successive semi-finals, Munster had first to suffer a bitter quarter-final defeat away to Colomiers four years ago. All part of the learning curve.

"Ultimately the injuries over the last few weeks and the impact that had on our preparations, that told in the end," maintained Williams, who was asked about the postponement of the Newcastle game for over 72 hours.

"Without a doubt it was an absolute killer for us. We said that in private before the game. It knocked us around. We lost players, we lost a week's training, it cost us a fortune and it had a huge impact on us. There's absolutely no doubt that the postponement of that game and the lack of preparation certainly did hurt us for the Toulouse game. That's no excuse for today, you've got to say Leicester played some superb rugby."

Yet in private both he, the rest of the management and the players will surely admit it went a bit deeper than that. There was no shame in losing away to Toulouse and Leicester. Even the vastly-travelled and experienced Roly Meates afterwards reckoned he'd never come across such a well-orchestrated, partisan atmosphere quite like Welford Road.

However, Leinster will know that they didn't give it their best shot, though Victor Costello manfully took the game to Leicester whenever he could. Without Malcolm O'Kelly their line-out buckled again, they didn't hit the rucks or the tackle area nearly as fiercely as a fired-up Leicester did and Brian O'Driscoll was a heavily and abrasively marked man.

It was their added misfortune that playmaker Nathan Spooner aggravated his thigh injury and Leinster's last-quarter comeback when keeping the ball in hand and attacking Leicester wide will merely make them wonder what might have happened had they stuck to that game plan in the second quarter.

Perhaps, in the heel of the hunt, they haven't had Munster's same sense of desire since the turn of the year. If so, where were the roots of all this? The Celtic League final assuredly. The suspicion lurked then, and has been reinforced tenfold since, that the pain of losing a final focused Munster's minds.