Newport Gwent Dragons 8 Munster 24It was a bloodless coup in the end, with Munster, streetwise and economical, producing the type of performance often filed under the sporting euphemism "professional". Winning away from home in the Heineken European Cup is a cherished commodity, but the more often a team manage to do so the pickier their supporters may become.
This wasn't vintage Munster. There was precious little swagger, because competency was more than adequate. The Dragons may have been bellicose before the match but once the contest began that belligerence quickly evaporated.
Shorn by injury, they were denied a platform and field position by a misfiring lineout, while their backplay was largely lateral. They elected to put too many hands on the ball; cluttered corridors, short passing, crabbing sideways and failing to fix the defender meant they were easily policed.
There is mitigation in that Dragons coach Paul Turner had to play three club players in the back three: fullback Aled Thomas, Gareth Thomas and Richard Fussell. None could be faulted; accusations of ineptitude or rank decision-making should fall on more experienced shoulders.
Next week, when the teams meet for a second tilt, this time at Thomond Park, Welsh internationals Kevin Morgan and Hal Luscombe should fill two of the back three berths, having recovered from injury. It'll only be cosmetic, though, unless the Welsh region manage to address their shortcomings up front.
Turner tried to put a positive spin on the afternoon, but his words rang a little hollow.
"Having three club players in my back three was a good development for the future. As I expected, their 10 (Ronan O'Gara) put them in the right areas and they were a little too smart for us in the contact areas.
"We just couldn't get into the right areas, which we talked about all week.
"I'm really proud about the way we adapted. There was a sort of Test-match feeling about the first 20 minutes."
It was hard to blame him, for if he really analysed his team's failings on the day it might cast a pall over next week's trip.
He wasn't completely oblivious to his side's faults, accepting that their lineout had been poor, before adding the rider, "They have one of the best lineouts in Europe even without (Paul) O'Connell and (Frankie) Sheahan. We're not despondent and have a couple of players coming back. We're quietly confident that we can move on."
They might be better, and probably will. But the scope of that improvement will have to be significant, because Munster too will look to be a little more polished. They managed enough line breaks to claim a hatfull of tries, but couldn't muster the four that would have produced a valuable bonus point.
It was invariably the case that, the initial breach having been made, the support ran poor lines or an individual made the wrong choice. Those mistakes are unlikely to be repeated.
One aspect of Munster's patterns that will have pleased Declan Kidney is the offloading in the tackle. It gave his side greater potency, speed and fluency in possession, a fact acknowledged by Turner.
The Dragons coach observed, "They're offloading in the first half had us in all sorts of trouble. I thought David Wallace was outstanding."
Indeed he was, and his man-of-the-match accolade was deserved ahead of candidates like Mick O'Driscoll and Denis Leamy, in particular, but collectively the pack.
Anthony Horgan defended well.
Wallace's athleticism was very much to the fore, making breaks, ripping ball - all the qualities associated with thriving in the modern game at the highest level.
O'Gara - despite one or two uncharacteristic mistakes - nudged his team into all the right places. Yet for all their obvious superiority, Munster still couldn't establish that fact on the scoreboard.
A couple of drop goals, one from Mossie Lawlor, who settled well at fullback, another from O'Gara, who also tagged on a penalty, and a try from Denis Leamy gave Munster a 17-0 lead. The Dragons outhalf Craig Warlow posted a penalty, but Munster were still poised to kick on at the interval.
Instead, the second half involved much huffing and puffing, with only a Marcus Horan try, converted by O'Gara, to show for the perspiration.
There is a Japanese proverb: "He who empties the bench almost in one go is in danger of hara-kiri." Gareth Chapman's injury-time try underlined its validity.
Kidney swept away any notion that they had come chasing a bonus point, choosing his words with care so as not to rile the opposition ahead of next Saturday.
"We had to play with a little bit of structure. It's not the way that you want to play necessarily, but you don't play into the opposition's hands by playing a very loose type game. We played with a structure and got the three, six, nine points.
"I thought we were going to lose it (the structure) after about 30 minutes, because we threw around one or two balls that brought them into it. We managed to put a bit of pressure on and get that try."
He does expect the Dragons to be better at Thomond Park, isn't counting any poultry, and does, under pain of death by cliché, want to concentrate on performance and let other issues tend to themselves. Privately, Munster will view anything other than a bonus point in Limerick as an opportunity spurned.
SCORING SEQUENCE: 10 mins: Lawlor drop-goal 0-3; 14: O'Gara penalty, 0-6; 25: O'Gara penalty, 0-9; 37: Leamy try, 0-14; 40(+3): O'Gara penalty, 0-17; 40(+6): Warlow penalty 3-17 (half-time 3-17); 64: Horan try, O'Gara conversion, 3-24; 87: Chapman try, 8-24.
DRAGONS: A Thomas; G Chapman, S Tuipulotu, C Sweeney, R Fussell; C Warlow, G Cooper; A Black, S Jones, R Thomas; I Gough, P Sidoli; A Hall, J Ringer, M Owen (capt). Replacements: G Robinson for Thomas (59 mins); Thomas for Robinson (63-77mins); L Charteris for Sidoli (59 mins); J Bryant for Tuipulotu (67 mins); R Bryan for A Hall, G Baber for Cooper (both 71 mins; D Maddocks for Black (84 mins). Sinbinned: S Tuipulotu (25 mins).
MUNSTER: M Lawlor; J Kelly, G Connolly, T Halstead, A Horgan; R O'Gara, P Stringer; M Horan, J Flannery, J Hayes; D O'Callaghan, M O'Driscoll; D Leamy, D Wallace, A Foley (capt). Replacements: B Murphy for Connolly (77 mins); T O'Leary for Foley (82 mins); F Roche for Horan, D Fogarty for Flannery, T Hogan for O'Callaghan, S Keogh for Leamy, J Manning for O'Gara(all 84 mins). Sinbinned: B Murphy (80 mins).
Referee: Tony Spreadbury (England)
