Munster need more intensity

IT’S THE final round of matches before the RaboDirect Pro12 League goes into a three-week hiatus and therefore apposite that it brings the leaders, Ospreys, to Limerick where they take on their closest pursuers.

Munster make eight changes from the side that suffered a first league defeat of the season against Edinburgh last time out. Doug Howlett returns on the right wing, Johne Murphy switches to fullback, Danny Barnes is back in the centre, while Duncan Williams starts at scrumhalf.

Stephen Archer, Billy Holland, Dave O’Callaghan and Peter O’Mahony are introduced up front, with the latter captaining the side from number eight.

Props BJ Botha and Marcus Horan have recovered from illness and injury respectively to be included amongst the replacements. Holland wants the Irish province to reproduce the intensity the team had in previous matches but lacked on their visit to the Scottish capital. “Yeah, we’ll have to if we’re to have any chance against them. I think we lacked the bit of edge we had in the games before Edinburgh; just weren’t sharp enough. We didn’t help ourselves (in being) 16 points down after 20 odd minutes.”

The Ospreys have won all five of their matches and despite contributing handsomely to the Wales squad at the World Cup can still field a team, led by flanker Justin Tipuric, with plenty of Test-match experience in Limerick. Forwards coach Jonathan Humphreys admitted: “We’re expecting a tough evening . . . Both teams may have a different look to them from when we last played, but it will still be intense and will be a real battle.

“We are well aware we have to raise our game several levels from where we were against Connacht (they won 26-21). We weren’t at our best, and a lot of credit for that has to go to Connacht for stopping us playing, but we have to learn how to deal with it. Munster won’t be any different in that area, so we need to learn how to combat it.”

Munster rarely have consecutive off-key displays and they’ll be keen to finish this tranche of games on a positive note.

MUNSTER: J Murphy; D Howlett, D Barnes, L Mafi, D Hurley; I Keatley, D Williams; W du Preez, D Fogarty, S Archer; B Holland, M O’Driscoll; Dave O’Callaghan, N Ronan, P O’Mahony (capt). Replacements: S Henry, M Horan, BJ Botha, I Nagle, T O’Donnell, P Stringer, S Deasy, S Zebo.

OSPREYS: B Davies; H Dirksen, T Isaacs, A Bishop, R Fussell; D Biggar, R Webb; D Jones, R Hibbard, C Griffiths; I Gough, I Evans; J Bearman, J Tipuric (capt), J Thomas. Replacements: M Davies, A Jarvis, J Rees, T Smith, J King, M Morgan, S Parker, K Phillips.

Referee: James Jones (Wales).