Old warriors recall mother of all derbies

HEINEKEN CUP SEMI-FINAL: GERRY THORNLEYtalks to former Munster centre Rob Henderson and Leinster prop Will Green who recall key moments in the 2006 semi-final

WE LABELLED it the mother of all Irish derbies. A 47,800 sell-out at Lansdowne Road which could have been sold out twice over, with a place in the Heineken Cup final at stake between Leinster and Munster. As interpros went, the Heineken Cup semi-final of Sunday, April 23rd, 2006, was fairly tasty.

That was, of course, before the GAA opened its doors to Croke Park, before Munster went on to win two Heineken Cups and Leinster a Magners League, before Ireland delivered its first Grand Slam in 61 years, and the two provinces provided a dozen of Ireland’s record 14-man contingent for the Lions. Unquestionably, even a world record 82,500 capacity for a club game next Saturday will scarcely satisfy the demand for tickets.

Leinster’s prop Will Green, then in the first of a two-year stay with Leinster, and Munster’s Irish and Lions centre Rob Henderson, are now living, working and rearing families in London. Their wives, are, indeed, both expecting a third child this summer.

Green is working in a renewal energy company and coaching at his local club, Worthing, in Division National Three, and in immediately recalling the huge sense of occasion concedes: “We over-hyped before the match. That’s why I think we started poorly. What I can also remember is meeting up for an early lunch in the David Lloyd Centre and coming on the bus to the match, we were playing at home in Dublin, and everywhere was a sea of red. All the pubs were a sea of red and that was the same when arrived at the stadium. It was an incredible atmosphere.

“As players there’s two ways you can deal with it. You can either use it as a tool or let it affect you, and I think it affected us and we didn’t use it to our advantage. Ultimately, looking at the result, we were undone.”

THE RED ARMY had long since travelled like no other supporters in Europe and Henderson, who has just started his own financial brokerage company, particularly recalls the Munster coach going past the Beggars Bush pub. “It was like the pub was bleeding. I’ll be honest with you,” he adds, “in all the big games we ever played, it was always like that, so it wasn’t so much of a surprise to us. When Munster play in big games everyone travels. Last one out of Munster turn the lights off.”

It’s funny to think Leinster’s stunning 41-35 quarter-final win away to Toulouse – as against Munster’s largely under-appreciated 19-10 arm wrestle over a huge Perpignan pack – had made them the bookies’ favourites. Furthermore, Munster’s defeats in the 2000 and 2002 finals, along with 14-man Leinster’s win over Munster in the 2001-02 Celtic Leaguer final at Lansdowne Road – when Munster had been huge favourites – had earned them an unfair reputation in the eyes of some of being “chokers”.

Critically though, Munster had been through these kind of days more so than their rivals. Over the previous seven campaigns, Leinster had played in five European knock-out matches, as against Munster’s 15.

From the moment Malcolm O’Kelly knocked-on O’Gara’s kick-off, Munster were on the front foot. O’Gara knocked over a first-minute penalty, and after the Leinster lineout malfunctioned a Paul O’Connell take led to the Munster pack driving Denis Leamy over the line, O’Gara’s conversion to make it 10-0 inside eight minutes.

Henderson watched the first 10 minutes unfold from the bench. “It was a great start and I think that came with experience. Even though when you looked at the teams theirs was as good as ours, we’d learned from previous matches it’s nothing to do with the hype or the build-up, it’s what you do on the field, and if you can get on the field with a cool head you’re already one step ahead of the game, especially when you’re playing against less experienced opposition in that kind of scenario.”

LEINSTER HAD been authors of their own poor start, and thereafter their pack never matched Munster for control in the basics. Green attributes that to concentration. “As the sports psychologists would put it, we were over-aroused and when you get over-aroused then you can become a bit flat sometimes. I think the emotion of the occasion got to the boys, which was really frustrating.”

Henderson had, he said, just put down his coffee and croissant when called from the bench in the 11th minute after John Kelly suffered a shoulder injury. With his first act he did his routine charge up the middle into Gordon D’Arcy and Brian O’Driscoll.

“I actually injured my ankle in the first passage of play I was involved in. I twisted my ankle then, I managed to stagger through for 55 minutes or so but when I really went over on it a second time I had to come off.”

Declan Kidney often refers to a key moment soon after, in the 13th minute. One of Leinster’s four tries in Toulouse three weeks earlier had been a stunning length-of-the-field counter-attack which Denis Hickie finished off in the corner. When Leinster orchestrated a similarly daring counter this time, Hickie found himself one-on-one with O’Connell, but having beaten him on the outside the covering Shaun Payne just did enough to force his left foot onto the touchline. Even from outside his own 22, he would assuredly have scored as only Hickie could. The ebb and flow of psychic energy and all that.

O’Gara and Felipe Contepomi exchanged penalties before Contepomi and Leamy became embroiled in a wrestling match off the ball and, instead of a Leinster penalty just outside the 22 after a break by O’Driscoll, the penalty was reversed and O’Gara made it 16-3. “Relax,” O’Driscoll could be heard to say to Contepomi over the referee link, but the sense of injustice only added to Contepomi’s frustrations, and the Puma missed penalties either side of the interval; the second hitting an upright.

His performance against Munster in Thomond Park two weeks ago, when also missing three penalties, revived memories of the ’06 semi-final, but it should also be remembered that in the preceding win over Munster at the RDS Contepomi had a virtuoso two-try, 25-point haul and last season landed six from six in the 21-12 win which effectively clinched the Magners League.

“Felipe knows he’s going to get targeted next week and he’s just got to forget all that day,” says Green, “because Felipe on his day, as we know, is a match-winner. But what will Munster try and do? They’ll try and wind him up. He’s got to realise that a switched-on, cool-headed Felipe is a world-beater, and if he can win that battle by not getting revved by them, then Leinster will be in a great position.”

But that day Munster targeted Contepomi big time, and Henderson makes no bones about it. “With D’Arcy and Drico in the centres, we thought ‘okay, if we can close down Contepomi then the two boys will get limited opportunity’. That was it, simple as that. We knew our forwards could look after themselves, so as a backline if we could snuff out their middle three, or keep them under as tight a wrap as we could, we’d be in good shape.”

And rattling Contepomi was part of it. “He’s one of those players who can change a game on his own. I think he’s absolutely brilliant and when he goes to another former club of mine, Toulon, he’ll bring a wealth of experience, skill, glamour. He is box office, but I would say if you got up and got into him, then he would rattle easily and seemed to shrink back into himself, and that’s exactly what he did that day.”

AFTER A BREATHLESS, often harum-scarum opening half, Munster led 16-3 at the break. “I don’t believe we’ve ever let a lead like that slip in a big game,” says Henderson. “I was watching the Munster-Ospreys match the other week and as soon as the first try was scored by Paul Warwick, I turned around to anyone and everyone around me and said: ‘that’s it, game over’.”

All that said and done, both agree the game was a good deal tighter than the final 30-6 scoreline would suggest. And there were many other significant turning points. Indeed, Henderson’s abiding memory of the day aside from winning, is just before he was taken off in the 65th minute when his ankle gave way completely. “I remember hobbling up off the floor and getting back into the defensive line and D’Arce opposite me screaming for the ball. He could see I was gone, but thankfully the ball went the other way. I was delighted when he didn’t get it, as I literally couldn’t walk.”

Henderson was promptly replaced, and received a standing ovation. “Anything that makes Angie cry – because she’s not the world’s biggest rugby fan, though she obviously supported me 100 per cent – but she said it was amazing.”

Contepomi then tapped a penalty inside the Munster 22, and Brian Blaney knocked-on a loose pass. “That was the final nail in the coffin, when we tapped and went under the posts,” says Green. “That, if we’re being brutally honest, is when heads had gone. If you’re 10 points down with 15 or 20 minutes to go, you’re still well in the game.”

Even so, three minutes later, Contepomi’s second penalty did reduce the gap to 16-6, and in the 73rd minute Federico Pucciariello was binned by Joel Jutge for playing the ball from an offside position.

O’Driscoll and the team leaders opted for the difficult kick at goal, which would still have left Leinster needing a converted try to draw level, rather than go up the line, and he probably regretted the decision straightaway. Unsurprisingly, Contepomi missed.

Leinster were a beaten docket, O’Gara handing off O’Kelly to touchdown and joyously scale the perimeter advertising. “He had a cheeky smile on him,” recalls Henderson, chuckling, “and he only just cleared it as well. He looked a little like (100 to 1 Grand National winner) Mon Mone at the last.”

Trevor Halstead followed that up with an intercept try from fully 55 minutes. “Trevor had a shaky start with Munster but then he got better and better, and he was key to the success. Afterwards, I said to him ‘So when exactly did they put the quicksand out?’ It was similar to Duchie (Jason Holland) getting the intercept against Toulouse (in 2000). But it just showed the key players performed.” Munster “had a couple” that night. “It kind of buried the memory of losing the Celtic League final when we were heavy favourites.”

Buoyed by that, four weeks later Munster would reach their holy grail against Biarritz in Cardiff.

Recalling the endgame in their Lansdowne Road semi-final, Green says: “He and Felipe have had their battles down the years and Rog came out well on top that day. Yeah, that wasn’t much fun. That wasn’t much fun at the end really. But that’s what it’s all about. You play those big games, and you have good days in the sun and you have bad days in the sun, I’m afraid that was a bad day.”

“But I believe the main reason Munster have become the powerhouse in Europe they are is due to learning from bitter experiences and the only way you really learn and go on to become a successful team is having those bitter experiences in the bank.”

BOTH GREEN AND Henderson reckon the experience of that day is likely to benefit Leinster more. That was Michael Cheika’s first season in Irish rugby whereas now, according to Green, “Well versed in Irish rugby and Checks will have learnt a lot from that day as well in terms of preparation.”

Similarly, Henderson points to the strong contribution Leinster players made to the Grand Slam and the wealth of experience running through their squad in deducing: “Leinster will certainly be able to cope with the pressure more this time. They’ve brought in some experienced players and Drico’s back on form, which is always a worrying sign when you’re playing against him.”

Green looks on from a removed position nowadays and marvels at the rapid progress Luke Fitzgerald, Rob Kearney and Jamie Heaslip have made, “and the changes Checks has made at Leinster. He’s created a winning culture and brought in quality players. I think Irish rugby has a lot to thank Cheika for in instilling that work ethic into Leinster.”

He believes “the battle of the backrow” will be pivotal. “When Shane Jennings came back I forecast that he would make the Irish number seven jersey his, but it hasn’t happened. But with Rocky Elsom, who was simply fabulous against Harlequins, and Jamie Heaslip alongside him, what an opportunity this is for him.”

Henderson says of Munster: “They’ve developed the way they play the game. They’ve not reinvented the wheel and they’ve got better players in to be honest. Dumper (Tony McGahan) is a good coach, because a la (Warren) Gatland, (Alan) Gaffney and Kidney, he’s one for the players.”

Henderson believes Leinster have “one of the most dangerous back fives in Europe and they’re all playing well. But they’re coming up against a Munster team who, this time round, have got threats all across the paddock. You’ve got (Lifeimi) Mafi in the middle of the park, who throws himself about defensively but sucks people in, in attack. You’ve got (Keith) Earlsy and then you’ve got Doug Howlett, Paul Warwick and Ian Dowling. The quality of player being attracted to Munster is now greater too.”

However, Henderson only makes Munster marginal favourites, “because Leinster can draw on the experience of the last time. They’ve padded out their team as well, they’ve got young players who aren’t afraid to try things and maybe don’t have as much baggage perhaps.

“This is effectively the sixth Six Nations match of the year,” he concludes. “It’s bigger than all other European Cup games and it’s like an international.”

And the winner gets to play a seventh. It’s going to be a long week.

OLD FOES SET TO RENEW BATTLE

HEINEKEN CUP SEMI-FINAL, Sunday, April 23th, 2006. Leinster 6 Munster 30.

LEINSTER:Dempsey; Horgan, O'Driscoll (capt), D'Arcy, Hickie; Contepomi, Easterby; Corrigan (McCormack, 68), B Blaney, Green, Williams, O'Kelly, Jowitt (Miller, 56), Gleeson, Heaslip. Not used _ D Blaney, N Ronan, B O'Riordan, K Lewis, R Kearney.

Pens: Contepomi 2.

MUNSTER: Payne; Horgan, Kelly (Henderson, 12; O'Leary, 65), Halstead, Dowling; O'Gara, Stringer; Pucciariello, Hayes, O'Callaghan, O'Connell, Leamy, Wallace, Foley (capt; Roche, 73). Not used _ D Fogarty, M O'Driscoll, S Keogh, J Manning.

Tries: Leamy, O’Gara, Halstead. Cons: O’Gara 3. Pens: O’Gara 3.

Sin-bin: Pucciariello, 73.

Referee: J Jutge (France).

Att: 48,500.

AT THE time, it was hard to imagine there could be a bigger rendezvous for these rivals of over a century. The Celtic League final of December, 2001, had taken that rivalry to new levels, and it had been building up further in the intervening league meetings, with each winning handsomely in turn at home that season – Munster by 33-9 at Musgrave Park in October, and Leinster by 35-23 at the RDS on New Year’s Eve.

All told, 14 of the Munster 22 that day are still on their roster, including 11 of their starting line-up, and the likelihood is that six of their pack will again line-up come kick off alongside Ronan O’Gara and Ian Dowling, with Tomás O’Leary and Peter Stringer exchanging places, and Denis Fogarty and Mick O’Driscoll again on the bench.

By comparison, nine of Leinster’s starting line-up and 11 of their 22 remain. Of all those it’s likely Malcolm O’Kelly, Jamie Heaslip, Felipe Contepomi, Gordon D’Arcy, Brian O’Driscoll, Shane Horgan, Girvan Dempsey, Rob Kearney and Brian Blaney (the latter two were substitutes that day), will be involved – as might Cameron Jowitt and David Blaney. Three substitutes that day, Stephen Keogh, Niall Ronan and Kieran Lewis have moved in the opposite direction.

Even two of the five Munster players who have since retired have become part of the backroom, Anthony Foley and Shaun Payne, whereas seven of Leinster’s 22 have retired.