This year I acquired 5 pairs of tickets to the Munster Magners League home games in Thomond Park. Surprisingly they only clash once with the Leinster games. The first of these games was the return to the new Thomond Park against Glasgow Warriors in early October. Barney had traveled down from Galway and we had arranged to meet just outside the old Jury’s hotel. The traffic coming through Limerick was pretty awful – I made a few detours to avoid the worst of it and made it to the Ennis Road by about 30 minutes before kick-off. We parked on Veriker Gardens just round the corner and walked up to Thomond in the rain.
The new Thomond Park, Uploaded by M+MD.
The new stadium is fantastic. There are 2 identical stands each with 7,500 seats. There room for another 11,000 on the terraces below the stands and on the goal ends. There isn’t a bad seat in the stand – it steep and high so there is still an intimacy with the players. It will continue to be a great venue. The game was a sell-out – but in the conditions some of the faithful stayed at home and the official attendance was 19,000. There was a great atmosphere in the ground.
The game started on a great note, when a very messy quick line out by Glasgow on their line, gifted a tried to Peter Stringer who nicked the ball from a fumble by John Beattie the Glasgow number eight. An easy conversion, 7-0 . 15 minutes later O’Gara converted a penalty - 10-0 .
Every team has a psychological enemy – the bogey opponents. Glasgow is to Munster, what Edinburgh is to Leinster – a bogey team. Perhaps the new stadium was going to bury that bogey for ever. Colin Gregor the out half has been at the root of the problems for Munster in the past. However he did not have a good start missing an early penalty. But then he started to get it together and kicked two penalties and then had a third come off the cross bar. At half-time Munster were just ahead 10-6.
RoG managed another penalty ten minutes into the second half. The new young full-back Keith Earls, who is playing like a superstar so far this season, made a great run through passing to Tipoki who released to see Barry Murphy over for a try, - 18-6 .
But RoG missed the conversion and then Glasgow got a couple of penalties and suddenly at 18-12 Glasgow were just a score away. The bogeyman was approaching again! But Munster won a line-out on the Glasgow 22 and Stringer let a quick ball out to Earls Tipoki and Howlett went over. This time RoG didn’t miss. Munster could make the 4th try and didn’t get the bonus point. They also let Glasgow in for a soft try at the end. Final score - 25-17. Job done in difficult conditions. Thomond christened with a win and the bogeyman banished. Not a bad night’s work!
O'Callaghan Jumps, Uploaded by M+MD.
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