Munster fall just short against Castres in error filled Champions Cup battle
Peter O'Mahony of Munster is tackled by Andrea Cocagi and Leone Nakarawa of Castres Olympique. Picture: Brendan Moran/Sportsfile
Lacklustre Munster came undone in the cauldron that is the Stade Pierre-Fabre on Friday night as they lost their second Champions Cup tie after an error-strewn display.
Visiting such an intimidating venue you would have expected Munster to be tuned in from the get-go, but in the first 90 seconds, we had a missed tackle, a missed penalty to touch and a poor penalty concession as the home side were given the initial impetus.
Castres almost scored only for scrum-half Jeremy Fernandez to knock on in the act of scoring in the 6th minute and moments later Brian Gleeson held them up over the tryline.
The mistakes and indiscipline kept coming and eventually Castres made it tell, as former Connacht number eight Abraham Papalii drove over for the opening try in the 13th minute.
The home side turned down the opportunity to take three easy points in the 29th minute when they took a quick tap penalty and were awarded when loose-head Quentin Walcker blasted over from close range.
Matters got worse as Munster lost Craig Casey to what looked like a bad injury as the second try was scored, although in the 32nd minute, Walker was sin-binned for a shoulder to Brian Gleeson’s head. They capitalised five minutes later when John Hodnett broke away from a maul and powered over for a superb individual score.
Given the way they had played in the opening 40 minutes, Ian Costello’s side would have been happy to be just 10-7 down at half time.
Castres wing Geoffrey Palis was yellow carded for a deliberate knock-on in the 44th minute but Munster made a hash of the resultant lineout and let their hosts off the hook, and a couple dominant home scrums later and scrum-half Jeremy Fernandez was splitting the posts with a 49th-minute penalty.
Peter O’Mahony joined the injury list when he hobbled off in the 51st minute, while Munster coughed up another attacking opportunity when their maul was swallowed up by the Castres maul defence soon after.
Full-back Julien Dumora badly sliced a penalty wide in the 63rd minute with replacement prop Nicolas Corato being sin-binned for persistent team infringements in the 68th minute.
And after Paddy Patterson had been illegally stripped of the ball at the base of a ruck, that man Hodnett was on hand to pick up and dive over, and Jack Crowley added the extras from the tee to give Munster an unlikely lead.
However, home outhalf Louis le Brun kicked a penalty in the 71st minute after another scrum penalty concession and from there on the Castres scrum continued to dominate to ensure they saw the game out.
J Fernandez (1 pen), L le Brun (1 pen), A Papalii, Q Walcker (1 try each).
J Crowley (2 cons), J Hodnett (2 tries).
J Dumora; G Palis, J Goodhue, A Cocagi, R Baget; L le Brun, J Fernandez; Q Walcker, G Barlot, W Collier; G Maravat, L Nakarawa; M Babillot (c), T Ardron, A Papalii.
W de Benedittis for A Papalii (35), A Papalii for W de Benedittis (42), Santiago Arata Perrone for J Fernandez (51), Loris Zarantonello, W de Benedittis, N Corato, F Tukino, T Chabouni, A Seguret for Q Walcker, G Barlot, L Nakarawa, A Papalii, A Cocagi (62), N Corato and T Chabouni for W Collier and J Dumora (65), W Collier for M Babillot (71).
M Haley; C Nash, T Farrell, A Nankivell, T Abrahams; J Crowley, C Casey; D Bleuler, N Scannell, S Archer; F Wycherley, T Beirne (c); P O'Mahony, J Hodnett, B Gleeson.
D Kilcoyne for D Bleuler (21), P Patterson for C Casey (31), J O’Donoghue for B Gleeson (48), T Ahern for P O’Mahony (51), D Barron and O Jager for N Scannell and S Archer (54), R Scannell for T Abrahams (58), A Kendellen for J Hodnett (71).
Christophe Ridley (RFU)
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