Bumper Cork crowd expected as Munster take on Edinburgh

Munster entertain Edinburgh at Virgin Media Park in Cork on Friday evening seeking to bag the maximum five points on offer for the third match in a row, as they look to continue their charge up the URC table.

As seems usual this season we start with some negative news on the injury front, despite the fact that Munster did not even play last weekend. Ireland A’s clash with their English counterparts last Sunday in Bristol, which was lost 28-12, came at a significant cost for Munster. 

They only sent six players over for the game and yet three of those came back injured, with Shane Daly’s being by far the worst, as his serious hamstring injury is set to keep him out of action for the rest of the season. 

Front rowers Diarmuid Barron and Oli Jager also had to leave the pitch, but the hope is that their respective knocks were more short-term in nature, although Jager must go for a scan on his foot injury.

With Thaakir Abrahams, Mike Haley and Diarmuid Kilgallen already on the injured list, Daly’s unavailability puts serious pressure on Munster’s back three resources, although the return to fitness of Sean O’Brien and Alex Nankivell should help somewhat in terms of options. 

SHOWCASE

Ben O’Connor and Shay McCarthy will now get plenty of opportunites in the coming weeks to showcase their respective talents. 

Staying fit and being available counts for a lot in this sport.

Munster do have a three-week gap until their next competitive game after Friday, with the trip to Glasgow on March 21 being their next league fixture, so the hope would be that the squad is starting to look healthier by then, with the Champions Cup sojourn to La Rochelle looming in early April, but nothing can be assumed anymore when it comes to Munster’s injury list. 

The team will be travelling to Welford Road to face the Leicester Tigers in a friendly on March 14. 

Players cannot be wrapped up in cotton wool at this stage of the season, but fingers will be crossed that everyone emerges unscathed from that one.

Munster’s 29-8 win over the Scarlets a fortnight ago saw them jump two spots in the URC table to fifth place, and another win here will see them leapfrog the Sharks, even if only temporarily considering they play on Saturday away to the Lions.

In the past two campaigns, this is the time of year that Munster made their move, creeping up the table as the injury list began to subside. 

We cannot be confident on that score yet, although Jeremy Loughman and Tom Ahern are also available for selection once more, but the hope is that Ian Costello will have more squad options available to him in terms of selection, and that should mean from here on in that Munster are extremely hard to beat.

Edinburgh have only played two URC fixtures since the turn of the year with Mike Blair’s men finishing on the losing side on both occasions. 

They lost 30-24 away to the Scarlets in January before succumbing to a surprise 17-22 defeat at home to Zebre two weeks ago. 

These losses has seen them slide down to ninth place in the table and they will know that they need to register wins in order to keep their play-off ambitions alive. 

The defeat to Zebre would have particularly stung given they had the last 10 minutes to score a winning try against 13 men, but they just did not have the guile to capitalise.

Given the small Munster representation in the Irish camp at present we can expect Munster to be as strong as possible for this weekend’s Round 12 clash, especially when considering the three-week gap to the Glasgow game. 

A five-pointer in front of a boisterous Cork crowd will not only be useful, in terms of Munster’s league campaign, it is expected.