Glasgow Warriors v Munster, 2 December

First topic message reminder :

            
Glasgow Warriors v Munster Rugby
Friday 2 December 2016
KO 19:35
Scotstoun Stadium

Live on BBC Alba and TG4

Referee: Nigel Owens (WRU, 142nd competition game)
Assistant Referees: Dan Jones (WRU), Dunx McClement (SRU)
Citing Commissioner: Paul Minto (SRU)
TMO: Jon Mason (WRU)

A. Head to Head

28 Played 28
11 Wins 16
16 Losses 11
1 Draws 1
566 Points 639

B. Form

Sat 22 October 2016
Munster Rugby 38 -  17 Glasgow Warriors

Fri 19 February 2016
Glasgow Warriors 27 - 24 Munster Rugby

Sat 30 May 2015
Munster Rugby 13 - 31 Glasgow Warriors

Sat 28 February 2015
Munster Rugby 22 - 10 Glasgow Warriors

Sat 20 December 2014
Glasgow Warriors 21 - 18 Munster Rugby

C. Teams

Glasgow Warriors 

Peter Murchie, Rory Hughes, Nick Grigg, Mark Bennett, Tommy Seymour, Peter Horne, Ali Price; Gordon Reid, Fraser Brown, Sila Puafisi, Tim Swinson, Rob Harley, Josh Strauss, Chris Fusaro, Ryan Wilson (capt).

Replacements: Corey Flynn, Alex Allan, D'arcy Rae, Rob McAlpine, Langilangi Haupeakui, Nemia Kenatale, Rory Clegg, Lee Jones.

Munster Rugby

Andrew Conway; Darren Sweetnam, Jaco Taute, Rory Scannell, Ronan O'Mahony; Ian Keatley, Duncan Williams; Dave Kilcoyne, Niall Scannell, John Ryan; Jean Kleyn, Billy Holland; Peter O'Mahony (capt), Tommy O'Donnell, Jack O'Donoghue.

Replacements: Rhys Marshall, Thomas du Toit, Stephen Archer, Donnacha Ryan, Robin Copeland, Te Aihe Toma, Dan Goggin, Alex Wootton.

You mean they look pish

Munster look pish but they have taken their opportunities.

There is a difference between looking and being

Not sure what you mean there, are you saying Munster are pish or Glasgow are pish?

Glasgow.

Look our team is pisher than yours :-) the scoreline confirms

I just hope for a better 2nd half. The 1st half was dire with the exception of a few decent breaks.

Glasgow are off colour right now and it's quite disconcerting.

Glasgow need more choice at fullback - other than just Murchie. Before Bryce went East, there looked like there was depth.

I have a hunch an out-of-form Murchie may leave at the end of this season with a new coach coming in. That would leave Glasgow with just Hogg and probably an EDP youngling who's been in the wings. Hopefully Rennie with bring some talent with him.

Keatley really is a poor 10...

That looked really bad.

Again Keatley displays his inability at game management. Terrible kicking from him.

Is that a rugby ball or bar of soap? Seems to be the story for this game.

How do Glasgow fans feel about the artificial pitch? It seems to be causing some problems in this game.

What a try!!

Excellent try from Bennett, great to see him back.

Again though, I must say that Keatley's game management is absolutely poor.

Munster tactics: kick the ball back to Glasgow.

Rory_Gallagher wrote:Munster tactics: kick the ball back to Glasgow.

My biggest pet hate in Rugby, kicking away of turnover ball.

Yeah - there is some peculiar logic to always kicking ball away into the teeth of a closing side.  I'm still trying to work out the secret logic after years of research.  Maybe someone out there already knows and is willing to release the secret?

Well, a win is a win. That's all I can say about that match.

Hard lines to Glasgow, thought you had it there after Bennett's superb try.

Well that was tough, Glasgow clawed their way back into the game after a very poor first half. They are not a million miles away, but still not quite firing. Two great tries but still not enough in the end

Still Munster defence very impressive and so well done to them for digging the win out.

Lets see what the full side can do next weekend.

More injuries though, Hughes and Horne taking bad ones.

There are definitely some gaps in the Glasgow squad and they are in need of a bit of re-building. We can judge our first team on next weeks performance against Racing but to win the league, you need a stronger squad than we currently seen to have. Yes we have been unlucky with injuries, but that is the nature of the beast. Some key positions, SH, FH and FB in particular, we do seem pretty light.

Hopefully the new coach will have some ideas about how to fill in some of the gaps. It just goes to show that you can never stand still. Our recruitment was not great last year, probably hampered by having to re-sign some of our internationals. I will watch this years announcements with interest.

Well done to Munster - well deserved. Glasgow just looked about 5% off the pace.

Is the artificial pitch taking it's injury toll?

The Great Aukster wrote:Well done to Munster - well deserved. Glasgow just looked about 5% off the pace.

Is the artificial pitch taking it's injury toll?

I suppose our only cause for comfort is that in the last two games it was 10 and 20% off the pace. That could be seen as a sign of progress!

We are officially in our worst league form since 2011. Worrying times.

I really hope we are able to get something out of the Paris game in a week's time because if not it's looking like a bloody miserable winter.

It looks like Rennie could be coming in at the right time? Great for Munster though, they're looking unbeatable again.

Glasgow had some very good moments last night George, they just look shot for confidence. They need the win next weekend in order to restore their belief.

Confidence is the name of the game here. Last nights game was close and could easily have gone either way.

How many times over the past few seasons have Glasgow closed out close games like these but this year it is just not happening. The leaders in the team are just not stepping up.

Probably the most worrying is the lose of form of Josh Strauss, who has been a talisman for us for many years now. He just seems a shadow of his former self this year. He is 30 years old now and has taken a hammering as a ball carrier like him does. I hope we have not seen the best of him and that it is just the niggling injuries holding him back. It is a bit of a worry though.

I think what we are seeing at Glasgow is the inevitable conclusion of successive seasons, where we have lost more quality than we have brought in.

There are many reasons, our younger players have progressed and have rightly been put on contracts which reflect their market worth, which has meant we have had to trim our wage bill elsewhere and senior players wanting to move on. However, I also think we have made some poor signings during that same period.

We can't lose players like DTH, Maitland, Matawalu, Nakarawa and Duncan Weir....and not replace them with similar quality, and expect to remain at the same level.

I also suspect that the artificial pitch is contributing to the number of serious injuries sustained this season. Horne and Hughes were stretchered off last night to add to the long term casualty list which includes: Peterson, Cummings, Ashe, Sarto and a fair few others. Almost all of the injuries were sustained at Scotstoun. When combined with the number of quality players that have moved on this is making Toonie's aim of making the champions cup QF's an even more difficult task.

I am not sure our injury list is that much worse than in any other season, it is just a pity that they seem to be concentrated in the second row which is definitely leaving us underpowered up front,

Probably the most telling thing this year is that it is fairly obvious what our best XV is, wheras in other years, none of us, Toonie included seem sure about it.

The squad definitely needs a bit of rebuilding and Rennie is probably not a bad guy to be doing it.