Eddie O'Sullivan still not impressed by 'vulnerable' Munster defence

RTÉ News​

21-05-2025

Eddie O'Sullivan believes Munster's knockout mentality means they're capable of causing chaos in the BKT URC play-offs, but says he remains unconvinced by their defence following last week's win against Benetton.
The province finished sixth overall in the URC table, and secured qualification for the Investec Champions Cup, with the 30-21 win against the Italian side, but needed a second-half rally to get over the line, coming from 14-10 behind at the break.
Two tries for Benetton full-back Rhyno Smith opened Munster up in what was a poor first half, but their own attacking flair prevailed after the break.
It was similar to their previous week's win against Ulster where they gave up two sloppy first-half tries, before an impressive third quarter saw them win 38-20.
"The defence is vulnerable. It seems like they're not settled in their defensive system," former Ireland head coach O'Sullivan said on the RTÉ Rugby podcast.
"They're not confident, and you have guys making bad reads, coming out of the line and getting carved.
"It seems to me there was confusion in the ranks as to who was doing what. There was a disconnect in their defensive line and that's a disaster area, when one guy is on one page and another guy is on another page.
"You can see that early in the season when you're kind of bedding in for the first few games, you can have big defensive screw-ups and you get caught, but at that this stage of the season everyone should be lockstep on D."
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The province conceded an average of 24 points per game in their 18 matches in the regular season, the highest average of the eight teams that made it into the play-offs.
And O'Sullivan says similar leaks could be exposed badly against the Sharks, who they face in the quarter-finals in Durban next week.
He said: "South African teams bring two things to the URC as they always do. One is physicality. They're brutally physical.
"They will go toe to toe, pound the hell out of you. Sometimes you just run out of gas against them because you make so many big tackles. There's no easy tackles against South African teams. You taste your fillings every time you hit somebody.
"They have that and they always have serious gas on the edges, the outside channels.
"That's what makes South African teams so dangerous in the play-offs, they bring huge physicality and you know it's coming and there's not much you can do about it, and if they get free in the outside channels they can skin you alive and score from 50 or 60 metres. It's a lethal combination.
"Your defence has to be really buttoned down so that you're able to make two-man tackles, a tackler and an assist to at least slow the ruck ball and don't give up too many yards on the collision.
"To do that you have to commit more to the contact zone, and at the same time you can't leave edges with lots of space out there, because they have so much pace when they get out there."
If Munster are to win the title, they would likely have to win away in Durban, Pretoria and then against Leinster at Aviva Stadium, a path even tougher than the one they travelled to become champions two seasons ago.
And while O'Sullivan says he doesn't see enough evidence that they are capable of doing it, he's prepared to be proven wrong.
"They've always been able to pull out rescue results, when they're circling the pan and they get a result, and it rights the ship for a while," he said.
"They haven't got enough results through the season to really make them contenders.
"I'll probably get criticised for saying it because you don't know with Munster, they could go on and get to a semi-final or final because they're a knockout team, as we've seen in the last two games.
"Their form is not good, 50%, nine wins nine losses, average scoring 25 and conceding 24. That's about as bang average as you can get. Bang average shouldn't really win you the league.
"Their form doesn't say to me that they're going to win the URC. I might take that back in a few weeks, because Munster are Munster."