Munster growing in confidence

There are, naturally enough, two ways of looking on this one. An initially edgy Munster were undoubtedly flattered by their winning margin against a game and pacey Pontypridd, but then again to win by 22 points when not playing at your best is surely the hallmark of a good side.

And that's what Munster are now. Unbeaten this season, and with only two defeats in their last 17 competitive games (both on French soil), their basic standard of performance is altogether higher than when they kicked off last season's European Cup campaign with a grim 20-13 home win over Padova.

In part this is the product of an ever-stronger squad, imbued with new arrivals such as Keith Wood and John Langford, not to mention the increasing maturity of Ronan O'Gara. Most of all, though, it is the product of the thoughtful and meticulous work of the Declan Kidney-led Munster brains trust.

With their long run of form, Munster have steadily progressed much as Kidney wanted and planned, the coach believing that teams never stay stagnant, they either go backwards or go forwards. This performance may not have been compelling evidence of the latter, but it did show how much more self-confident Munster have become.

Hence, after a discernibly nervous and anxious first quarter, and a third quarter concentrated mostly on defence, they rode out the odd mini crisis or two with some assurance. Originally, if anything, Munster were culpable of trying too hard off slow ruck ball in the face of Pontypridd's aggressive defence, forcing the game feverishly through the hands only to cough up several turnovers and a try.

Trailing 9-10, another turnover was followed by a penalty and the concession of an extra 10 metres for dissent. Whereupon Mick Galwey could be heard saying: "Don't panic now boys, c'mon let's keep the heads."

Such was the hushed and typically respectful silence of the 6,000 Thomond Park crowd on a sunny, sporting day, that Brett Davey may actually have been distracted and pulled the kickable 35 metre penalty wide. In any event, Munster pulled themselves together.

O'Gara hadn't been giving his side his customary control up to that point, but what's impressive about him is the way mistakes don't get to him. He underlined his innate footballing brain when steadying a laboured Munster drive that was rapidly running out of numbers and options by calling a switch with Peter Stringer, and then spotted a gap behind Gareth Wyatt to kick a diagonal punt to the corner with the outside of his right boot.

From the ensuing line-out drive, O'Gara landed a drop goal.

Munster's line-out maul was their most potent weapon and the bedrock of their game, effectively providing the platform for 16 of their points.

It was the basis for their crucial 33rd minute try, when the lively Wood drove through off Langford's take, whereupon Galwey and Anthony Foley (who were invariably at the heart of most of Munster's big plays) broke up the touchline before Foley intelligently put Quinlan away. O'Gara's touchline conversion was the pick of his personal haul of 22 points.

Galwey repeated much the same "don't panic" message during the interval, and despite concerted Pontypridd pressure in the third quarter and again late on, kept their line intact while tagging on a couple more O'Gara penalties and Killian Keane's late intercept try.

"We were too anxious," conceded Kidney afterwards. "These players have an awful lot of pride and we just tried too hard in the first half. I couldn't knock a performance that's due to too much effort if you like. In the second half we settled down and did a whole lot better.

"There wasn't a whole lot for me to say at half-time - the players did it for themselves. When they're defending like that and you're winning slow ruck ball, there's no point in trying to smash into them all the time. Some times you have to put the ball in behind them, into space."

Kidney intimated that the Munster players, as has often been the case after some of their wins this season, weren't overjoyed about their performance. "We judge ourselves on our results and on our performance, so publicly we'll judge ourselves on our performance," said Kidney, a tad enigmatically.

This suggested that, privately, Munster will be more critical, especially about the unnerving number of missed first-up tackles. Pontypridd are admittedly a decent little young side, who have been relatively unencumbered by the World Cup and so therefore are better drilled than most.

Always alert for the unorthodox quick throw or restart, and using shortened line-outs and committing few numbers to set rucks, they attacked in waves, often breaching the first line of defence through the talented Sweeney or the elusive John Colderley, and but for some last-ditch covering tackles or failure to apply the final pass, would have scored a couple more tries.

Hence, Pontypridd coach Richie Collins was a little down about the final margin, if not the actual outcome. "Their (Munster's) driving line-out was excellent. We struggled to cope with that. Once they got two scores ahead of us, they put the ball in behind us and forced us to play catch up. They thoroughly deserved their victory."

The way Collins sees this tough group, Colomiers could be anything on a given day, while Saracens are very akin to Munster - two games he could see going to the home side. As for Pontyprid, "the main thing is we'll give everybody a game in Sardis Road, I'll assure you of that."

Scoring sequence: 4 mins: Davey pen, 0-3; 7 mins: O'Gara pen, 3-3; 10 mins: O'Gara pen, 6-3; 13 mins: Wyatt try, Davey con, 6-10; 18 mins: O'Gara pen, 9-10; 29 mins: O'Gara drop goal, 1210; 33 mins: Quinlan try, O'Gara con, 19-10; 42 mins: O'Gara pen, 22-10; 66 mins: O'Gara pen 2510; 75 mins: Keane try, O'Gara con, 32-10.

MUNSTER: M Mullins; J Kelly, K Keane, C Mahoney, A Horgan; R O'Gara, P Stringer; P Clohessy, K Wood, J Hayes, M Galwey (capt), J Langford, A Quinlan, A Foley, D Wallace. Replacements: J Staunton for Mahoney (61 mins), M Horan for Clohessy (77 mins), T Tierney for Stringer (77 mins), D O'Callaghan for Galwey (79 mins), E Halvey for Foley (79 mins).

PONTYPRIDD: B Davey; R Greenslade-Jones, J Bryant, J Colderley, G Wyatt; C Sweeney, P John (capt); M Griffiths, F Vinupola, S Cronk, W James, I Gough, G P Lewis, D McIntosh, R Parkes. Replacements: L Jarvis for Sweeney, J Lewis for Bryant, N Tau for Griffiths (all 47 mins), M Lloyd for McIntosh (59-66 mins) and for G P Lewis (69 mins), R Sidoli for Parks (72 mins), G Williams for Vinupola (73 mins).

Referee: B Campsall (England).