Munster Defeat Scarlets at the Fortress

Munster ended their losing run defeating the Llanelli Scarlets 19-13 in a hard fought game in front of a good crowd at Thomond Park on Sunday afternoon.

Munster ended their losing run defeating the Llanelli Scarlets 19-13 in a hard fought game in front of a good crowd at Thomond Park on Sunday afternoon.

It took some time for teams to settle down in the wet conditions, but Munsters’ dominance showed in the first try when their forwards controlled a driving maul for 35 metres allowing Alan Quinlan to touch down.

The Scarlets were reduced to 14 men on the half hour when prop John Davies was yellow carded for scrummaging offence, but despite this disadvantage the visitors attacked, Gareth Bowen landing a 40 metre penalty which went in off the cross bar. However his second attempt just a couple of minutes later went wide leaving the score at the turn ‘round 5-3.

The home side came out determined in the second half, and Scarlets had to resort to illegal tactics to stop them. A line out from a penalty for high tackle resulted in Anthony Foley breaking down the middle. The ball passed through the hands of Ronan O’Gara and Anthony Horgan before Christian Cullen went over for Munster’s second try. The third again came from forward power, Cullen this time making the break, and scrum half Peter Stringer setting man of the match Denis Leamy free to touch down.

O’Gara’s conversion stretched the lead to 13 points, but the visitors came back into the match almost immediately, Tal Selley making the initial break which eventually gave full back Garan Evans a try in the far corner.

Well into injury time, Evans then made the break for Mike Philips to score Llanelli Scarlet’s second of the night, and by drawing them back to within 7 points of Munster’s score, earning a losing bonus point.

After the game Scarlets’ coach Gareth Jenkins said: “We came here optimistic, we felt we were in with a chance of getting the result, it was a big ask because this is a famous ground with great tradition and a great team.

Probably in the end we deserved not to win, the result has gone the way of our performance. We showed spirit and defence, we created but didn’t have enough composure and enough of the game to expect the result.”