MUNSTER will aim to bounce back from the heavy weekend URC loss at Ulster away to Toulon in the Investec European Champions Cup on Sunday, kick-off 1pm.
Going in at half time trailing just 6-3, hopes were high of a victory on the road for the Reds.
A second-half scoring burst from Ulster, however, simply blew an understrength Munster away, 28-3 (and three tries to nil).
Acknowledged Munster coach Clayton McMillan: “Ulster are a good side and we were just not better than them in the second half. We should have done better, we made too many mistakes and we were just not good enough tonight.”
In fairness, Munster were short of a lot of their senior players and when McMillan had to dig deep into the replacements chest, experience was short.
Now the focus turns to this weekend’s trip to France.
Munster will be encouraged by the French side’s latest outing, an away weekend hammering to Ronan O’Gara’s La Rochelle.
In their Cup opener, Toulon impressed in a 45-34 defeat to Bath at Stade Mayol.
After two rounds, the current pecking order in Pool 2 is: Bath, Castres, Munster (loss at Bath, home win v Gloucester), Toulon, Gloucester and Edinburgh.
In the wake of the happenings in Belfast, this round three outing is a serious challenge for McMillan and his coaching ticket.
Still, there is no reason why all can’t be turned around in a few days’ time.
On Friday, McMillan reflected: “We’ll go away. We’ll reflect on what we can do better. We’ve got a nine-day turnaround now, so we really need to leverage off that to try and find the solutions. We’ve plenty of quality in our team and we’ll bounce back.”
Munster, for whom captain Tadhg Beirne and fellow internationals Craig Casey, Jack Crowley and Tom Farrell are certain returnees, are a tempting 11/2 to win.