While the scoreline never lies, it sometimes has a funny way of not telling the truth either. Munster actually played some of the most progressive rugby by an Irish side in this season's European Cup at the Arms Park on Saturday. But an enforced eve-of-match reshuffle, a poor start, a referee who did neither the game nor Munster many favours, missed tackles and a few key errors all combined to leave a curiously unconvincing Cardiff out of reach.

Munster were, to a large degree, very unfortunate, even if they were also authors of their own misfortune. To lose their main line-out jumper (Shane Leahy) was one thing, to lose their thrower (Mark McDermott) through illness 10 minutes before kick-off quite another.

Ultan O'Callaghan moved to the second row and Anthony Foley came in at number eight, but the timing between lifters/jumpers and the replacement hooker Frank Sheahan was out of sync from the start. Munster lost three of their first four line-outs. Munster didn't help themselves, however, by overcomplicating their line-out calls to the middle and the tail.

All of which made their decision to repeatedly kick penalties to touch odd, given they couldn't win their own throw. A rash of early handling errors compounded this, giving Cardiff's beefy pack the first seven put-ins within 10 minutes of the kick-off.

Munster could find no way out of their half into the wind, and no way into the game. Thus, 20-3 down inside 18 minutes a week before, they trailed 12-0 this time after 10 minutes. Poor defensive organisation wide out let Nigel Walker in; missed tackles by Mick Galwey and Alan Quinlan let Steve Wake make the inroads for Jon Humphreys' try.

Gradually Munster brought themselves into the game by running from deep, the outstanding Quinlan, Dominic Crotty and Eddie Halvey igniting them. But they were undone by referee Brian Campsall, who called many things incorrectly and failed to apply advantage. Even the Welsh contingent in the press box agreed that Killian Keane's counter-attacking pass to Anthony Horgan looked flat but, following the clamour of the crowd, Campsall (straight down the pitch on half-way) adjudged it forward.

Walker was sent in for his second try from the ensuing scrum, pulling his hamstring in the process. Lee Jarvis, a bigbooted if ponderous out-half by comparison to main Welsh rival Arwel Thomas, and a dubious choice as Man of the Match, cancelled a second Ronan O'Gara penalty with a prodigious 60metre effort on half-time.

Munster regrouped and applied better tactics. Galwey went to the front of the line and Halvey to the middle. They put together some excellent passages of running rugby - probably the best by an Irish side this season. O'Gara began launching huge Garryowens to expose the dodgy full back Silva and the Tipperary travelling support of seven were rewarded with three second-half tries from their two men.

Quinlan followed up one of O'Gara's up-and-unders into the in-goal area and, when Munster finally moved scrum ball quickly away from the Cardiff back-row through Foley, O'Gara and Crotty, John Lacey cut inside three men to score, later chasing his own grubber kick to add another.

But missed tackles continued to cost them. The video re-run of Wake's try won't make pleasant viewing for O'Callaghan, Lacey and Crotty, nor the first of Steve Williams' brace courtesy of O'Meara's loose pass.

All in all though, "it's not been a bad week for Irish rugby," as the watching Brian Ashton observed. "Two things stand out to me on today's performance. In the firsthalf I could not understand why Munster continually elected to kick for touch from free-kicks and penalties when they lost every line-out. They also proved that when they kept the ball in the field and moved the heavier Cardiff pack around a bit there were holes to be made.

"The second thing was that in the second-half at one point they seemed to spend about 10 minutes in the Cardiff 22 and came away without a score. And Cardiff went straight up the other end and scored seven points. You cannot do that at this level. When you're inside the opposition 22 you must convert territory into points, even if it's only three. Obviously that's something they'll need to work on."

For the second week running, the Irish coach singled out the mighty Quinlan, another parttimer in the shop window who the IRFU/Munster need to make fulltime. So too did Alex Evans, Cardiff's Australian coach.

"They were very dynamic in running from anywhere on the field. The number six and number seven were a handful. The number six had an outstanding game. He certainly busted us a few times today. He runs straight, he runs hard, and he can unload the ball as well. He's got a bit of a future."

It was another day for Munster manager Jerry Holland to rue, lamenting another poor start, silly mistakes and Mr Campsall. "I found some of the decisions by the referee quite incredible," said Holland, who was permitted to talk to the English official during half-time.

"How did you call a forward pass from 30 yards away?" asked Holland. "I had the angle on it to call it and it had nothing to do with the crowd." To which Holland retorted, "I'm glad you mentioned that and not me."

All is not lost for Munster. Far from it with three home games still to come. After seven games, six of them away, Munster finally get to trod the Thomond turf next Saturday for the visit of Bourgoin.

Scoring sequence: 5 mins: Walker try 5-0; 10: Humphreys try, Jarvis con 12-0; 26: O'Gara pen 12-3; 33: Walker try, Jarvis con 19-3; 38: O'Gara pen 19-6; 40: Jarvis pen 22-6; 42: Quinlan try 22-11; 45: Wake try, Jarvis con 2911; 60: Lacey try, O'Gara con 29-18; 62: Williams try 36-18; 72: Williams try, Jarvis con 4318; 77: Lacey try 43-23.

Munster: D Crotty (Garryowen); J Lacey (Shannon), K Keane (Garryowen), R Ellison (Shannon), A Horgan (Cork Constitution); R O'Gara (Cork Constitution), B O'Meara (Cork Constitution); I Murray (Cork Constitution), F Sheahan (Cork Constitution), P Clohessy (Young Munster), M Galwey (Shannon, capt), U O'Callaghan (Cork Constitution), E Halvey (Shannon), A Foley (Shannon), A Quinlan (Shannon). Replacements - G Walsh (Garryowen) for Murray (73 mins).

Cardiff: M Silva; S Hill, L Davies, Gareth Jones, N Walker; L Jarvis, S Wake; A Lewis, J Humphreys (capt), L Mustoe, T Rees, D Jones, G Kacala, S Williams, Gwyn Jones. Replace- ments - E Lewis for Jones, D Young for Mustoe (68 mins), J Hewlett for Wake (74 mins), K Stewart for Williams (78 mins), M Bennett for Gwyn Jones (79 mins).

Referee: B Campsall (England).