Munster 13 Ospreys 9: As an advertisement for the Celtic League, this top-of-the-table meeting deserved better than this. An 8.05 kick-off, at the behest of TV, a week before Christmas, played under an unrelenting downpour, was hardly designed to show the competition in its best light.
A Musgrave Park crowd of 3,000 was actually a decent enough turn-out in the least spectator-friendly conditions one could imagine. And they got about as much as they could have hoped for, a tetchy, error-strewn yet wholly committed affair in which the home side, or more pertinently the home pack, rolled up their sleeves and got down and dirty enough to maul over the line and ground the ball once for a decisive, match-winning try.
The Ospreys hung in grimly to deserve their bonus point and thus stay above Munster on points' difference; a satisfactory position for Munster considering they were 10 points and eight places behind the Ospreys after just three win-less rounds - at which point, Alan Gaffney reminded us on Saturday night, you could have backed Munster at 20 to 1 to win the league.
Predictably, there was a post-Euro fallout here ("we just weren't fully there this week," Gaffney admitted) but what will have given him particular satisfaction is that he managed to rest virtually the spine of his pack in John Hayes, Paul O'Connell and Anthony Foley.
"People need rest and Hayes and Axel (Foley) were delighted to have that week's rest," said Gaffney. "And for John to be on the farm today and just potter around was just a delight for him."
Gaffney will endeavour to rest more of the frontliners against Connacht next Monday in Galway "and that's not treating Connacht lightly", and perhaps others for the sell-out here in Cork against Leinster on New Year's Day "to make sure everyone is refreshed when we come back into Europe."
The return of three of Munster's main men, and the switch to a packed Thomond Park, ought to strengthen Munster's hand considerably for the fourth instalment this season of this growing feud between the two sides in three weeks' time.
"There's a lot of history there but it's a very competitive history. I know there was some hanky panky at the Gnoll but we've put those issues away. They're dead and buried. We've got to move on from there," maintained Gaffney.
The Ospreys will hope to have Stefan Terblanche, Brett Cockbain and Barry Williams back for that game. But in addition to Richard Mustoe - the fringe winger who will still be serving a 12-week suspension for stamping on Marcus Horan at the Gnoll in the European Cup at the end of October - the Welsh side are likely to be without the far more influential back rower Ryan Jones.
Adding to the bad blood between the sides - almost an inevitable consequence of meeting four times in four months - Jones was sent off by Scottish referee Iain Ramage in the 38th minute for stamping on the head of Donncha O'Callaghan. "He'll get a kick up his arse for that," admitted an unsympathetic Lynn Jones, the Ospreys coach.
Jones possibly had a point when suggesting that his team's relative familiarity with Munster will be a help rather than a hindrance.
"I think we know each other's games inside out. January doesn't hold any demons for us, as such. We've got to come over, we're playing well," said Jones, who admitted he expected the crowd "to be a bit louder, the pitch a bit wider, but we all know what Munster's strengths and weaknesses are."
When asked what additional information he learnt about Munster, Jones commented: "The fact that they are not infallible. They are not God's gift to rugby, they're just human beings like everybody else and they get things wrong if you apply a bit of pressure. Munster have had a good run in Europe and I'm sure they're desperate to do it this year but it's all to play for."
That may be, but more grist to the mill? The conditions, more suitable for ducks than rugby players, negated Munster's numerical advantage to some extent for it was impossible to move it wide through the hands. Their scrum went well and after a huge hit by Denis Leamy on Elvis Seveali'i earned a penalty for not releasing (and pointedly several Munster players rushed to the breakdown) it was scrum pressure that enabled Ronan O'Gara to open the scoring.
However, the lineouts were a lottery and Munster's actually came off much the worse, thus denying them a decent platform. The golden booted Gavin Henson clearly antagonised his opponents occasionally but there's no doubt that this gifted player is on top of his game now. Here he adapted well to the conditions, kicking with alacrity out of hand and landing three penalties to give his disadvantaged side a 9-3 buffer entering a backs-to-the-wall last half hour.
A huge diagonal touch find by O'Gara awoke Munster, followed by a penalty from their captain on the night. Munster then went for the jugular, but when the Ospreys' seven-man pack broke and wheeled off a Munster put-in, even though the home pack scrummaged square and straight, Ramage bizarrely gave the visiting side the ensuing put-in.
In any event, the Munster pack came again and when Frankie Sheahan located Alan Quinlan at the tail, the hooker was then at the fulcrum of the sustained drive which followed. O'Gara's conversion gave Munster sufficient breathing space to ensure a comfortable enough win. Hard-earned wasn't the half of it.
SCORING SEQUENCE: 11 mins: O'Gara pen, 3-0; 13 mins: Henson pen, 3-3; 34 mins: Henson pen, 3-6; half-time: 3-6; 46 mins: Henson pen, 3-9; 51 mins: O'Gara pen, 6-9; 69 mins: Sheahan try, O'Gara con, 13-9.
MUNSTER: C Cullen; S Payne, M Mullins, R Henderson, P Devlin; R O'Gara (capt), P Stringer; M Horan, F Sheahan, G McIlwham, D O'Callaghan, T Bowman, A Quinlan, J Williams, D Leamy. Replacements: T Hogan for Bowman (64 mins).
NEATH/SWANSEA OSPREYS: A Durston; E Seveali'I, S Parker, G Henson, S Williams; M Jones, J Spice; P James, R Hibbard, A Jones, A Newman, J Thomas, J Bater (capt), S Tandy, R Jones. Replacements: C Wells for Hibbard (62 mins), A Millward for A Jones (68 mins), B Cockbain for Newman (73 mins), R Pugh for Tandy (77 mins), A Lloyd for Bater (83 mins). Sent-off: R Jones (38 mins).
Referee: Iain Ramage (Scotland).
