Munster Rugby were on the receiving end of the biggest upset thus far in the BKT United Rugby Championship as they fell to Italian side Zebre 42 -33.
Zebre were full value for their win with scrumhalf Alessandro Fusco shredding Munster around the ruck for two tries.
Despite putting themselves in position to steal a result, Munster would see their comeback fall flat with a late concession of a penalty which denied them a second losing bonus point.
The result shocked just about everyone and led to heavy criticism from all corners, with former Munster lock Donnacha O’Callaghan voicing his concerns in particular.
O’Callaghan, a cornerstone of the Munster sides that won the Heineken Cup in 2006 and 2008, labelled the result ’embarrassing’ when breaking down the match for RTE sport. Without detracting from Zebre’s performance, the 45-year-old explained that there were warning signs for Munster in their round one victory over Connacht.
“You don’t want to take away from the fact that Zebre were full quality for it but it was totally unacceptable from Munster.
“Their performance, as individuals, as a team, to go on the road, we know what Zebre are. They were bottom of the league last year, of course they have shoots to come about.
“But Munster’s performance there was completely unacceptable.
“The amount of errors, the amount of poor performances, the amount of individual sloppy mistakes was just totally unacceptable,” he said.
“It is great for our league, it is brilliant to see Zebre coming on but Munster will look back on that and they should be embarrassed with that performance.
“There were warning signs from last week, that Munster defence, be it individually, they need to figure out a way to get organised quicker. It’s as simple as that.
“We saw last week, players looking in, players not being set. (Donncha) and I were talking about it during the game. As a defence coach, if a team passes the ball five times to the edge and scores in the corner, it’s not ideal but you can probably live with it.
“If you’re a team that believes you can win trophies, it’s just not good enough.” O’Callaghan concluded.
Responding to the criticism, Munster’s defence coach Denis Leamy who was a teammate of O’Callaghan’s throughout the Munster glory days did not shy away from the issues. When asked about the comments, Leamy said he had seen what was said and was in full agreement with his good friend’s assessment.
“I saw Donncha’s comments. Someone said that he’d had a go and I specifically went home and watched it.
“Donncha was completely on the money. I know Donncha since I was 18. I’ve nothing but respect for him. He was like a brother to me when we played together. Donncha O’Callaghan said nothing that we don’t know, that the players don’t know, that we didn’t feel.
“Does it hurt? I think the hurt comes from how we were on Saturday. We want to remember the legacy that people like Donncha created here and we want to build on that. And when someone like Donncha honestly calls out our actions at the weekend, you put your hands up and you say, ‘we have to do better, it wasn’t good enough’.
“We’re not going to step away from that, either. Donncha O’Callaghan will always be a legend here and he said nothing on Saturday that we didn’t say ourselves.”
Munster Rugby defence coach Denis Leamy offered a clear breakdown of where he saw things go wrong for his team in their shock loss to Zebre in round two of the BKT United Rugby Championship 🇮🇪🏉#UnitedRugbyChampionship #MunsterRugby #IrishRugby pic.twitter.com/uBbtdrnIPt
— FloRugby (@FloRugby) October 2, 2024
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