Munster v Bourgoin - Pool 4

[An Tarbh]

Munster will be bouyed by their last gasp win at Leicester last Sunday and Bourgoin may have possibly thrown in the towel following their defeat to Cardiff so who knows what to expect in this one, a hammering like the ones we saw on Bourgoin's last 2 trips to Ireland or the home form which has seen them unbeaten for so long at the Pierre Rajon in the Top 14, tough to know. Either way the crowd expects and I don't think this will be the day the Thomond record falls.

 

[An Tarbh]

One enforced change for Munster with Anthony Foley out for 2 months following a shoulder injury picked up at Welford Rd, Alan Quinlan comes into the back row with Leamy moving over to no. 8. Bourgoin make 6 changes to the side which lost to Cardiff, Laloo comes in at full back, Cotzee slots in on the wing while in the pack Milloud, Williams, Del Fava and Rennie come in for Khinchagishvili, Pierre, Fevre and Monzeglio.

Munster: Shaun Payne; John Kelly, Barry Murphy, Trevor Halstead, Ian Dowling; Ronan O'Gara, Peter Stringer; Marcus Horan, Frank Sheahan, John Hayes; Donncha O'Callaghan, Paul O'Connell ©; Alan Quinlan, David Wallace, Denis Leamy.

Replacements: Andy Kyriacou, Federico Pucciariello, Mick O'Driscoll, John O'Sullivan, Toams O'Leary, Jeremy Manning, Lifiemi Mai.

Bourgoin: Sébastien Laloo; David Janin, Gillaume Bousses, Salési Finau, Rudolph Cotzee, Benjamin Boyet, Mike Prendergast; Olivier Milloud, Benoît Cabello, Olivier Sourgens, Carlo Del Fava, Bryce Williams, Augusto Petrilli, Mark Rennie, Julien Bonnaire ©.

Replacements: Jean-Philippe Genevois, Pablo Cardinali, Pascal Peyron, Wessel Jooste, Mickaël Campeggia, Florian Denos, Julien Frier

 

[An Tarbh]

Great start for Munster to the campaign backing up last week's win with the expected 5 points, harder than anticipated though with Bourgoin actually wanting to play, how they couldn't play like that last week though instead of the pedestrian way which they tried to bash away with their forwards against Cardiff.

Good news for Munster though with the form of Barry Murphy, looking so much more sharper and has to be pushing for an Ireland callup soon, but again an outside centre so not much chance and no point in accomodating him elsewhere although I think he might make a better winger than Trimble.