AFTER A MANIC Monday of updates from across the provinces, it was back to business as usual as Munster’s HPC base in Limerick yesterday.
Munster’s season has been sliding towards chaos in recent weeks, but for now, their heads remain above water. Graham Rowntree’s side have won just one from their last six across the URC and Champions Cup and on Monday, Jean Kleyn became the latest Munster man to see his season ended by injury. A few hours later, it was confirmed Joey Carbery will be leaving at the end of the season.
Munster have enough on their plate to be dealing with this week but Carbery’s impending departure presents another problem to solve. After seeing Ben Healy leave for Edinburgh last summer and Jake Flannery opt for a move to Ulster in 2022, a once-stacked out-half depth chart is now looking light.
Jack Crowley has firmly established himself as Munster’s first-choice 10 but beyond the Ireland international, 21-year-old Tony Butler and the uncapped Dylan Hicks (18) are next in line for the shirt.
Munster will likely have to dip into the market to secure a more established replacement for Carbery but attack coach Mike Prendergast says it’s a problem that will have to wait until later in the season.
“It’s professional sport,” Prendergast says. “From my own perspective, I’ve had it in France where squads change a huge amount every year, and that’s a challenge in itself. Here it probably happens less, albeit with the key position of a 10 obviously Ben went to Scotland last year and Joey will go on to play in France next year.
“Yeah, there’s little challenges but there’s excitement behind that as well. I think there’s excitement for Joey from now to the end of the season and you can feel it out there, there’s a spring in his step and it gives us good balance that’s he’s around and I suppose next year will be another year and we’ll see what that brings and who that brings, we don’t know at the moment.
‘He’ll be moving on at the end of the season but you can see he wants to do something before he goes which is great as well. So he brought in new energy (this week).”
Prendergast added that while Munster have known Carbery was planning to leave for a couple of weeks now, the coaches have yet to hold a proper conversation about replacing him for next season.
Genuinely we haven’t even (discussed it), because of this block of games, everything in terms of recruitment etc has taken a back seat at the moment. We’ll just see what’s out there and what we’re allowed bring in.
“Someone like Tony Butler has stood up and got good gametime. I thought he did quite well against Connacht in challenging conditions and he’s played a few other games that he’s done well in. He shows it outside (at training), he’s a very calm guy and I think with the right people and players around him he can definitely grow.
“Like I said, we’ll have those conversations in the next few weeks when things settle a small bit and we can get our head around other stuff as well because it’s just game after game at the moment.”
Munster find themselves in must-win territory this weekend, with the province heading to France to take on Toulon in round three of the Champions Cup, ahead of welcoming Northampton Saints to Limerick a week later.
Following a home draw with Bayonne and defeat at Exeter, Munster find themselves with three points in Pool 3. Saturday’s opponents Toulon are also scrapping for their lives, propping up the pool with just two points.
Munster have been ravaged by injury across the Christmas period but there was an encouraging update after Tuesday’s training session, with Carbery, captain Peter O’Mahony and hooker Niall Scannell all in contention to feature in France. Thursday’s training session will be the decisive day this week, but for now, Munster are optimistic about welcoming some of their senior stars back for the trip to the Stade Felix Mayol.
“Genuinely the likes of Joey Carbery and Peter O’Mahony looked good today, so hopefully things going well those two stick out at the moment,” Prendergast said.
“Niall Scannell trained today as well so hopefully those three. But you could come in on Thursday and it could be a different case. But when we blew the whistle at the end of training today, the three of them looked in good nick. So it will be great to get the three boys back, their experience, great players.
“And just even them being around today, because there has been such a big block of games and so many injuries, we’ve been relying on the same players. So to get three or four players would be huge, especially given their calibre.”
The prognosis is less clear on tighthead Oli Jager, who suffered a head injury in the New Year’s Day defeat at Connacht.
“We’re not sure yet. He’s still going through his protocols, so we’ll see where he’s at on Thursday. We’ll give him up to Thursday and if he’s right, he’s right, and if he’s not the next lads will step up. Genuinely I don’t know with him, in terms of whether he will be (passed fit) or won’t be.”
