Sport never loses its ability to amaze. No matter how much of it you look at. In fact, maybe the more of it you observe, the more confusing it becomes.
How else to explain Manchester United holding Liverpool to a draw? At a time when the form of the two sides was about as polarised as it would be to invite Jamie Bryson to a Ceili.
Yet for whatever reason, as used to be the case when Meath and Dublin collided, the form book goes out the window. To some extent, it very much did so at Anfield also.
Yes, Liverpool yet again kicked Erik ten Hag’s team into a corner – in keeping with the form which had seen Jurgen Klopp’s side thrashed their most ardent rivals 7-0 and 5-0 in two of their most recent meetings.
Contrast that with a version of Manchester United that’s more Sunday League than Champions League and you could understand why Liverpool had been chalked up at 4/11 before kick off. Yet their visitors walked beneath the Anfield sign with a totally deserved split of the spoils.
Now if you switch focus to last weekend’s European Rugby action, to a certain degree, similar sentiments can be applied. For example, there should have been as much chance of Boris Johnson being a party pooper than Connacht getting something from a trip to play Saracens.
To a certain extent of course it can be said they didn’t, but, any time you put 36 points up against a team of Saracens ilk you must be doing something right. The problem arises when the 96 points deposited over the course of two matches in their debit column are taken into account.
The western province are far from alone in having plenty of problems at the minute but a shortage of solutions. Exhibit A being Munster. Leave aside their latest shortcomings in the joust with the arch rivals in the blue corner and, in their matches since, there have been anathema to what seasoned observers will be used to from the province – turnovers coughed up, getting butchered at the set piece and, for me at least, most alarmingly, throwing away winning positions when normally – like the great Meath football teams of the late 1980s and ’90s – par for the course for them would be coming from behind.
Just to be clear, the following is not a criticism of Conor Murray in an overall sense, he is, to my mind, one of the best half backs the game has seen. In fact, in more recent years it would be contended that, more use could, nay should have been given the opportunity to contribute more from either fly half or centre. Certainly in red, quite possibly in green.
However, all of the above cannot distract from the fact that when he came on for the ever-lively Craig Casey the wheels came off the wagon. Only once in nearly 29 years of being properly attuned to all things rugby have I witnessed Munster falling foul of an intercept pass – albeit on the worst possible day for it to occur – against Leinster in Croke Park, so for it to happen twice in one match was wholly disconcerting.
Firstly when Calvin Nash and Shane Daly between them made an absolute horlicks of dealing with a bouncing ball. Thus gifting it to the in rushing Exeter pack who gleefully accepted the gift and duly edged back in front. As one would expect, the men in red did respond as they only know how – by instigating multiple phases of pick and drive before, maybe predictably, with the fuel gauge flashing red, Murray tried one skip pass too many which, upon interception, let the English side skip in for the try which gave them an eight point win. In so doing completing a 19 point turn around.
The upshot of which means that their Champions Cup ambitions hang by the most tenuous of threads. But you know what, a stint in the Challenge Cup mightn’t do Graham Rowntree’s side any harm.
If for no other reason than they would have a damn good chance of winning the thiing out. Which, lest it be forgotten, would be two trophies in two seasons under the former English forward.
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Elsewhere, Leinster will of course still fancy their chances of taking ‘club’ rugby’s top gong again. There’s no reason for them not to. The ease with which Gibson-Park and yet another fly half, Ciaran Frawley, dropped into sync is yet another portrayal of the depth which Leo Cullen has at his disposal, and, moreover, an illustration of how machine-like the 12 county province have become. In that, it would appear to matter not who is sent into battle clad in blue, they all seem to work off the same hymn sheet.
Or at least they do most of the time. However, Cullen is unlikely to be overly enamoured by the fact that, for whatever reason, the engine began to splutter entering the final straight. A diversion from the norm which saw their opponents put 27 points on them before the end.
Obviously they won well and are still in prime position to be major players at the business end of the competition but, knowing the standards which prevail with the Dublin based province, the mood will be one a lot done, more to do.
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