I missed the Munster v All Blacks game 30 years ago; I had to choose between using my last day of annual holidays to go to the game or keeping the day, just in case it needed it. I chose badly. I cannot remember what I did when I finally took my holiday, but I certainly know what I didn’t do on October 31st 1978.
This time I took no chances. Once my ticket was secured, the day off was booked. I left Cork at 1.30pm to allow plenty of time for the journey. Even if the car broke down, I was giving myself enough time to finish the trip on foot.
The pre-match publicity suggested that this was a celebratory game. It was to celebrate the opening of the new Thomond Park and the 30th anniversary of Munster’s 1978 win, rather than to be a competitive match. There was even talk of blow out with New Zealand winning handily. This worried me a little until I heard Tony Ward on the radio yesterday morning saying that he thought Munster could win.
I arrived in Limerick at dusk. Former All Black winger, Jonah Lomu was there on Monday to turn on the Christmas streetlights. It is ridiculously early for Christmas lights but I have to admit they added to the atmosphere of the day. There was an air of Christmas Eve about the occasion and Munster shirts and scarves could be seen everywhere.
The traffic was already slow. After the experience of the traffic jams on the night of the Heineken Cup game against Mountauban in October, my travelling party decided it would be best to leave the car on the Cork side of the Shannon. A suitable spot was found near O’Connell Street; the parking meter was fed with coins and we headed off in search of sustenance.
After we were fed, we headed for Thomond Park. We joined the flow of hundreds crossing the River Shannon at six o’clock. The crowd was moving at a brisk pace; there was lots of joking and laughing, some people making arrangements on mobile phones while others were shouting to friends, neighbours or work colleagues they had spotted in the crowd. By the time we turned off the Shelbourne Road and arrived at the stadium, everyone was buzzing with the expectation of seeing a great game.
My group split up according to out tickets. I headed for the West Stand from where I had an excellent view. I was half way up the stand in row z, looking down on the try line. There was about 300 New Zealand fans seated to my left and they brought their brand of excitement to the occasion once the game started.
The official opening of the ground, the singing, the drummers, the Air Corp helicopter arriving with the match ball, the hakas; both the Munster and All Black one and the fireworks all added to the atmosphere. “How in heaven’s name”, I wondered “can the game live up to the expectation.”
It did. It was ‘game on’ from the first whistle. Paul Warwick’s first penalty kick for goal was given the customary “silence for the kicker” by the Munster crowd. The New Zealanders to my left didn’t seem to know of the custom, some of them started to jeer. They were quickly ‘shhhhh-ed’ by the Munster fans. The most of them complied, but one in particular continued to heckle Paul Warwick.
“Shut up ye langer” someone (obviously from Cork) shouted, and even if the noisy Kiwi didn’t understand the terminology, he certainly took on board the sentiment. That was the last we heard of him during penalty kicks for the night.
The tackles were fierce. It did not seem to matter that Munster were short many of their regular first team players. In fact, one of the lessons from last night’s game is that there is no Munster ‘B’ team. Once a man puts on that famous red shirt, he becomes as good and as passionate a player as any man who has worn the jersey before him.
There were times however, when things looked dodgey. The New Zealand out half, Stephen Donald, made a couple of bursts past the flailing arms of Munster tacklers during the first half; these had the crowd holding their breath.
The supporters were singing when Munster led 9-3 but the All Black try in the 23rd minute knocked them off key. We took solace from the fact that Denis Leamy was off the field at the time and Munster were defending with one man short.
In fact, the passage of play that led to the first New Zealand try was one of the few occasions in the game when they looked superior to Munster. This is a testimony to the fact that there were no weak links on the Munster side. Every Munster man was doing his job.
By half-time the hope of a repeat of the1978 win was tangible among the crowd. That hope continued to grow even stronger during the second half. The only doubt was that Munster created no further scoring chances.
Some of the referee’s decisions didn’t help either. A number of the people around me almost went apoplectic at some of his decisions. I did not think he was that bad. It is hard to tell when you are up to 100 metres away from the action, but I think it would be fair to say that Mr Poite refereed the game without sentiment rather than poorly.
About five minutes form the end of the game I noticed several photographers scurrying along the sideline towards the area behind the goal that Munster were defending. It gave me a bad feeling. Photographers have an eye and nose for a dramatic photograph in the same way that rats can sense trouble on a sinking ship. “Why”, I wondered “are they going down there when all the play is at the other end?”
Within a minute I knew the answer. New Zealand broke down field; the ball was worked out to Joe Rokocoko who crashed past Doug Howlett and over the line for the winning try. This happened right in front of the recently settled photographers. Minutes later the final whistle blew and the scoreboard read 18-16 to New Zealand.
People just stood and clapped. They clapped Munster and they clapped New Zealand. It is not often that reality exceeds expectation in sport; last night it did. The result hardly took from the performance on a night when the rich history of Thomond Park merged seamlessly with its pioneering future.
There were no complaints from the crowd as they dispersed into the night. All my party were back at the car by 10pm. We listened to radio sports bulletins as we sped out the Dock Road. An hour and half later I was safely back home in Cork; happy in the knowledge that I had seen a great game and I got out of Limerick a lot easier than New Zealand did.