So... here come the Munster Men (and ladies!)

Our return to the Heineken Cup sees us pooled with Munster, Montauban and ASM Clermont Auvergne, and as Mark Cueto said recently "It is the toughest club competition in the world", and boy have we drawn one heck of a group. Our last HC run saw pitted against Munster at home at the start of the competition, then away in Limerick at Thomond Park at the end. At home we ran out 27-13 winners but the away leg was an entirely different story.

The masses set out for Limerick by almost everyway possible and on the day of the game headed intoLimerick city to start pre-match preparations. Prior to the away game in an un-named pub I decided to have a drink that contains all the important food groups in one go and ordered an Irish Coffee. For those who don’t know the four main food groups involved are sugar, caffeine, fat and alcohol. CE says anything green is suspicious, unless it’s Keith Wood but that’s another fantasy (of hers, shudders at thought).

Anyway, as the day grew on my tummy got to being a bit wobbly and I knew I was heading for Sickyville, I just wasn’t sure of the arrival time. We set off to the ground with throngs of Munster fans and made our way to our gate. The ground was packed, and I mean packed in a way that would make tinned sardines feel like they were back in the Med and that was with over an hour to go until kick off. This didn’t help me at all.

Looking around the ground there were two or three pockets of blue-clad fans – we spotted a few familiar faces surrounded by an ocean of Munster-red shirts, flags and banners and there was no chance of us pulling the Sharks wagons into a circle, or making ourselves heard over the crescendo of noise. To encourage the Munster lot to make even more noise - as if this was needed - they had a lady with a fierce voice on the pitch, and her singing and cries of "Come on ya!" made Delia's tired and emotional "where are you?" seem like a whisper on the breeze. After a bruising encounter Munster came out on top 31-9, Charlie scoring our 9 points via the boot. The silence for the kicker was so intense that I'm sure you could have heard a mouse snoring four streets away. Col and our friends decided to have a greasy burger before we left the ground and I had to stand well away from them as I seemed to be on the last part of the trip to Sickyville.

Despite the result, I think many Sale fans had a mighty fine evening with the generosity of the Munster fans paying for many a round of drinks. Dolans, one of the main Munster fans' pubs rocked until the early hours as fans of both teams helped Arthur Guinness to another record profit. At one point I was dragged from my corner, trembling and grey by CE and Riggers the Missis to “show Niels (de Vos) our new from row!” A person who has barely the energy to shiver isn’t the best choice in this ‘line’ as hooker if the people either side are rat-legged and giggling. A certain person asked if I was okay to which I replied I was not, and he then said “I wonder if I’ve got anything with me you could take?” My answer was “Peter, you are a vet. I think I’ll take my chances as I am”

My illness forced us back to the hotel early (12am) and I went directly to bed, did not pass Go and most certainly not collect a raging hangover like everyone else seemed to do. Mind you, it didn’t stop the mob in the bar carrying on until well past 3:30am. Dirty rotten jammy lot.

Will it be more of the same this year? Oh yes.

Will I have an Irish coffe? Erm, I don’t think so.

Bring it on.

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