In their first match back at home after the Autumn International series, Edinburgh welcomed Munster to the DAM Health Stadium for their Round 9 match in the 2022 BKT United Rugby Championship.
In what was, in all senses of the phrase, a game of two halves, the home side were up in the faces of the opposition defence right from the off.
A well worked move saw flaker Luke Crosbie pull in two defenders, allowing Edinburgh’s No. 12, Chris Dean to find space for the offload. The centre then found himself with a clear run in to the line for the opening score in the third minute. Blair Kinghorn then slotted the conversion for 7-0.
The game then swung back and forth, with the hosts probably having the upper hand to a degree, with the returning Duhan van der Merwe showing why he was one of the capital’s favourites before leaving for Worcester Warriors.
Edinburgh’s second try came in the 14th minute in the midst of a fairly rare, Munster attack.
Swinging the ball right to left, the final long, looping ‘swing’ landing in the hands of wing, Darcy Graham. With an open field in front of him, 60 metres later, he went over in the corner for his try and 12-0.
Straight from the restart, Munster set Edinburgh hearts aflutter when Munster’s No. 14, Calvin Nash beat everyone to the ball and got his pass away down the line. However, the home defence rallied, and in defending a series of rucks turned the ball over and cleared throught the boot of famed kicker, Jamie Richie!
The visitors weren’t quite done, however, and they were soon back in the home five-metre zone and, this time, came away with the points.
The ball came out of the back of a post-line out ruck, following a series of penalties, to be picked up by scrum half, Craig Casey who took advantage of a bit of confusion in the Edinburgh defence to dive over for their opening points.
With Joey Carbery’s conversion, the score was now 12-7 after 25 minutes.
The rest of the half was all Edinburgh as the home side battered away before Kinghorn put Richie over for the third home try. Kinghorn failed to convert, leaving the score at 17-7 with two minutes left to play.
And it was a ‘two minutes’ to forget as the hosts took their eye off the ball, once again, defending a Munster series of rucks. leaving a huge gap for centre Rory Scannell to fire through and over. Carbery converted again and the sides went in at 17-14.
So, things were looking bright for the home side as the sides match off for the second half, but that brightness was soon extinguished as Munster quickly took control of the game and dominated early proceedings.
Nash scored his second of the evening just two minutes in for, with Carbery’s conversion 17-21, which seemed to precipitate an Edinburgh collapse as a string of penalties and dropped balls gave the visitors an easy time of it and a 52nd minute, converted, try from lock Gavin Coombes took then further away at 1728.
Tony Carbery then put the icing on the cake for Munster with a penalty and an 80th minute try and conversion to leave the final score at 17-38 and a home crowd wondering where it had all gone wrong…
