Edinburgh v Munster: Asleep on the job

 I hope dear readers that you appreciate the pain I have put myself through by watching back the game against Munster in order to try and see where we went wrong.

It was painful. It was like watching your dad try to do the egg and spoon race at school sports day and falling on his butt in front of all your friends. It was also educational in the way that you learn how painful a splinter can be if you insert it right under your fingernail. 

I think first and foremost we have to decide if something has gone wrong? It has, fairly obviously, however no more than it does almost every year at this part of the season. Statistically there's not much difference in the rest of the year but here’s some of the autumnal losses.

2017 - Ospreys, Cheetahs

2018 - Zebre, Dragons

2019 - Benetton

2020 - Connacht

2021 - 0

2022 - Benetton

Those are not all the games in this window merely the ones you’d expect/hope to be winning at any time of the year and they are certainly ones you need to win if your league ambitions are anything more than illusory.  

The game against Munster didn’t fall into this category in the strictest sense because we did field a very strong side. It was however a side that had had a couple of weeks off and it showed. It looked very much like a familiarisation session. 

The big picture here is that we do not cope with the disruption that the international windows bring. This is not news and it is unlikely to change. Mike Blair has done his best to incorporate and include everyone in the squad in order that when these periods come round we are better prepared. He has succeeded to a degree with the win against Cardiff at the end of October perhaps being a prime example of that. But, if you need any further evidence that the needs of the national side outstrip those of Edinburgh in almost every way consider this.

After Jamie Ritchie’s try against Munster, Jaco Van Der Walt had the ball and looked like he was on his way to take the kick which was basically just inside the 5 metre line. You won't see this on the TV by the way. The ball was then taken from him by Blair Kinghorn who proceeded to miss the kick. It was a tough kick but I don't think there is anyone out there, not one person, who would consider that Blair was better suited to take it.  

Add into that mix MB’s comments in the post match analysis of the Argentina game about the need to give BK kicking practice weighed up against Boffelli’s superior technique and you can see where that decision has come from. 

Given the way that we failed to turn up in the second half it may have made little difference but it would have given us a 19-7 lead at that point and just may have put that wee bit extra pressure on Munster. It is one thing to give kicking practice to BK for the good of Scotland when you are scoring 8 tries against Benetton but entirely another against a side whom we have only beaten 8 times in our entire history. 

The kicking thing is perhaps a bit of a sideshow to the main shitshow.

What else was awry?

The lineout. I could fathom no plan about when we competed on their line out and when we didn’t. We got pinged once again for closing, which we seem to do almost every game and against a team who have the worst stats for lineouts in the league we struggled to get a success rate of 67%. 

Here’s a question that crossed my mind when looking at this facet. Our first attacking lineout the ball was thrown to Gilco and O’Mahoney pilfered it. Is he always first choice at first attacking lineout? I think he might be and at the very least Munster will know he is the main man and if you were hedging your bets for that 1st lineout what would be your guess?

The scrum. We have an issue at TH. None of WP’s replacements in that berth are anywhere near as good scrummagers as he is and unfortunately WP himself is understandably, not as mobile in the loose as he once was. I expected to see him at the start of the second half and tweeted it at the time but I didn't expect that Schooey would go off at simultaneously. In hindsight though, he had one carry in the whole of that first half and when has that happened before?

He wasn't alone there. Only Jamie Ritchie managed carries in double figures.

Overall it wasn't these technical aspects that were the most disappointing. On a night where we could have laid down a marker for what is arguably the best Edinburgh team of all time we just didn’t look up for it.

I think the Munster try on 52 minutes by Gavin Coombes was a distillation of the way it went. Coombes beat 4 Edinburgh tacklers (loose description) literally on his own. Kinghorn, Lang, Van der Merwe and Venter all being swatted aside like bowling pins.

I didn't see any visible frustration on the night, nor did I see either of our co-captains pulling everyone in and reading the riot act. 

We were passive and allowed Munster to dictate almost every aspect of the game.  

Tom English On the BBC Radio Scotland podcast said that at the end of the game he could see the players smiling. No harm in that but this should have hurt in a way that would be hard to smile through. If it didn’t then we have a bigger problem than merely losing to a side we lose to on a regular basis.

We are in London at the weekend to play Saracens in round 1 of this year's Champions Cup. I don’t care if we win. 

I do care that we show some grit and determination.