Munster will go into next weekend’s quarter-final knowing they have all the cards in their favour as they look to close in on back-to-back titles with home-field advantage.
Their last four victories, starting with a historic first victory at Loftus Versfeld over the Bulls on April 20, have all brought try bonus-points, as did three of the first four.
And though only the home 47-12 derby win over Connacht three weeks later could be characterised as straightforward, attack coach Prendergast has seen the Munster squad reach a new level of consistency, click with ball in hand and, significantly, produce big moments when it really mattered.
Ulster’s challenge will not be taken lightly, particularly given the northern province’s recent uptick in form under new head coach Richie Murphy that has seen them win their last four URC matches, the latest of which was a 23-21 victory at home to Leinster, secured with a late John Cooney penalty at Kingspan Stadium.
Yet it would be a major surprise if Munster did not find a way to continue their own unbeaten run and try-scoring form into next month’s play-offs, given the momentum that has already been gathered in the URC since the turn of the year.
“Yeah, that’s been pleasing,” Prendergast said. “Consistency is a huge thing and we’ve probably shown that. We have got players back that missed mid-season and it raises the bar in terms of competition within a squad. And when the competition is there it brings out the best in performances, generally in a squad, and individually.
“From the attacking point of view it’s been flowing quite good and a lot of it is down I think to our set-piece has been functioning well in terms of our maul. And even in South Africa, we had to play a bit of a different type of game.
“Tactically we looked a small bit different in terms of who to start and the players to make the impact. So tactically we changed up a few little bits and pieces. We kicked a bit more in terms of where we playing, at altitude, and it was nice to come away with bonus-point wins in those games especially.
“Getting back to Thomond Park, where we probably weren’t as happy as we wanted to be in terms of performances, but the evening against Connacht on good, fast ground, we connected in attack and we functioned quite well that night.”
The penultimate round, 29-26 win over Edinburgh a fortnight ago seemed like an important achievement within the group and Prendergast agreed.
“Yeah, Edinburgh was definitely a collective. A big thing over the last couple of weeks, months has been the impact of our bench as well and there has to be a huge focus on that. The game of rugby now is top-end, it’s 80 minutes and there’s 23 players and I think a huge focus needs to be on that. That’s shown over the last number of weeks, of months, we’ve had a big impact from our bench.
“In saying that, Edinburgh was always going to be one of those tough encounters and it worked out that way to the very end. There was big moments that swung it for us. We stuck in there but was it our best performance? Maybe not but in terms of character, the one to 15 doing what they had to do and your bench coming on, I thought was a pleasing aspect.
“Is there stuff that we can improve on from it? Absolutely there is, both sides of the ball and tactically. We’ve spoken about it and fortunately, we’ve had two weeks in the lea- up to this game.”
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