The 'brilliant' poetic way Munster have described travelling fans

Such is the appetite for Munster to win a first trophy since 2011, approximately 2,000 of the Irish club’s fans will be in Cape Town for this Saturday’s URC final versus the Stormers.

It’s no mean feat given that it wasn’t until May 13 that the grand final fixture was confirmed to take place in South Africa on the back of Graham Rowntree’s team ambushing the first seed Leinster with a dramatic 16-15 late drop goal win in Dublin.

Before Jack Crowley swung his boot, it was the Stormers who were set to be travelling, heading north for a 2023 final at Aviva Stadium against Leo Cullen’s men. However, a single kick shredded that expectation and for the second season in succession, the much-improved URC has now boiled down to a single 80-minute showpiece at the DHL Stadium.

WATCH as former Munster and Irish stalwart Christiaan Johan Stander unpacks the contrasting styles in the URC Final

WATCH as former Munster and Irish stalwart Christiaan Johan Stander unpacks the contrasting styles in the URC Final

For Munster, qualification for the decider means so much. Not since 2008, when they lifted their second Heineken Cup title in Cardiff, have they reached a European final and the league has been a tale of woe ever since they denied Leinster a 2011 league and European double at Thomond Park.

There have been wounding league final defeats versus Glasgow (2015 in Belfast), Scarlets (2017 in Dublin) and Leinster (2021 back in Dublin), but is their 12-year trophy famine now about to end at a sold-out stadium in Cape Town?

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Munster have 2,000 good reasons to believe so as they won’t be lacking support in the 55,000-capacity crowd, a backing Denis Leamy is most appreciative of. Having thrived in the back row during the glory years, he knows damn well what the roars of approval from the stands can do for a team. Coming to the end of his first year on Rowntree’s coaching staff, that rapport with the fans from his playing days is seen as being just important now that he is an assistant coach.

“I’m being told it’s more like 2,000 Munster fans, which is fantastic,” he said from Cape Town when asked about the level of matchday support the team will have on the ground in South Africa. “It’s incredible that we have that much travelling support from Munster fans from all over the world.

“We talk about it all the time, it just goes without saying, they will travel from Australia, America, Middle East, from Ireland and England, and it’s just fantastic that we will have that number of fans there.

“Ah look, it is brilliant to go on the road and come to a place like this. You want to give people like that, who have travelled out, a performance. Obviously, we want to perform for ourselves and everyone that is back home. That goes without saying. That’s part of being in the Munster environment.

“The whole Munster region and beyond, the diaspora means an awful lot to us. We are very conscious of what we represent, both in the present and in the past.”