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'Looking at their body language, I questioned whether they were shot' - Rob Baxter
Exeter director of rugby Rob Baxter feels his side showed “massive character” in overturning a nine-point deficit to defeat Munster 32-24 and post a second narrow Champions Cup success in as many weeks.
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The hosts were comfortably second best after 65 minutes, trailing 24-13, with the visitors having outscored them by four tries to one at Sandy Park.
However, two tries in two minutes turned the game on its head with Henry Slade’s last-gasp interception try robbing Munster of a losing bonus point, which puts in jeopardy their hopes of qualifying for the next round of the competition.
Dan Frost, Jack Dunne and Ross Vintcent and Slade scored Exeter’s tries, with Slade converting three and adding two penalties.
Tom Ahern, Calvin Nash, Antoine Frisch and Shane Daly scored Munster’s tries, with Jack Crowley kicking two conversions.
Baxter said: “When they scored just after half-time, I looked at our players behind the posts and looking at their body language, I questioned whether they were shot, but they went on to show massive character.
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“We had to stay in the fight and take our opportunities as Munster have great tradition and were here to win.
“They adopted a great attacking policy and it nearly succeeded in beating us.
“We defended the rucks too compactly as we had four men within inches of it defending nothing and our backs didn’t defend with sufficient width.
“We took too long to work that out but we succeeded in doing that by the second half when we also elected to kick more.
“We took three points to stay in contention and then took our chances to win the game.”
Slade kicked the match-winning conversion last weekend to give Exeter a 19-18 win at Toulon, and once again Slade was the hero with a match tally of 17 points.
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“He’s just loving it and he’s training like a young man and playing like he was when he was first called up by England,” Baxter said of the 30-year-old.
It was a different story in the Munster camp, who were on the wrong end of a number of refereeing calls.
Harvey Skinner was perhaps fortunate to escape a yellow card for a high challenge on Crowley while it took endless TMO replays before Slade’s try was awarded.
Comments on RugbyPass
“While Sotutu should start at No.8 for the All Blacks against England, but it’s only in that arena that he can prove just how good he really is.” And that my friends is where simply hasnt shone despite multiple opportunities. Even in this performance you can see what did him in in the test arena..he almost always still runs at the opposition almost ramrod upright making him easier to stop than it should be.
1 Go to commentsShould have been 0-0 and a message from SR CEO to both teams - “don’t worry about turning up next year”.
3 Go to commentsGreat work Owen Franks. A great of this team, scoring his first try for the Crusaders since 2010.He was beaming, justifiably. A fine win, he and the rest did the job up front.
1 Go to commentsDanny Care. Lang in die tand.
1 Go to commentsBig empty stadium does nothing for atmosphere but munster are playing well with solid performance
1 Go to commentsYes, Fiji can win the World Cup! With that belief plus their christian faith🙏 and hard work it is achievable. Great article. Ian Duncan Fiji resident 1981-84
2 Go to commentsInteresting comments about Touch. England’s hosting the Touch World Cup this year and the numbers have exploded since their last World Cup in 2019, something like 70% more teams and 40 nations taking part. And England Touch have made a big thing about how many universities are in their BUCS University Touch Championship as well as Sport England membership. Can only see this growing even more domestically as more people become aware of it
10 Go to comments“Cortez Ratima is light years ahead of anyone on current form, while TJ Perenara has also skyrocketed into contention following the unfortunate injury to the talented Cam Roigard.” At last some sanity. Hitherto so many pundits have been wittering on about Finlay Christie to the point one wondered if they were observing a FC in a parallel universe where the FC they saw wasnt just the mediocre Shayne Philpott project of Fosters hapless AB reign in the real world. Ratima, Perenara and Fakatava are the ONLY logical 9s for Razor now Roigard is crocked.
3 Go to commentsThis game was just as painful as the Hurricanes game. It was real fork-in-the-eye stuff.
3 Go to commentsNow if they could just fire the Crusaders ground PA guy who likes to play his dance music and just loves the sound of his own voice the entire game, even when play is going on. And I thought their brass band thing of a few years ago was bad.
5 Go to commentsUnfortunately when you lose by far the two form players this season in Roigard and Aumua, you're left replacing two game changing Tanks with a couple of pea-shooters. Which is also about the speed of TJs pass.
4 Go to commentsBit rich coming from the guy with zero loyalty to anyone or any team, including happily taking a players place in a league world cup squad because well, SBW wanted to play in it and thus an already named player got told he was no longer going. And airing stuff like this, which may or may not be true, doesn't exactly say you're a stand up guy either SBW. Just looking to keep his name in lights as usual.
38 Go to commentsTamati Tua. …the Taniwha NPC midfielder. Ollie Sapsford, Hawkes Bay NPC midfielder…doing well
4 Go to commentsFiji deserve to be in the rugby championship, fans love seeing the Fijian national team play, the Fijian Drua is a wonderful idea but the players can still be stolen to play for NZ and AUS…
2 Go to commentsThe first concern for this afternoon are wheather forecast…
1 Go to commentsWhy cant I watch Rugby games please?
1 Go to commentsBeautiful shot from Finau, end of story. Gutted for Shaun Stevenson though.
4 Go to commentsThe Chiefs definitely didn’t win ugly. They had the superior scrum, a dominant lineout, and their defence was excellent once the Waratahs scored their two tries (thanks to some lucky refereeing calls mind you). They put pressure on the Waratahs lineout throughout the game, and the mind boggles as to why the referee did not award a yellow card or a penalty try against the Waratahs for repeated scrum infringements on their own try line before Narawa’s first try. And the Chiefs were slick with their passing and running angles on attack. It was a dominant performance all round, even with many questionable refereeing decisions.
1 Go to commentsWasnt late. Ref 2 assistants andTMO all saw it so who are you to say it was?
4 Go to commentsAre the Brumbies playing the Blues twice in a row?
4 Go to comments