In what's been a tumultuous start to the season for Munster they have a chance to give it the kickstart they need tonight as they host an All Blacks XV at Thomond Park.
Munster obviously have a long and illustrious history of facing the All Blacks which has provided Irish rugby with some of its most iconic moments.
In what is another massive event for Munster it will also mark the first match since Graham Rowntree left the province on Tuesday. The former England International had been a part of the province's coaching ticket since 2019 and Head Coach since 2022, in which time he won the URC in his first season and finished top of the URC regular season during his second.
However Munster have endured a rough start to their campaign, losing four out of their first six matches, including defeats to Leinster, Zebre and two defeats to the Sharks and Stormers during their tour to South Africa, with Rowntree departing upon return to Ireland.
Diarmuid Barron Gives Interesting Insight Into Graham Rowntree's Departure
The decision from Munster and the IRFU to part ways with Graham Rowntree was a surprise to pretty much everyone in the rugby world, including Munster hooker Diarmuid Barron.
The Cashel man, who will captain Munster in their match against All Blacks XV broke through into the Munster first team during Rowntree's time on the coaching ticket and was handed the captaincy on multiple occasions across his two years as Head Coach.
Speaking in a press conference ahead of the clash with the All Blacks XV, Barron detailed how the players found out about the change in Head Coach and how training has been in the week since with Ian Costello taking temporary charge.
I definitely didn’t see it coming to be honest, we were told just before it was released to the media. It was strange, obviously a bit of shock around it, but we have got a pretty big task on our hands Saturday, so we couldn’t dwell on it, we had to drive forward.
That is the way it has been so far the last couple of days, we have trained, we’ve got a task and we have to get stuck into that and look forward, maybe deal with things in a week’s time or a few days after, but the magnitude of the game we have on Saturday, that is what we have been focusing on.
It's hard to predict what lies ahead for the rest of this season for Munster, with no one standing out as an obvious or an available candidate at this time.
However one thing you can't doubt is Munster's resilience, whenever the cards seem to be against them they are able to come out the other side and a strong outing against the All Blacks XV could give them momentum going into the International break.
