How gritty Glasgow Warriors reached another final as Franco Smith singles out two star men

Strength in adversity has been the Glasgow trademark since Franco Smith took over and they showed it in spades in Limerick to dethrone Munster and book their place in the United Rugby Championship final.

It’s South Africa next for Smith’s band of Warriors and a return to Loftus Versfeld where they will meet the Vodacom Bulls in the showpiece next Saturday at 5pm BST. A new name will be engraved on the URC trophy after Glasgow defeated Munster 17-10 in a gripping contest at Thomond Park, while the Bulls edged out Leinster 25-20 in Pretoria. 

Smith’s side fully deserve their place in the final. The outscored the hosts by two tries to one, produced a stirring defensive performance and overcame the handicap of having both Richie Gray and Matt Fagerson yellow-carded in the first half. There was needle and niggle, as is customary when these sides meet, but Glasgow recovered from a sticky start and scored a try in each half, through Kyle Steyn and Sebastian Cancelliere.

They grew into the game and were the better team after the interval, with Sione Tuipulotu, Tom Jordan and Jack Dempsey in particular producing stand-out performances. Munster had centre Alex Nankivell sent off near the end for a reckless lunge at George Horne and Thomond was silenced at full-time.

Smith, who took over in summer 2022, has now guided Glasgow to finals in each season he’s been in charge. If they are to win against the Bulls, they are going to have to do it the hard way but the coach was full of praise for his players and his assistant Pete Murchie, Glasgow’s defence specialist.

Glasgow Warriors' Sebastian Cancelliere celebrates after scoring his side's second try with Rory Darge and George Horne. | Ben Brady/INPHO/Shutterstock

“Because I'm attack-minded, sometimes people think we're all about attack but there is a lot of work that goes in [to our defence] and Pete Murchie is doing a great job and I'm very excited that we showed that without the ball we can be just as effective,” said Smith.

“I always believe in the saying that attack puts you in a position to win finals but defence wins finals so it was important for us to front up physically. The belief we created through that allowed us to back it up with some good ball-skill opportunities that were there.”

Jordan, the Glasgow stand-off, was also singled out for praise. “He reminds me a lot of myself when I played,” said Smith. “I never knew if I was a 10 or a 12 so that’s maybe why we favour him at the moment. He applies himself physically, he's a good communicator and I appreciate that he played really well tonight.”

Munster, the defending URC champions, had won 10 in a row going into the semi-final and Glasgow did not make the best of starts. They quickly got on the wrong side of referee Andrea Piardi, conceding five penalties in the opening ten minutes, and the Italian official felt sufficiently concerned to speak with Kyle Steyn, the Warriors captain. The warning was not heeded and Gray was shown the yellow card for straying offside as Munster piled on the pressure. Jack Crowley, who missed a simple penalty opportunity from 31 metres after three minutes, made no mistake this time and slotted the first points of the match.

In truth, it wasn’t the worst outcome for the visitors who had been under the pump in the opening skirmishes, apart from one surging run from Tuipulotu which took to within a metre of the Munster line.

Franco Smith had warned his players not to get drawn into niggles with the opposition but there were flashpoints between Matt Fagerson and Peter O’Mahony and the former became the second Warriors player to be sin-binned, just before the break.

Kyle Steyn bursts clear to score Warriors' opening try. | Dan Sheridan/INPHO/Shutterstock

But before that Glasgow had taken a shock lead with a try from out of the blue. The first half was 23 minutes old when Alex Nankivell fumbled a pass from his centre partner Antoine Frisch in midfield. Steyn seized on it and no-one could get near him as he ran in the score. Horne converted to make it 7-3 to the Scots.

Gray and Scott Cummings were making their presence felt in the lineout and Munster and they too weren’t slow in getting the face of O’Mahony. Smith had spoken of his admiration for the great Irish flanker pre-match, but Matt Fagerson is no respecter of reputations and when he tackled him out on the far touchline his swinging arm caught O’Mahony.

The home crowd didn’t like it and neither did Piardi who flashed yellow for the second time in the half. In mitigation, O’Mahony had been dropping down when Fagerson hit him.

It had been a frantic first half and although Munster had dominated possession (64 to 36 per cent), Glasgow had shown glimpses of their attacking intent, with Josh McKay and Sebastian Cancelliere prepared to run from deep.

The visitors may have been down to 14 men but you wouldn’t have known it from the way they started the second half. They built the phases, pushing Munster further back towards their own line and were rewarded with a penalty when John Hodnett came in from the side. Horne went for goal from 42 metres but the wind dragged it wide.

There was no need for too much angst because Glasgow scored a brilliant try from the restart. Jordan fielded the kick and ran from deep. He passed it to Darge who shipped it on to Huw Jones who produced a devastating burst of pace to leave the red jerseys in his wake before flicking it out to Cancelliere and no-one was going to catch the Argentine. Horne, judging the wind to perfection this time, kicked the conversion to put Glasgow 14-3 ahead. 

Franco Smith has guided Glasgow Warriors to another final. | SNS Group

Munster needed a quick route back into the game and they got it. RG Snyman, surprisingly left out of their starting team, was involved, as was Jeremy Loughman who played it for Antoine Frisch to score in the corner. Crowley’s conversion reduced the lead to four points with more than 20 minutes remaining.

It was time for Glasgow to dig deep and that’s exactly what they did. Their defensive excellence was frustrating the champions who were warned by Piardi. Worse was to follow when Nankivell charged into Horne at the base of the scrum, catching the No 9 high and sending him flying. It was reckless from the Munster centre who had come in from the side and he was shown the red-card. Horne dusted himself down and kicked the resultant penalty to make it 17-10 with five minutes to go.

Munster had one last chance, winning a penalty, kicking to the corner and launching their final attack off a lineout. But John Ryan dropped the ball out the back from Snyman and Glasgow ran down the clock from the subsequent scrum before kicking the ball dead for a famous victory.

Scorers: Munster: Try: Frisch. Con: Crowley. Pen: Crowley.

Glasgow Warriors: Tries: Steyn, Canelliere. Cons: Horne 2. Pen: Horne.

Red cards: Nankivell (Munster, 73min). Yellow cards: Gray (Glasgow, 11min), M Fagerson (Glasgow, 39min)

Munster: M Haley; S Daly, A Frisch, A Nankivell (S O’Brien 46-50), S Zebo (O’Brien 61); J Crowley, C Casey (C Murray 57); J Loughman (J Ryan 66), N Scannell (D Barron 45), S Archer (O Jager 45), F Wycherley (RG Snyman 45), T Beirne, P O'Mahony, J Hodnett (A Kendellen 72), J O'Donoghue (G Coombes 54). 

Glasgow Warriors: J McKay; S Cancelliere (J Dobie 57), H Jones, S Tuipulotu, K Steyn; T Jordan, G Horne; J Bhatti (O Kebble 70), J Matthews (G Turner 57), Z Fagerson, S Cummings, Richie Gray (M Williamson 57), M Fagerson (E Ferrie 60-70), R Darge (H Venter 57), J Dempsey.  Replacements: M Walker, R Thompson.

Referee: Andrea Piardi (FIR).