That sole backline change sees Simon Zebo slot into the left wing berth at the expense of Denis Hurley who picked up a slight hamstring injury last Saturday while in the front row, Tony McGahan by and large, just reverses the order from last weekend, with Wian du Preez, Damien Varley and John Hayes starting on this occasion ahead of Marcus Horan and Stephen Archer.

Mike Sherry misses out with a shoulder knock sustained against Dragons.

Following their defeat in Ravenhill, Lineen was keen to accentuate the positives although bemoaning the fact that their usually reliable line-out didn't function while admitting they may have been the architects of their own downfall giving away two intercept tries.

McGahan for his part expressed his pleasure with his side's first half performance but can have been none too pleased with a second half that saw Munster at one stage reduced to thirteen after Damien Varley was yellow carded, Peter O'Mahony already in the bin, Lifeimi Mafi not long back on before the skipper took his place.

"We had three (cards) against London Irish the week before and we had three against Dragons. Clearly not good enough. he said."

Nor was he using the referee's relative inexperience as an excuse for his players. "Not at all. We need to cop on to that regardless of the referee's interpretation. There will be some 50/50 calls. Same for both sides. But we saw retaliation, repeated penalties, high tackles. That's not what we're about. We need to address that."

What must have pleased him though was the rear-guard action Munster mounted in that period that saw the visitors restricted to just two penalties. He will look for more of the same tomorrow in a fixture that has always been one of the most difficult of the season.

Munster: J Murphy; D Howlett, D Barnes, L Mafi, S Zebo; I Keatley, P Stringer; W du Preez, D Varley, J Hayes; B Holland, M O'Driscoll; P O'Mahony capt, N Ronan, J Coughlan. Replacements: D Fogarty, M Horan, S Archer, D Foley, T O'Donnell, D Williams, S Deasy, T Gleeson.