O'Donnell: 'Style of Munster's Maori tries a throwback to '78'

VICTORIOUS Munster captain Tommy O’Donnell believed the manner in which they scored several of their tries against the Maoris on Friday was a throwback to the province’s famous win over the All-Blacks in 1978.

Munster outscored the Maoris by four tries to two before a sell-out attendance to seal a third ever win for the province over a touring side at Thomond Park.

O’Donnell, who was captaining Munster for the first time said: "The hack throughs and the way we chased, it was a throw-back to the old Munster team of 1978 - chasing like wild men. Fair play to everyone, they did incredibly well.

"I am extremely proud. That is just incredible, the performance the lads gave out there and the support from the fans, it's just incredible. 

"After coming up short in 2008 against the All-Blacks, the belief out of the side today was incredible. When it did get tough in the second half there, we pushed on and got another try. 

"It was just outstanding out of everyone. 

"The Irish boys proved last week that if you are going to beat new Zealand teams you are going to have to score tries and outscore them, you cannot hope to out last them. It was the manner in which we went about scoring them, we were really dogged.

"We came in under the posts after we conceded the second of the two tries to them. We knew exactly what we did wrong. That is where we are building momentum over the past few weeks, we are not panicking.”