Anthony Foley: Munster just didn’t turn up

Dejected Munster head coach Anthony Foley admitted his side just “didn’t turn up at times” as his side exited the Champions Cup with a heavy defeat at Saracens and thus miss out on an accustomed quarter-final spot.

The 33-10 drubbing at Allianz Park means Munster are out of the competition after suffering their heaviest European defeat since losing 60-19 to Toulouse during the 1996-97 season.

Their failure to reach the last-eight, which was confirmed this evening after Clermont’s 22-13 victory against Sale Sharks, is only the second time in the last 17 European campaigns for them to experience such misery.

“It was very disappointing. We didn’t turn up at times,” said Foley.

After suffering home and away defeats against Clermont in December, it was the first time for Munster to be on the receiving end of three successive European losses.

Foley said: “If you look at their scores, they probably started with a big error by us.

“We didn’t fire a shot, particularly early on in such an important game for us with the tournament on the line.”

Centre Denis Hurley’s late try, plus an Ian Keatley conversion and penalty, could not mask Munster deficiencies, as Saracens overpowered them up front and won an overwhelming majority of midfield collisions.

“With a result like that, we don’t get out of our group. We need to address a few things and make sure that we turn up next weekend (against Sale) and put in a performance.

“We were dropping passes, we were passing the ball to fresh air.

“There is a lot of character in the team and a lot of good players. It is just unfortunate that we played like we did today.”