United Rugby Championship: Stephen Larkham hits back at Munster critics

Munster coach and former Australia fly-half Stephen Larkham has often been notoriously sceptical of media in the past, and Wednesday was no exception.

Larkham labelled criticism of Munster’s playing style and strategy as “misinformed” and “wide of the mark” in a tense exchange with a journalist where he staunchly defended the work with Johann van Graan.

Constructive

Several journalists and former Munster players have been outspoken recently about Munster’s form and style, but Larkham challenged those players, including Donal Lenhihan, Keith Wood, Ronan O’Gara and Tony Ward, to engage in more constructive dialogue.

“When you ask that question and you see some comments like that you’d have to ask what are you seeing in our game at the moment, what do you think is hurting us or not strong enough, What do you feel we are not doing well enough?” responded Larkham to a question about style and an over-reliance on kicking.

“You’ve got to be realistic when you look at our game. We are not the team that kicks the most in our games.

“I know we have been criticised for kicking too much in the past but the stats just don’t add up.

“We feel that we’ve got a very balanced game and play a game that we want to play.

Larkham was also asked about Munster’s apparent poor form in the past month or so, in which the team has scraped to three wins and a defeat.

“You’ve got be more specific in terms of that commentary. There are positive and negative comments. There are parts of those games (recent games against Castres and Connacht) we’re happy with,” he said.

“Some passages haven’t been great and we put our hand up and said we need to be better.

“In others, the referees have made some questionable decisions that have made it very difficult to get a roll on. And then recently we’ve had a couple of really good passages in a couple of really good performances.

“Maybe the score didn’t reflect how well we’ve played in the last couple of games.

“We feel that we when there is an opportunity on the table that we take that opportunity. I think we’ve got a sound game and we are improving.

“I could probably talk to those specific questions but when you talk generally that our game isn’t good enough I think it’s misinformed.”