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Munster beat Gloucester to secure semi-final place

05/04/2008

Munster secured their place in the Heineken Cup semi-finals with a well-deserved 16-3 win over Gloucester at Kingsholm today.

Wingers Ian Dowling and Doug Howlett scored a try each for Munster to secure the win, but the Irish side's defence also deserve a lot of credit for the way they nullified Gloucester's attacking threat.

The home side looked good with ball in hand but the kicking of Chris Paterson let them down badly. The Scottish international missed three vital penalty opportunities which he usually would have expected to convert.

Paterson, who has converted a remarkable 33 kicks at goal for Scotland, should have given his side the lead within the first ten seconds, but he hooked a 30-yard penalty wide.

Gloucester wasted another penalty through Paterson, before Ronan O'Gara gave Munster the lead after 12 minutes with a penalty after Carlos Nieto was sin-binned for not rolling away at a ruck.

Munster scored their first try on the stroke of half-time thanks to great work from Howlett.

The winger unleashed a blistering run from inside his own 22 and although he didn't score the try himself, Howlett passed the ball to Dowling to crossover. O'Gara failed to add the conversion but his team still had an 8-0 half-time lead.

Gloucester boss Dean Ryan brought on Mike Tindall and Gareth Delve in the second-half and had Nieto back form the sin-bin. But Nieto again infringed in a ruck and gave away a penalty and O'Gara added three more points.

Munster all but ended the game with another try soon after and Howlett was once again the star. The New Zealand legend got hold of the ball in midfield and made 20 yards before passing the ball to Denis Hurley who kicked the ball towards the try-line and it was Howlett who raced through to score.

O'Gara missed the conversion attempt - but it did not really matter as all Gloucester could manage was a consolation penalty from Ryan Lamb.