Healy on a high after Munster’s URC success

By Shane Brophy

Ben Healy is basking in the glow of ending his time with Munster in the best way possible after winning the United Rugby Championship title with victory over the Stormers in Cape Town, South Africa on Saturday evening.

The 23-year-old Kilruane native came off the bench in the 62nd minute when Munster trailed 14-12 and helped his side recover, with the help of a John Hodnett try, to a 19-14 victory and a first piece of silverware for Munster since the 2011 Magners League.

“To be honest it hasn’t really sunk in yet, even with the home-coming which was amazing and seeing so many people turn out,” he said.

“Who knows how long it will take before we realise what we actually achieved.”

The turnaround in Munster fortunes in recent weeks has been incredible as after their heavy loss to the Sharks in the Champions Cup last 16 and a defeat at home to Glasgow in the URC, Munster looked a long way from title winners but the three trips to South Africa over the last two months were key according to Healy.

He revealed: “After the Sharks European game in South Africa when we came home and had to go back to play the Sharks and the Stormers (in the URC), we made a decision not to complain or tap put but to drive on and go to another level and in those two games we won one and drew one. A lot clicked for us there and a lot of belief came from those games.”

From there Munster went onto the road to Glasgow and Leinster for the quarter and semi-finals respectively before returning to South Africa for last Saturday’s final in front of a partisan 55,000 crowd, many of whom travelled from Tipperary to support Healy along with New Inn’s Diarmuid Barron and Boherlahan’s Denis Leamy.

“I am very proud to be a Kilruane man, a Nenagh man, a Tipp man, and a Munster man,” he added.

“I have been blessed to have so many people supporting me. North Tipp is sports mad, so it was great to have so many people row in behind me and travel to South Africa, not just once, twice, but three times in the last eight weeks.

“I definitely recognise how much the supporters are behind us as a team and me personally from Nenagh and North Tipp.”

“As Graham (Rowntree) said, it is unprecedented what we have done in terms of the last six games, all being away from home, playing teams higher up the table, but we turned it into a positive in that we were all together and battle-hardened going into someone else’s backyard and who were relatively comfortable playing at home.”

When it was confirmed last January that Ben would be leaving Munster at the end of the season to move to Edinburgh, many thought he would slip down the pecking order with the management focusing on Jack Crowley and Joey Carbery, but Healy has gone to a new level since then and has been an ever-present on match-days.

“Since my decision, it would have been easy to say I have a few months left with Munster and I’ll tip away with my mind drifting towards playing with Edinburgh but my mindset for very much that I want to win something before I leave,” he said.

“I definitely believed it was possible, even at the time when it didn’t look likely. It gave me extra motivation to take my game to the next level.

“I have said to myself that I should move club every year because it gives you a motivation that when you put a timeline on something, it is incredible what it does to your subconscious in terms of finding new things and new ways to get things done.”

Ben and his teammates are still enjoying the buzz of their URC title success, but he doesn’t have too much time off before he has to head to Edinburgh after he was included in the Scotland World Cup training camp which begins next month.

“I have two weeks off now and straight into camp in Edinburgh,” he revealed.

“That is what my next few weeks looks like, so I have to make sure to get some down time over the next few weeks and then all guns blazing hopefully for the World Cup.”