MUNSTER COACH GRAHAM Rowntree was typically upbeat after his team was outplayed 41-24 by a Springbok-laden team in Durban and he is certain that the United Rugby Championship is not dead and buried after a poor start to the tournament.

“It is October, we have been in this situation before and come back and we will do our best to fix what we can and work our way back up the table,” the coach said.

“It is not doom and gloom. I am pleased that we dug in and scrapped it out for a bonus point,” he added. “We did that with a lot of young men on the field given the injuries before the game and during it.”

Munster have previously visited South Africa at the tail-end of the URC and left with a decent harvest of points, but this season they have traveled to the Republic early on with a different result.

“We are disappointed to come away from South Africa with a bonus point for our efforts. I fully believe we could have got a try-bonus point last week (against the Stormers in Cape Town), we deserved it, but the story of the last three weeks is us not taking opportunities,” Rountree added.

“There have been moving parts with players coming in and out because of injuries but as a coaching team, all we can do is be honest with ourselves and the players and work on what we can be better at.

“It is a long season. We will regroup, have a drink tonight, relax, and then the hard work gets started on improving.”

Rountree admitted, though, that credit had to go to a Shark side resplendent with starting Springboks.

“I was impressed with the speed of their backs, they have some very fast players on the edge of the field, but they also have their big men offloading in the tackle. That is an aspect of their game that they have developed and it is tough to stop.

“The big thing for us is that we are creating opportunities, we just need to get better at taking them. We can play rugby, and we will be back.”