Win v Leinster would be massive for us - Prendergast

Mike Prendergast believes a win against Leinster on St Stephen's Day would be a groundbreaking moment for Munster in their season of transition.

It's just over two months since their last derby meeting, with Leinster 27-13 winners at the Aviva Stadium on that occasion, Munster's fourth defeat in their opening six games of the season in the BKT United Rugby Championship.

While the Munster performance on that occasion was dogged - given their injury crisis - they were still in the process of getting used to their new gameplan under their new coaching ticket, and were some distance off the quality of Leinster.

But they've looked a far more cohesive side since the November break, winning four of their last five, and picking up a losing bonus-point against Toulouse in the opening round of the Heineken Champions Cup.

And Prendergast says his team have made significant strides in the last two months.

"I think we have all [changed]," he said. "As we alluded to as a coaching staff from the start, it was always going to take a bit of time. We are still on that journey. Week on week, month on month, we have improved in different domains, parts of our game.

"I think defensively we showed that last week, especially in the second-half. In the first-half there were good in aspects of our attack and areas around our ruck are improving as well and our decision-making around that.

"So you look back to that game [v Leinster], there was a couple of clips that we brought up from it, and even in terms of how we moved, we were still getting used to how we trained, training quicker, training in smaller teams with quicker game-based stuff.

"When you look at that now, two months ago to now, our ability to move quicker on both sides of the ball is