The late American baseball coach Leo Durocher said 56 years ago: "Show me a good loser in professional sports and I will show you an idiot. Show me a good sportsman and I will show you a player I am looking to trade." Yesterday Neil Back seemed in little danger of being traded by Leicester.
"I did what I felt was necessary," he said. "Obviously there was a risk I might have been sin-binned but I weighed it up and fortunately it went our way. I used all my experience of club and international rugby to ensure that we won the game. I am sure that other back-row players have done it in the past. I don't make a habit of it, but the game wasn't won or lost on that incident and I don't think that a big issue should be made of it.
"I am not a cheat and I would be very upset if anyone accused me of being one. I am quite at peace with myself; what I did was part of the professional game."
Leicester are no strangers to gamesmanship, although it might be argued that the onset of professionalism has led to a less chivalrous approach and the Tigers are noteworthy merely because of their fierce desire to win.
Back has been here before. The last time he used his hands outside the laws in a cup final he was banned for six months for shoving the referee Steve Lander after the defeat to Bath at Twickenham in 1996. Leicester had been leading 15-9 (Saturday's scoreline) five minutes from the end when Bath were awarded a penalty try for persistent infringing at rucks by the Tigers.
That bitter experience hardened Leicester and their appetite for success shows no sign of being satiated after four consecutive league titles and two Heineken Cup triumphs. They remain the Manchester United of rugby union, driven by winning with a ruthlessness few can match.
They defeated Llanelli in the Heineken Cup semi-final last month through a last-minute penalty which the Welsh claimed had been the result of the referee being conned at a scrum; moreover Tim Stimpson stole a couple of extra yards with the referee's back turned which proved crucial as his kick went over via the crossbar and post.
The London Irish rugby director Brendan Venter claimed this season that Leicester's success was based on their testing the tolerance threshold of referees to the limits, to the point where officials were slow to take the necessary actions.
On Saturday the Munster players protested about Back's intervention to no avail. "Those decisions go against you sometimes," said their captain Mick Galwey afterwards. "I would not say we were robbed because they scored two tries without reply."
The American football coach Vince Lombardi once said: "Winning is not everything. It is the only thing." And Leicester are winners.
