Saturday’s 22-10 loss in Limerick was not the outcome O’Gara and head coaches Laurent Labit and Laurent Travers would have wished for but from a mix and match team well below full-strength there was enough spirit in their performance to suggest there are better days ahead in defence of their Top14 title when the likes of Dan Carter, Bernard Le Roux, Gerbrandt Grobler and Juan Imhoff are restored to the Racing line-up.

“I think there were a lot of positives,” O’Gara said. “They (Munster) were better, but if we had a little bit more, I’d have just loved if Dan was playing.

There was some really serious kick space in the back field which Munster will have to address urgently. If if it was executed, you could kill them there.

“That’s the other side of me, I’d have loved if we were going on both fronts, we could come here and the world’s best out-half could make it a different game, but tonight we were beaten by the better team, but you could take something out of it.”

Munster, of course, will take much more out of Saturday’s win, not least second seeding after the pool stages and with that a home quarter-final and potential semi on Irish soil.

O’Gara has been impressed by the way the province has turned itself around under director of rugby Rassie Erasmus. He also welcomed the return of All Black centre Francis Saili after missing the first half of the season following shoulder surgery.

“He is really good at what he does,” the Corkman said. “I don’t know what it is that he does but he is obviously very good at it. They have serious clarity about how they play. Everyone knows what they are doing and how they are doing it.

“They’re a different side with Saili in it. He just looks awesome with the ball in hand and he attracts three defenders to him every time.

“Keeping him fit, obviously if Keith Earls plays, they are a different team as well. The two of them combined together could be deadly.

“They have a back-line now that maybe they didn’t have for the past two years. And they have serious strength in depth too. The Irish players are so hard-working and honest, they have a serious base level of knowledge and skill as well.”

O’Gara knows he has some world-class personnel to work with on the Racing roster and having been dumped out of Europe after four straight pool defeats he has been pleased with the way they have turned the corner in a bid to rescue their league campaign, beating Leicester in round five and showing the heart they did at Thomond Park given their embarrassment at home.

“I suppose it’s more disappointing in the fact that it’s Champions Cup and it was Munster. It hit me like a ton of bricks.

“I was proud of the boys. In fairness to the two coaches they let me kind of run the week and that was a big responsibility.

“I mean, I’m not washing my hands of it saying I’m an assistant coach. I have a big input there and a big role and I’m very happy with my role, I’m very proud of what I do there and I got control of this, not the week but the build-up and I must say I enjoyed it.”

Asked what his key message to the Racing players had been as they prepared for the trip to Limerick, O’Gara replied: “Honesty of performance. That was all I stressed. I just said it’s 60 games and four teams have escaped here with a win. So I asked them ‘is it realistic to win?’

A few of them said ‘yeah, maybe’ and I said ‘from my point of view, it’s that we can look each other in the eye afterwards and have a beer and get on with preparation’ and I think that’s what we can do because we dug in there. We hung there and it was easy to fall at times but the lads didn’t fall and that’s an important trait. Character is crucial and we didn’t fall.”