GLASGOW Warriors centre Mark Bennett expects his team to learn a lot from Saturday’s 38-17 defeat by Munster - more than they might from any normal loss.

The Champions Cup pool game in Limerick was Munster’s first outing since the death of their coach, Anthony Foley, in Paris. It was an emotional afternoon, and the home side rose to the occasion, running in five tries despite being a man down for an hour after winger Keith Earls was sent off for a dangerous tackle on Warriors hooker Fraser Brown.

But while Munster were at their best, Glasgow fell far below the standard they reached in their win over Leicester eight days earlier. Bennett expects some searching questions to be asked when the squad report for duty at Scotstoun this morning and try to work out what went wrong.

“We warmed up well, trained really well this week, so I think as a team we were in a good place,” he said after coming off the bench to score one of his team’s two second-half tries. “Why we didn’t, who knows?

“It wasn’t good enough at the start. We started the game poorly, and Munster really rose to the occasion and put us under a lot of pressure. Munster were outstanding, they really were. They came together as a team and performed on what was a great occasion for a great man. They put us to bed - as simple as that.

“I think we’ll analyse it as we do every other game. There will be probably more learning in that game than there is in the games where it all clicks.

“We can look at where we went wrong and what we did to make it a bit easier for Munster, but we can also look at what Munster did so well to put us under so much pressure. We will really focus on taking what we can out of this one.

“Just now it’s very emotional, so we’re all absolutely devastated with it. But by Monday we can come into it and think rationally about the rugby: why it didn’t happen. So it won’t be as emotional then - it will be a case of ‘This is what went wrong, this is why it happened’, and being really analytical with where we go from there.”

After getting off to a great start in the pool with that five-point home win over Leicester, Glasgow now have to get their campaign back on track with December’s double-header against Racing 92, last year’s runners-up. The Warriors have never qualified for the last eight of the Champions Cup, and to do so this time need to either win their pool or are one of the three best runners-up from the five pool.

“If we’d managed to back up the Leicester result on Saturday, we’d have been in a great place going into the next two,” Bennett added. “We’re still in this group, but we really need to up it when we next come out.”

The first match against Racing, who have former Warriors forward Leone Nakarawa in their squad as well as 2015 World Player of the Year Dan Carter, is in Paris on 10th December. The return at Scotstoun is on Friday 16th. The final two games, after the turn of the year, are at home to Munster then away to Leicester.