WP Nel and Viliame Mata incentive for Edinburgh against seven-in-a-row champions

Munster match is likely to be final home game of season

Edinburgh won’t lack motivation this week as they seek to get the better of Munster for the first time in four and a half years.

Apart from the need to gather as many points as possible in their quest to make the URC play-offs, Friday’s fixture is also likely to be their final home game of the season and therefore a chance for supporters to say farewell to two long-serving club greats.

WP Nel and Viliame Mata have made 341 Edinburgh appearances between them and such has been their contribution to the cause that they are assured of a warm send-off. Nel, 38, is retiring at the end of this campaign while Mata, 32, has agreed to join Bristol Bears in the summer.

“There’s a lot of reasons why we need to win on the weekend and that is definitely one of them,” said Sean Everitt, the Edinburgh head coach. “Bill and WP have been massive for the club - they’ve been crowd favourites. WP has served Scotland well, over 60 Test matches, and I’m sure the crowd would love to give him a good send-off, at the same time also the team. And a win would be the cherry on the top for it.”

Edinburgh have been slowly building since returning from South Africa and last Friday’s win over Zebre Parma was their third on the spin. It lifted them up to seventh in the standings and they need to finish in the top eight to make the play-off quarter-finals, and top seven to be guaranteed a place in next season’s Champions Cup.

They have two games remaining in the regular season and Munster represents a significant step up in class from Zebre who frustrated Edinburgh at the Hive for long periods before the home side powered away to secure a bonus-point win.

Graham Rowntree’s team come to Edinburgh as defending champions and on the back of seven wins in a row in the URC. They showed last season how impressively belligerent they can be on the road but Everitt is thinking big. The coach set his side a target of winning their final five regular season games and have ticked off three, with Munster and Benetton still to come.

WP Nel, left, and Viliame Mata could both make their final home appearances for Edinburgh in Friday's match against Zebre. (Photo by Paul Devlin / SNS Group)

“It’s probably going to go down to the wire,” said Everitt of the race for play-off positions. “The points that we get out of the Munster game are going to be important for us. It’s a massive game, being potentially our last game at the Hive.

“We know that whatever points we get this week, four, five, it’s going to go well for us finishing higher than eighth or seventh. Also knowing that if the Sharks win the EPCR Challenge Cup, they’ll take eighth place in the Champions Cup next year.”

Edinburgh will make a decision on Tuesday on the availability of Emiliano Boffelli. The Argentina international suffered a recurrence of a nerve problem in his back last week and missed the Zebre game. He trained on Monday but Everitt will wait to see if there is any adverse reaction.

“It’s a day by day thing,” said the coach. “It’s not an injury we can manage, it's an injury that is frustrating for him because he’s not sure how the nerve will react in his back. It’s not damaging if he plays, it’s just a matter of whether he can get through the sessions through the week and onto the field on Friday. We’ll give him until Tuesday afternoon to see if he will be able to take the field on Friday or not.”

Friday’s match will come too soon for Harry Paterson who is still feeling his way back after he suffered a quad injury shortly after recovering from a stress fracture in his foot.