TWELVE points from replacement Jon Preston kept alive Bath's faint hopes of qualifying for the quarter finals of the Heineken Cup in front of a capacity crowd at The Rec.

The house full signs were up well in advance of this eagerly awaited Pool Four match and after the disappointment of defeat in Limerick a week ago, the Bath faithful turned up in numbers sensing revenge.

Bath coach Jon Callard made two changes to the team beaten 31-9 at Thomond Park, with Mike Catt making a return at outside half, a position from where he dominated the game especially through his tactical kicking.

Callard also handed a first team debut at prop to Simon Emms, a mid season signing from Welsh Cup holders Llanelli.

Bath started much the brighter of two evenly matched sides and didn't have to wait too long to register the game's opening points. From Catt's huge up and under, Mike Tindall jumped highest and from his knock back Munster flanker Alan Quinlan was penalised for being offside.

Matt Perry, who in the absence of Preston was first choice kicker, made no mistake from inside the 22. The same couldn't be said of Munster's Ronan O'Gara.

The outside half who landed 16 points last week proceeded to miss two straightforward attempts at goal within two minutes of each other.

Perry made Munster pay for this inaccuracy doubling Bath's lead on 14 minutes from 30 metres. O'Gara missed again on 24 minutes before Munster lost inspirational skipper Mick Galwey through injury.

However, this spurred the Irish side into their best attacking spell of the half and after Dominic Crotty had hacked on his own chip ahead Munster were awarded a scrum five metres from the line.

Crucially Welsh referee Nigel Whitehouse penalised Munster for back chat and reversed the decision marching play back to the half way line and awarding Bath a penalty.

Having been let off the hook Bath responded with verve.

Scrum half Gareth Cooper was forced to leave the field after a bang on the head and it was his replacement, Preston, who took Bath into the break 9-0 ahead with a successful penalty.

Munster stormed into Bath from the start of the second half and went close to a score when Stringer and O'Gara combined only to be halted metres from the line.

The respite was short lived though as from a quick tap penalty Munster created a solid forward platform from which flanker David Wallis was able to pick up and force his way over in the corner, with O'Gara missing the conversion.

Bath responded positively and in the space of ten minutes they secured the points.

Preston punished some sloppy Munster play by confidently slotting two quick penalties before Munster saw their Irish international prop Peter Clohessy sent to the sin bin for deliberate off side. With him went Munster's hopes of victory.

Preston completed a quick fire penalty hat trick on the back of a superb break from Catt and Kevin Maggs to take the score to 18-5.

The win gave Callard's men a chance to make it through the group and will give them confidence as they prepare to take on Gloucester in the Tetley's Bitter Cup next week.