Clinical Leinster back in business as Brive crumble

MICHAEL CHEIKA’S smile said it all after his side had hammered admittedly poor opposition and recorded their biggest win on French soil.

The fact that the Scarlets had done Leinster a huge favour by beating London Irish at the Madejski Stadium had in Cheika’s opinion “made a bit of a battlefield” of a pool that threatens to go down to the wire.

Simply put, Brive were awful. Their supporters came with the hope that the side would roll back the glory years with a performance of substance. But all they got was a reminder of two teams light years from each other in terms of organisation and player quality. The French side have struggled this season in the Top 14 with just three wins in nine but they saved perhaps their poorest performance for the visit of Leinster

That shouldn’t take from the superb professional job done by Cheika’s men, who went about their task from the off, squeezing the life out of the early Brive challenge. Their lineout was solid while Mike Ross enjoyed supremacy over Georgian Davit Kinchagishvili at scrum time.

But it was at the breakdown where the game was won – a much-improved Leinster performance there from last week against London Irish.

Cheika branded it as a “solid” performance. He said: “We knew we had to start well to get ourselves into the game and to keep the crowd as quiet as possible. Everyone knew their role. We’d changed the team around a bit for certain reasons. We worked hard and kept working ourselves into positions.

“We showed a lot of belief in that we could have gone into our shell after losing last week at home.”

The Leinster coach revealed that the set piece had been targeted in particular. “We tried to get consistency with the lineout last week and it wasn’t that great. We set the team up with the three big fellas so it made it a little bit easier. We did want to put a simpler strategy around the lineout because we did want to get some set-piece play on the night which was successful for us in the game.”

That strategy paid dividends on 14 minutes when Rob Kearney finished off Jonathan Sexton’s wrap-around to score. The fly half converted and added another penalty soon after to make it 3-13. To their credit, Brive hung on with Andy Goode adding a penalty after Sean O’Brien was penalised for a high tackle on Gerhard Vosloo. But Leinster maintained their vice-like grip, forcing the French side into coughing up further penalties to make it 6-19 at half-time.

The break did little to arrest Leinster’s momentum. Sexton added to his tally of points with a penalty a few minutes in and from then on, the game looked a lost cause for the home side. A yellow card for Isa Nacewa for a high tackle on Alexis Pallison got the home crowd going but Brive looked clueless with the little possession they had and sorely lacking direction from their English half-back pairing of Shaun Perry and Goode.

A try by Gerhard Vosloo on 66 minutes temporarily narrowed the gap to nine points. But as if to drive home their dominance, Leinster retaliated from the restart with substitute Kevin McLaughlin barging over for the first of two tries after good work by Brian O’Driscoll and Nacewa.

Leinster’s one regret might have been the failure to secure a bonus point when the tries were there for the taking. Cheika disagreed for it would have been a result he’d have been happy to take before the match “No. Just get a win. Have respect for the opposition and get onto the next team.”

Cheika was full of praise for Scotland and Lions second row Nathan Hines, who excelled at blindside wing-forward. “We just wanted that extra little bit of experience on the field at the start of the game. Hines has played in France. He’s very savvy and he’s really become an important part of the team.”

Scorers for Brive: Tries: Vosloo 66. Con: Goode. Pens: Goode

Scorers for Leinster: Tries: Kearney 15, McLaughlin 67,80. Cons: Sexton 2, Berne. Pen: Sexton 5

BRIVE: F Estebanez (c) (R Cooke 70), A Palisson, J Noon, L Mackay, V Waqaseduadua, A Goode, S Perry (J Pejoine 55), D Kinchagishvili (P Toderasc 55), S Thompson, P Barnard (P Idieder 66), C Short, D Browne, G Vosloo, V Forgues, A Claassen

LEINSTER: R Kearney, S Horgan (G D’Arcy 72), B O’Driscoll, L Fitzgerald, I Nacewa, J Sexton (S Berne 77), E Reddan, C Healy, B Jackman (J Fogarty 46), M Ross (C Van Der Linde 61), L Cullen (c) (K McLaughlin 54), M O’Kelly, N Hines (D Toner 68), S O’Brien, J Heaslip

Referee: James Jones (Wales)Ian Moriarty, Brive