Leinster stay focused as Roberts adds to Cardiff’s blues

Leinster are refusing to take Saturday’s Heineken Cup quarter-final against Cardiff Blues for granted despite the Welsh region’s myriad of problems on the pitch and off it.

The most recent was yesterday’s news that Jamie Roberts has been ruled out for six months.

Gavin Henson’s sacking earlier this week may have grabbed all the headlines but the problems run much deeper than one man for a club that is set to lose a raft of players in the summer and is unsure who their coaches will be next season or even where they will play.

With a clutch of injuries and a hat-trick of defeats coming into the tie in Dublin, they must now face the European champions in front of 50,000 or so Irish fans.

“Whether you are going well or things haven’t being going well off the field, we don’t look at that,” said scrum coach Greg Feek. “We just want to turn up and play our game. Sometimes the teams with nothing to lose are the worst ones to play.”

Feek went on to list a handful of the Blues’ top-class players. Unfortunately, one of them was Roberts who has since been ruled out for the rest of the season after damaging the medial ligament in his knee during last week’s 31-3 defeat in Glasgow.

“First and foremost, I’m pretty devastated to be missing this weekend’s Heineken Cup quarter-final match against Leinster, in what is our biggest match of the season,” Roberts admitted yesterday. “It’s a match I’ve been looking forward to for a long time but unfortunately my body hasn’t quite allowed me to be a part of such a huge occasion for us as a region.

“I originally injured my knee in Paris playing against Racing Metro after returning from the World Cup. With the fantastic help from the medical staff at the Blues and Welsh Rugby Union, I was able to rehab my knee well enough to get me through a handful of games for the Blues and the successful Grand Slam Six Nations campaign with Wales.

“However, following my injury in the match against Glasgow on Friday night, I’ve been advised by the knee surgeon that my knee is now not stable enough to continue playing.

“The decision has been made for me to have an operation on the Anterior Cruciate Ligament (ACL) later this week. It will mean a minimum of roughly six months away from the playing field.

“I suppose it’s a chance for me to get my body fully right for what is a huge season for both club and country, with a certain carrot at the end of it too.

“It will also allow me to continue my focus on the final year of my degree in medicine and the finals I’ll be sitting next March.”