Leinster getting on with business, says Fitzgerald

When Nigel Owens called a halt to Leinster’s tussle with Castres on Sunday, it prompted a pitch invasion that, win or lose, is par for the course in a number of the oldest rugby strongholds in the south of France.

The GAA may frown on them here, for health and safety reasons, but there was little threat to life or limb at the cosy 10,000-capacity Stade Pierre Antoine, and it made for a charming scene.

Among those mingling were dozens of Leinster fans, and visiting players who stayed out long enough to converse and have their picture taken, but the idyll was soon broken as thoughts turned to the five-day turnaround. Within three hours of the final whistle they had replenished the energy level, been plunged into ice baths and been whisked the 50 miles westward to Toulouse Airport for the two-hour flight home.