Castres can’t be underestimated, warns Reddan

Leinster coach Matt O’Connor spoke last weekend about the need to avoid an "ambush" in Castres in their European Rugby Champions Cup encounter this Sunday and Eoin Reddan knows all too well how best-laid plans can go awry in the Stade Pierre Antoine.

Reddan was in the starting line-up last January when Castres flew into an early 14-0 lead in a game that Leinster simply couldn’t afford to lose, but he still ended up on the winning side.

The same couldn’t be said back in 2009. The Limerick man was still a Wasps player then. Heineken Cup champions only two years before, they found themselves in the south of France in round six needing a bonus point to escape the pool — instead of Leinster, as coincidence would have it.

Castres had already seen off Leinster on home soil the month before, reversing a pummelling in Dublin from the week before and prompting the injured Leo Cullen to thump his fists on a press area table in frustration more than once. “We were a fairly decent side and they ended up beating us pretty well (21-15),” said Reddan yesterday. “In my experience, I have never played down there where they haven’t been anything but 110% committed. This will be my fourth time there now. One year, Munster went down there and destroyed them but other years they have come back and produced pretty big performances.”

Castres lost by 16 points to Harlequins at The Stoop last Friday, but in doing so they produced a display far beyond most of their offerings in a so-far-dismal Top 14 campaign.

“They know that if they win this weekend, they are in with a shout big-time. The way the French league is going, they are going to use this as a dual thing. They are going to try and springboard their performance back to the Top 14.

“They are also going to see it as a way to put a line under a period and finish very strong. I know the result (against Harlequins) didn’t go their way but they were a lot happier with their game at the weekend than they were previously. Their intensity was there and their defence was a lot better than it had been. It’s going to be a very tough game.”

Add that defensive grit to what Reddan admits is a Leinster attack that hasn’t been great this season, and it may spell trouble.

Yet Castres’ defeat of Leinster in December of 2008 is their only triumph over Irish opposition in their last 11 attempts and, in truth, this isn’t the type of game Leinster can afford to lose, in a competition where the margins are now even smaller.

“It feels like more pressure,” said Reddan. “I certainly feel that every game. Not that they didn’t feel like finals anyway, but you’re in a very, very tough group. Everyone is, so you have to keep winning.”