Leinster brace for impact

It’s been a week of plaudits for Jamie Heaslip after his display against Wasps last Sunday, and rightly so, but the Leinster skipper’s individual efforts overshadowed one of the more important inputs by the collective.

Leinster took on a side that had destroyed a highly-regarded Bath scrum a week before without their starting loosehead (Cian Healy) and their first-choice (Mike Ross) and second-choice (Martin Moore) tightheads.

Yet, they survived, and more.

In fact, the most remarkable aspect to the discussions on the home team’s efforts five days ago is that there has been next to no talk about the solidity of that vital building block. Take a bow, then, players and staff.

After all, scrums are like referees: most are noticed only when they are particularly awful and only the few are ever good enough to merit a mention. Such is the life of the grunts and those employed to guide them.

Many were the jokes and jibes when Marco Caputo arrived in Dublin to take over from Greg Feek as Leinster’s scrum coach last summer. An Aussie scrum coach? Well, you can make up the punchlines in your own good time.

Michael Bent has probably heard more than enough, already. Parachuted in to win an Irish cap within days of arrival at tighthead this time two years ago, he floundered for country and then club before being retooled mostly as a loosie.

Then Ross went down late last week and, hey presto, he was at tight again.

“It was tricky, there’s no doubt,” said Caputo. “We did the majority of our work on the Tuesday and the Wednesday before in the lead-up to the Wasps match and we trained with Mike all through that period.

“So, Mike pulling out on the Wednesday night threw a spanner in the works. I know Michael Bent has had a little bit of stick with the Dublin public and supporters, and even with (the media), and I thought in the circumstances, he did an outstanding job.”

It remains to be seen if Ross will be fit to return from what the province is describing as a minor groin injury in time for Sunday’s trip to Castres, where the visiting scrum is sure to be inspected thoroughly for structural faults.

It’s four years since a callow Healy was found out in the scrum 80km down the road in Toulouse in a Heineken Cup semi-final, but Leinster have not been exposed in such a fashion since, regardless of how many injuries they have had.

Castres have the usual supplies of beef you would expect from a Top 14 outfit and, though they lost four scrums at The Stoop during their defeat to Harlequins, they are stereotypically French in the manner in which their game raises when on home soil.

Leinster suffered significantly in Castres in the scrum 10 months ago in a game in which they trailed 14-0 before winning by seven points, and Caputo knows the scene in those parts, having visited as a player with Clermont back in the early noughties.

“I’m expecting them to be abrasive and confrontational,” said Caputo. “Having played in the Top 14 and gone down to Castres, I know the importance they place on la conquête — the scrummaging and the mauling. All the real confrontational aspects of the game.

“They’ll come at us with their scrum. They’ll try to drive us with their driving maul and (with) the confidence they can get from that, the crowd then becomes involved. If they spot a weakness, they’ll come after you there.

“It’s just such a huge part of the psyche of the French game, so we’ve got to be good in those areas. I thought we answered a lot of those questions against Wasps, but we’re going to have to be even better.”