Madigan: 'I'd much rather be in Leinster's position than Toulouse's'
Aer Lingus College Football Classic ambassador Ian Madigan. Photo by Ramsey Cardy/Sportsfile
Give Ian Madigan the choice of which dressing room to be a part of at Tottenham Hotspur this Saturday and the former Ireland fly-half would head straight for the door marked “Leinster”, not the one belonging to a mentally scarred Toulouse.
The 35-year-old, who twice won a Heineken Cup with Leinster in 2011 and 2012 before a career that also took in Bordeaux-Begles, Bristol Bears and Ulster until his retirement at the end of last season, believes his home province have what it takes to banish their own Champions Cup demons and win this Saturday’s final against a Toulouse side they have stopped at the semi-final stage in each of the last two seasons.
Leo Cullen’s team hammered Toulouse 40-17 in May 2022 and 41-22 11 months later, both at the Aviva Stadium, only to fall at the final hurdle, on each occasion beaten by La Rochelle.
Yet having ended La Rochelle’s reign at the Aviva in last month’s quarter-finals and seen off Northampton Saints in their Croke Park semi earlier this month, Madigan believes Leinster hold the better cards going into this weekend’s showdown in north London.
"I think Leinster are going to win and I think they deserve to win because it's their third final in three years,” Madigan said on Wednesday as he looked ahead to this year’s Aer Lingus College Football Classic on August 24 at Aviva Stadium.
"The road that they've had to the final has been tougher than Toulouse's run. Now, that doesn't mean you deserve to win the final, certainly not, but I think that accumulates.
"When a draw comes out for a competition, as a player you hope that you're on the easier side. It's just human nature, and talking to one of my colleagues earlier who is a professional tennis player, she said it's exactly that, you hope you're on the weaker side of the draw.
"But if you get into the final and you've come through the tougher side of the draw, you're in a much stronger position.
"And for Leinster having beaten La Rochelle, having beaten Leicester, who were far better than people gave them credit for and Northampton, who in my opinion are far and away the best team in the UK this year, and off the back of beating Toulouse in two semi-finals in the last two years, it's very hard to say that Leinster don't deserve to win on Saturday.
"To be in the position of the two teams in the final, I would rather be the team that has beaten the opposition in two semi-finals and to be thinking the opposition could be mentally weak having lost two semi-finals.
"I'd much rather be in Leinster's position than Toulouse's going into this final.”
Despite Leinster having lost in their last four European finals since the last of their four titles in 2018, Madigan added that it was his belief Toulouse would bring the greater emotional baggage into Saturday’s decider given their heavy defeats in the last two semi-finals.
"Not only were they beaten in the last two games, they were significantly beaten. You're talking 20 points and for two top tier sides, they're always going to be in the top eight or even top four in Europe every year, and I think the Leinster performances over the last two years have definitely left a scar because Toulouse typically rely on other teams making mistakes and then they're so dangerous off those mistakes.
"I think their concern is that this Leinster defence isn't going to let their attack breathe and the Leinster attack simply doesn't make the same mistakes that other teams make.
"They don't play an expansive style, it's actually quite blunt force, they win the gain line and when it's on, they go, but it's very hard to fluff that attack. I just don't see many flaws in this Leinster team.”
With arguably the two best scrum-halves in the world going head to head at Tottenham Hotspur Stadium with Toulouse led by Antoine Dupont and Leinster boasting the talents of Jamison Gibson-Park, Madigan focused on the battle of the number nines as a key element of Saturday’s match.
"It's so exciting to have, in my opinion, the two best scrum-halves going at it in a European final, it's brilliant.
"Dupont is probably the best player in the world. To have as good skills as he does, to be able to kick off both feet, his actual physical strength isn't talked about a whole lot but pound for pound he's definitely the strongest rugby player that I've ever seen.
"When a defender thinks they have him, his ability to wrestle out....and that's when it's actually most dangerous, because the defensive players either side of the person in the tackle switch off because it looks like it's managed and then once he wrestles free, there's no-one there to save it as opposed to a traditional side-step where the defender is inside and outside the person making the tackle is still very switched on and very aware.
"I think Dupont can get the edge on Gibson-Park but, for me, that doesn't mean Toulouse win. If Gibson-Park gets the better of Dupont I think Leinster most certainly win.
"The key for Leinster is not allowing Toulouse to get on the front foot. That's where he's particularly dangerous because he's so quick around the breakdowns, getting in and out, his ability to skip outside not only the first defender but also the second at the breakdown, to then create indecision with the third defender - does he have to bite in on Dupont - and you've got a serious dangerman outside him in Ntamack, that's when things can get quite chaotic.
"But the key for Leinster is not getting themselves into that position, they've got to stop Toulouse at source, prevent them getting over the gain line, force them to win lineout ball at the front of the lineout that's not going to get them coming hard down the 10 channel, getting through one on ones, and that's where I think Leinster are going to have a gameplan that isn't going to allow to Dupont do what he's done to other teams so far in the competition.”
CONNECT WITH US TODAY
Be the first to know the latest news and updates
