Perfect ten tries for Leinster as Harlequins fire a blank at Croke Park

Ross Byrne of Leinster celebrates after scoring his side's eighth try with teammate Robbie Henshaw. Picture: Sam Barnes/Sportsfile

Champions Cup round of 16: Leinster 62 Harlequins 0

Leinster have served clear notice of their Champions Cup intentions by pounding Harlequins for ten tries while, maybe even more impressively, keeping the visitors scoreless in their round of 16 tie on Saturday afternoon.

The province has lost four finals since claiming their fourth ‘European’ title in 2018, including the last three. The heartache has been monumental, but they move on to another home tie, due next Friday evening at the Aviva Stadium, with serious momentum.

Putting up a shutout at this level is a serious statement but then their defence has impressed through most of the campaign. Their attack? Not so much. Their work with ball in hand was exceptional at times here, in terms of fluidity and skill execution.

Eight players touched down, another was a penalty try. It all bodes very well.

It looked like anything but a formality in the opening minutes.

Harlequins had all the possession and all the territory and they were asking serious questions of the much-vaunted Jacques Nienaber defence with Marcus Smith darting and probing and their forwards punching holes.

Ultimately, though, it amounted to nothing.

Leigh Halfpenny missed a long penalty attempt and when Leinster held up a driving maul over the try line ten minutes in it proved to be the end of the difficult beginning for the hosts who were about to go supernova.

Three tries inside 13 minutes put the game to bed. And it wasn’t just the rat-tat-tat nature of them so much as the quality of all three that served notice that their attack still retains an ability to stretch and skewer opponents.

Harlequins' Jack Kenningham attempts to fend off the challenges of Luke McGrath and Joe McCarthy. Picture: Morgan Treacy/Inpho

Sam Prendergast got the first, punching over after Dan Sheehan bludgeoned a path up the right wing. Joe McCarthy got the second soon after against a Quins defence that even then was completely and utterly pulled out of shape.

Jamie Osborne got the third off a loose ball in their own third, Jamison Gibson-Park picking it up and starting a counter that owed plenty to a battering run from the brilliant Josh van der Flier before the winger sashayed past three defenders to touch down.

Quins were hurt further by the fact that they had to use no less than four temporary replacements, three for HIAs and one for blood, and they were 19-0 adrift at the break in front of 55,627 fans at GAA HQ on a sunny but chilly Saturday afternoon.

The hits and the hurt kept on coming.

RG Snyman snaffled try number four shortly after the restart, Garry Ringrose claimed one in the 48th-minute and Dan Sheehan got on the scoresheet ten minutes later. Amid all this Jordie Barrett, an All Black legend, was brought in off the bench by Leinster.

Ooof.

This was now firmly in watch-through-your-fingers territory. A penalty try followed, Luke Northmore getting binned in the process for a deliberate knock-on. Then Ross Byrne added an eighth before Jamie Benson got shown a yellow for tripping Barrett off the ball.

The end just couldn’t come quickly enough for Quins but there was still ample time for James Lowe to go over twice. Not a good scoreline, or look, for a tournament that continues to lose its lustre as the years roll on. Leinster won’t care about that.

LEINSTER: H Keenan; J Osborne, G Ringrose, R Henshaw, J Lowe; S Prendergast, J Gibson-Park; A Porter, D Sheehan, R Slimani; J McCarthy, RG Snyman; J Conan, J van der Flier, C Doris.

Replacements: T Furlong for Slimani (46); L McGrath for Gibson-Park (49); J Barrett for Ringrose (51); G McCarthy for Sheehan, J Boyle for Porter and R Baird for Snyman (all 59); M Deegan for McCarthy (64); R Byrne for Keenan (67).

HARLEQUINS: L Halfpenny; T Green, O Beard, B Waghorn, N David; M Smith, W Porter; F Baxter, J Walker, T Lamositele; J Launchbury, C Cunningham-South; J Kenningham, W Evans, A Dombrandt.

Replacements: L Northmore for David (18-30), for Beard (35-40) and for Halfpenny (53); G Hammond for Evans (28); D Care for Porter (29); I Herbst for Kenningham (48); Kenningham for Launchbury, S Riley for Walker and S Kerrod for Lamositele (all 62); J Benson for Waghorn (70).

Referee: P Brousset (Fra).