Leinster need restorative rays of sunshine
James Ryan, centre, Jack Conan, right, and Tadhg Furlong. Pic: Tyler Miller/Sportsfile
Two weeks on from the Champions Cup final defeat to Bordeaux-Begles and the shadow cast in Bilbao has only lengthened.
Leinster need the restorative rays of sunshine that would come with a successful defence of their URC title.
A back-to-back of league titles wouldn’t make everything right in their world again, but it is a bare minimum requirement in the wake of more European frustrations and the catalogue of difficult, and public, conversations that have stemmed from that loss at the San Mames.
Leo Cullen and Jacques Nienaber have both given blockbuster press conferences in the last ten days that touched on their futures at the club and other newsworthy topics. There is disquiet over the squad’s perceived strength next season and over the style of play.
Cullen has insisted that all this noise, so much of it instigated internally, has not permeated the dressing-room. There is no sense of discontent in the playing group, but there is an angst surrounding the club right now that isn’t going away.
All of this will be reflected again in the footfall at the Aviva Stadium. Less than 10,000 turned up for last week’s quarter-final defanging of the Lions in Ballsbridge. This semi-final will trump that, but not by a margin that disguises the disconnect.
A return to the RDS can’t come quickly enough.
If a Champions Cup record of five losses in their last five deciders is the biggest stick with which to beat the province then they need to get their business done here against the Stormers to avoid a run of just one win in four URC semi-finals and further fallout.
Underlining all of the club’s recent history is an unmistakable pang of underachievement. This is the nuts and bolts of it, regardless of Cullen’s attempts to reframe Leinster’s status as last province standing as something to be celebrated.
It’s not all doom and gloom.
They have scored 158 points in their last three URC ties, Nienaber was delighted with the energy and the vibes he saw and felt in that 59-10 throttling of the Lions, and they will put out their usual international-heavy selection for this one.
Leinster will field 21 Test players with Alex Usanov and Diarmuid Mangan the only two among this matchday squad yet to be capped internationally at the elite level. A dozen of this group has toured with the British and Irish Lions.
The unavailability of Dan Sheehan and Tadhg Furlong isn’t ideal but Ronan Kelleher and Thomas Clarkson are stand-ins that others could only dream of, and they will hope that Sam Prendergast can reproduce the form he showed at No.10 last week.
And stand tall defensively. Ciaran Frawley has another weekend off.
The Stormers are, of course, without their chief orchestrator with the world-class Sacha Feinberg-Mngomezulu out for the foreseeable with an injury suffered in their last eight defeat of Cardiff in Cape Town. That is huge.
The Springbok out-half was named URC player of the year on the eve of this one and you just can’t gloss over his absence, no matter how many times head coach John Dobson bigs up the abilities of the more than capable Jurie Matthee.
Others unavailable are wing Seabelo Senatla, lock Ruben van Heerden and scrum-half Cobus Reinach, but Nienaber, who once spent six years as an assistant at the Stormers, made sure to emphasise that this is a dangerous opponent coming to Dublin.
“The Stormers have threats across the board. They have players that were invited to the [latest Springbok] alignment camp. I’m not sure how many but it is there in the vicinity of 14, 15 so those are players that are on the international radar of the national coaches.
“That is testament to the quality of rugby they have played during the season so they have lots of threats, the normal stuff.
“Why do teams normally get to the knockout stages? Because they have got a good defence and a good setpiece. They have a good attack. They scored the second most points [in the URC] so they have an ability to get over the tryline. They had a very good win over Cardiff, they have a very good defensive system.
“I don’t think they have a weakness per se.”
Nienaber was dismissive of the advantage that comes with playing at home this week given the familiarity South African players now have with cross-equator travel, but it is unquestionably a factor in the URC and especially in these playoffs.
The Stormers have had to fly long distance from Cape Town and eat into their week’s preparations to do it. They have played ten times in Ireland to date and won only two of them, one being their visit to Thomond Park late last year.
This should be Leinster’s day, but it won’t be straightforward.
H Keenan; J O’Brien, R Ioane, J Osborne, J Lowe; S Prendergast, J Gibson-Park; A Porter, R Kelleher, T Clarkson; J McCarthy, J Ryan; M Deegan, J van der Flier, C Doris.
D Willemse; W Simelane, R Nel, D du Plessis, L Zas; J Matthee, I Khan; N Mchunu, AH Venter, N Fouché; A Smith, C Evans; P de Villiers, BJ Dixon, E Roos.
H Davidson (SRU).
CONNECT WITH US TODAY
Be the first to know the latest news and updates
