Cullen will take some positives from tour
LEINSTER are in the midst a review into their two-game, 12day tour of South Africa and there is no doubt lessons will be learned from an experience that was never less than eventful.
The logistical issues that saw captain Isa Nacewa and scrum-half Jamison Gibson-Park turned back from Johannesburg Airport are unlikely to be repeated, nor the incident which saw prop Cian Healy asked to leave a flight from Port Elizabeth to Cape Town for not closing his laptop.
The main concern from a playing point of view will be the lacklustre performance against the Cheetahs on Friday night, when Leinster looked out of sorts for large passages of the game, untypically falling off tackles as their hosts cut loose for an unexpected 38-19 victory.
Altitude looked to be a factor and Leinster’s decision to delay their transfer to Bloemfontein until the day before the game will be reexamined, as will the call to allow senior coach Stuart Lancaster return home early to prepare for Friday night’s RDS assignment against Edinburgh.
An update on the calf injury sustained by Nacewa against the Cheetahs is expected today but he looks set to miss Edinburgh and Munster the following week and is now a doubt for Leinster’s European Champions Cup opener against Montpellier on October 14.
The wisdom in getting Nacewa to rejoin the squad after he was sent back to Ireland from Oliver Tambo airport on his initial arrival will also come under scrutiny, particularly whether asking a 35-year-old to take 10 flights in 12 days contributed to his injury after only a quarter of the Cheetahs game.
However, there were also positives for director of rugby Leo Cullen that should stand to his squad as the season progresses. A lengthy tour is an unusual experience for players more accustomed to the short-sharp travel of the European circuit and these 12 days should have been invaluable in gelling this young squad for bigger challenges ahead.
The hat-trick scored by youngster Barry Daly was one major plus, as were the performances of outhalf Ross Byrne, who looked extremely composed in possession — particularly in the opening 31-10 win over the Southern Kings.
Edinburgh should enable Leinster to get back on track and record their fourth win from five outings. Graham Cockerill’s side have had a rough couple of weeks, losing at home to Treviso and away to Scarlets, and will not fancy the RDS on a Friday night, particularly with Cullen ready to reintegrate some of his international stars.
Discipline will feature heavily in the build-up, Leinster’s persistence in giving away easy penalties allowed the Cheetahs to build a lead before hooker James Tracy’s yellow card killed any comeback momentum at the start of the second half.
The following week against Munster at Aviva Stadium will be a different examination entirely but Rassie Erasmus has a rebuilding job of his own after his side were hammered in Scotstoun by Glasgow.
The Warriors had lost their previous four encounters with Munster, including the game in Thomond Park just after the death of Anthony Foley and the Scotstoun clash which saw a bitter fallout over the targeting of Conor Murray.
The nature of Munster’s 37-10 capitulation will be a cause of some concern for a squad not accustomed to heavy defeat and, with the clock ticking down to the return of Erasmus and his defence guru Jacques Nienaber to South Africa, an announcement on their long-term coaching future might help to steady the ship.
They host Cardiff in Limerick on Saturday and face a team experiencing a surge of confidence following their gutsy 17-15 win in Galway over Kieran Keane’s Connacht. Head coach Keane was furious after his men led 15-10 with three minutes to go only to allow Willis Halaholo cross over for the winning, converted try.
The Kiwi, in his first season as head coach after Pat Lam took over Bristol, gave a tetchy TV interview afterwards which went viral before conceding that defeat was ‘pretty hard to take’ and fuming that ‘the boys thought they had already won the game’.
Already it is looking like being a difficult season for the province, who have managed just one victory (against the Kings) from four outings with the Sportsground attracting barely half of its 8,100 capacity on Saturday.
Life is unlikely to get any easier for Keane who brings his men to Llanelli next Friday to face champions Scarlets. The Welsh side sit just behind unbeaten Ulster at the top of Conference B, with Les Kiss’s men poised to make if five wins from five away to Zebre this Saturday.
“Altitude looked
to be a factor for Leinster”