Clinical Leinster lay down marker with impressive bonus-point win

LEINSTER 40 EDINBURGH 14

LEINSTER maintained their unbeaten record by getting the better of Edinburgh at the RDS last night.

News had just filtered through of how Cheetahs had filleted Munster a hemisphere away. And the Blues had to make it five points just to keep pace with the super-charged South Africans.

Hugo Keenan’s immaculate drift onto Ross Byrne’s pass was the deal-maker for the opening try, putting Dave Kearney in the clear, the ball inside bouncing off James Lowe’s head for Jamison Gibson-Park to ground the ball for the lead in the 16th minute.

Luke Crosbie poached a penalty out of Kearney and, suddenly, Edinburgh were five metres out. When the maul was sacked, they looked to the scrum.

It was dominant enough to force two resets, four penalties, a yellow card for Michael Bent and, ultimately, Jamie Farndale’s try on the right, all over five long minutes.

In addition, Joe Tomane was correctly binned for using his knees on Farndale, and Jaco van der Walt slipped the Scots ahead from the conversion.

Forcing

Now, Leinster were down to 13 and facing a penalty into their 22, Lowe flashing out of the line to knock over George Taylor and Rory O’Loughlin forcing a penalty.

The rebound was impressive, Scott Fardy rescuing Leinster’s attack with a miracle pick-up and Bent arriving re-energised to crash over for Byrne’s extras to make it 12-7 right on half-time.

Straight away, Gibson-Park’s quick thinking unsettled Edinburgh and Caelan Doris’s line was good enough for the third, Byrne converting.

A scrum penalty followed and Scott Penny’s low centre of gravity was just the job from close range. Byrne’s two took it out to 26-7 in the 48th minute.

That was the bonus point safely tucked away. It was left to Michael Milne to power out of a tackle for the fifth and Rowan Osborne to snatch his first try in Blue from a breakout by Jimmy O’Brien.

Edinburgh had enough about them to engineer a late consolation by Charlie Shiel, converted by Simon Hickey.

LEINSTER – H Keenan; D Kearney (V Abdaladze 28, temp), R O’Loughlin (J O’Brien 63), J Tomane, J Lowe; R Byrne (H Byrne 63), J Gibson-Park (R Osborne 63); P Dooley (M Milne 55), R Kelleher (J Tracy 55), M Bent (V Abdaladze 55), D Toner, S Fardy (capt, R Molony 66), M Deegan, S Penny, C Doris (J Murphy 46).

EDINBURGH – D Hoyland; J Farndale, M Bennett, G Taylor (J Johnstone 52), D van der Merwe; J van der Walt (S Hickey 53), N Groom (C Shiel 59); P Schoeman (J Bhati 61), M Willemse (C Fenton 61), P Ceccarelli (M McCallum 61), J Hodgson, M Douglas, M Kunavula (A Miller 49), L Crosbie, N Haining.

REF – B Whitehouse (WRU).