Breakdown war
NOW that they have the Champions Cup trophy back in their cabinet, Leinster can look forward to being the benchmark team that everyone wants to have a crack at. First up, it’s Munster in a PRO14 semi-final and as intriguing a match-up as we’ve had all season.
This rivalry has been crying out for a high-stakes encounter. They may be forced to rotate, but the European champions will field their strongest possible team, while Johann van Graan has had a two-week window and no distractions.
He is an admirer of how this Leinster team play the game, but the Munster coach’s primary focus for the past fortnight has been working out how to limit their opportunities.
Munster will want to impose their own style on proceedings, but are away from home and against a team that has lost just six of 30 games this season.
While many didn’t appreciate the borderline turgid nature of events in Bilbao last weekend, the South African would have been an intrigued onlooker and has undoubtedly been through the footage several times to see just how Racing 92 nearly halted Leinster’s unstoppable march.
Itwasa relatively simple game plan, well executed and the Blues’ coaching staff and players are all too aware that it was highly effective.
“They worked us out and that’s what you do,” scrum coach John Fogarty (above) said. “You think about the games we were mentally or physically off in and we’ve come undone in similar areas when we’ve been slowed up.
“I watched that Edinburgh (v Munster) game and I think they snagged the scrum-half four times and the collisions, there was a lot of impact.
“Racing had that energy at
UNLIKE most French teams for whom size matters, Racing fielded a side packed with athletic forwards who treated every ruck as an opportunity.
The conditions allowed them to bank on Leinster not being able to shift the ball wide, which meant the French side could throw more bodies into the breakdown and make life awkward for Luke McGrath and slow the ball getting out to Johnny Sexton.
Turnovers were at a premi-