Home Pro 14 Semi-Final, Sat 18/5 @ The RDS, 14.30

[joooooe]

I had forgotten how much I enjoy it when Leinster beat Munster. It was perhaps more enjoyable when their players were from Munster.

[cormac]

Sean Cronin's 40th try for Leinster. Only one current Leinster player in the squad has scored more tries than him. Phenomenal effort from him over the years.

[alanair]

Few things on the re-watch:

JVDF makes our defensive line completely different. He's simply immense off the line. His hit on Kilcoyne just after we lost a lineout early in second half was a particular highlight.

Conan completely outplayed CJ (again). He had two huge hits on Joey just before HT too, one going forward and one defending. I'd say he enjoyed that.
His footwork means he usually gets hit on his own terms and it's hugely helpful. Stander is an utter bosh merchant. Looks for contact every. single. time.
Ruddock outplayed Peter O'nonymous also.

Our starting halfbacks were really good. McGrath really bounced back from last week. Bought a pen in the 1st half and the yellow in the second. Some really nice little snipes and generally kept the tempo up. Byrne put in some huge defensive hits, one on Farrell in particular.

I actually thought Larmour was poor live, but he looked good and dangerous on the re-watch. Absolutely killed John Ryan and Scannell with a sidestep just before HT too.

Lowe is an absolute utter b*%&!cks. Fantastic shithousery from him at times. The little disagreement with Conway at the end followed by Lowe absolutely emptying a Munster carrier and then sticking it in Conway's face

Ryan was his usual self. Makes yards every carry. Fardy was quiet besides one huge turnoever.

Bit worried about Tadhg's form. Munster's pack usually have an edge on us in the scrum, but Tadhg was poor today I thought. (Bar his pass for the try, quality.)

Ringer isn't in great form. Him and Robbie just a few degrees off their best. This will be a big area of improvement for next weekend.

DK was good. Not a lot to do but thought he added a lot coming in field. Our back three's rucking game is immense, which is a strange thing to say but so important to momentum and continuity.

The lineout move we worked just before the Scannell yellow was excellent. Conan made yards and then the pass back inside to Cronin on the burst.

Also I loved how we backed our three young guys on the bench at a critical time. Excellent to see. Delighted for Porter too. He has had a tough season.

I really dislike Conway ( and not just because he’s a former ‘rock boy ... but more so because of his ‘I was always really a Lunster boy’ comments) - so its great to see Lowe winding him up - sure he’s a b*%&!cks - but he’s OUR b*%&!cks !!

[neiliog93]

Brave but flawed performance. Munster really threw the kitchen sink at us in the first half and were on top in the collisions and the scrum. Their inept attack and our brave defence saw us through. We really turned the screw in the second half and despite a lot of errors the tries we did take were excellent. Well done to all, especially van der Flier, Ross Byrne, Lowe and Jack Conan.

[leinsterfan100]

Moment of the day from James Lowe, excellent stuff on Conway, I approve!

[cormac]

Noticed that Conway was fairly mouthy throughout the match

[cormac]

Jimmy Jimmy

https://twitter.com/Murray_Kinsella/sta ... 4556597249

[wixfjord]

Love the way Conway looks at him at the end as if to say 'What sort of a lunatic is this fella?'

[carlow man]

Delighted it ended up lowe going over. Conway comes across as a right p***k and between him and cj standstill
, they both spend all match trying to wind Leinster players up. Standstill goading Ryan after they win a scrum against 7 men! He should look at Conan and learn a few things! He's the best 8 in Ireland followed by coetzee. Think I spelt it wrong but gave it a lash!

[cormac]

As easy as 1-3-2

https://twitter.com/Murray_Kinsella/sta ... 3509092352

[tomthefan]

I'm warning ye, much more of this shyte talk and I'll shout for Glasgow in the final.

[ronk]

Jimmy Jimmy

https://twitter.com/Murray_Kinsella/sta ... 4556597249

Watched that about 50 times.

[Barry]

thought our back row were incredible today - stander and o'mahony not in their league

[nelly the elephant]

Not exactly a ringing endorsement from the coaching staff to Deegan the last fortnight. Disappointed that he was so late off the bench today.

Thought our back row was totally dominant today. Can understand the desire to keep them on there.

That first try we scored, in the end it was passes out wide from Healy to Furlong to Cronin. Some hands and both of the props took the tackle before passing. Proper rugby that. Dont know many front rows that can do that. Also have to commend them (and Fogarty) for sorting out the scrum and pushing the maul more in the second half. Made a huge difference.

Agree 100%. They were excellent although JVDF, given his long absence....really was off the charts. Very satisfying performance, I was amazed by the energy today after the mammoth tackling effort last week.

[Twist]

One area that was still shaky was our lineout. Not having Toner next week won’t help matters


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[Serb]

One area that was still shaky was our lineout. Not having Toner next week won’t help matters

In fairness, Munster are probably the best team in Europe at disrupting a line out. Everyone looks incompetent against them.

Our lineout has been solid against pretty much everyone else, I wouldn’t worry too much about it.

[D2 Blue]

I'm warning ye, much more of this shyte talk and I'll shout for Glasgow in the final.

Ah ye wouldn't do that, would you?
What kind of s***e talk do you expect after what we went through last week. C'mon seriously!

[D2 Blue]

Strange atmosphere at the RDS today. No disrespect to Munster but the result never really looked in doubt after about 20 mins.
Although the crowd were getting behind the team, it really felt flat. Probably because of last week. Maybe that was just in the north stand and I was surrounded by munster fans. Had a bit of craic with them anyway.
Plenty of positives from the game, mainly Josh coming back and playing everyone else off the field.
I'm not sure if that level of performance will be enough to see off Glasgow but I've every faith in Leo and co to get them ready.
After looking at the comments on mf.com, its funny that I took a similar view of our performance last week that they took of Munster's performance today.
Not sharp enough, some bad decision making, the ref, not managing yellow cards (both ways) better.
Still, at least there's a chance of redemption next week.

[Laighin Break]

Leo the lion stole a Munster fans flag at one stage. It was glorious.

Bitterly disappointed his head fell off last Saturday in Newcastle - who knew he wasn't real....never meet your heroes, I say!

Would never have happened to the old Leo

What actually happened to the old Leo? He used to be ripped

[blockhead]

I'm warning ye, much more of this shyte talk and I'll shout for Glasgow in the final.

You're right about Darcy. Awful co-comms. Simply dreadful. Surprised he's still goin after last years diabolical effort in twickers.
As for the game, one of our easier wins over the "unsullied" (not capable of penetration).
8 years now without a trophy.