Ulster Away Rescheduled Round 9 Game Sat Mar 12 7:35pm Premier Sports & TG4

[Flash Gordon]

A tough game in tough condition's. Ulster are in form at the moment and were close to a full strength squad which is why I thought the bookies were a bit stingy on the odds.. If I was a Ulster fan I would be disappointed that they weren't able to do more damage to our seconds. That we got a losing bonus and could have stolen it should be worrying for Ulster but is a sign of how strong our depth is

Don't think it's fair to refer to them as seconds. You win trophies with the squad, we've been doing that for years. Lads like Rhys or Benty have arguably been our most important squad players in recent times.

For me, the real shame with this is the timing of the fixture. Leinster vs Ulster is a big Irish derby (the biggest one for me personally) and has been played in front of 50k people, it should be a showcase occasion for the League not on the aftercard of an international.

Fair play to Ulster though, they've done us twice this season, credit to them.

4 academy players: 1 making his debut on an emergency last minute basis.

1 starter (and that only because he's been ahead of a player with the international squad).

It was a top of the table clash and released internationals were decisive. I'm not saying it was unfair or making excuses, we had our chances.

It was a rescheduled match so it's not like they did this deliberately, both teams were able to field strong teams capable of playing a high level of rugby.

Think we had more internationals in our matchday 23 than they did. I know we were impacted but that's always the case for Leinster at this time of year. Appreciate scheduling has been difficult this year but this time was poor, we stopped playing during the Autumn internationals and our other derby game against Munster is in the middle of the cricket season! Think the URC need to have a look at all of this. From a season ticket point of view, people will be going into renewal season with our last home game in the RDS in February, so timing does matter commercially.