Leinster v Bulls Friday RDS 19:35 TG4

[nc6000]

Just slight favourites according to Gerry........

Betting: 1/40 Leinster, 50/1 Draw, 14/1 Bulls. Handicap odds (Bulls +20pts) 10/11 Leinster, 18/1 Draw, 10/11 Bulls.

Forecast: Leinster to win.

[munster#1]

Hi all.

I won’t go into details with my opinion on the game because it won’t be welcomed by some, and will ruin the thread.

However I will commiserate with you all.
Unfortunately I know all too well what you are going through, but that is the joy of sport.

The last few seasons have shown where Leinster have deficiencies. The list of deficiencies is a lot smaller than other teams and very fixable imo.
With the introduction of the SA teams to the URC and the HC, and the fact that they are strengthening their teams for next season, means that other teams must up their games.
Failure to perform a complete evaluation will mean that the gap will only increase next season.

[wixfjord]

Another big underperformance in a knockout unfortunately. It's now a commonly recurring theme.

Questions to be asked of the management and our mental preperation at this stage.

Forward coaching clearly an issue as well.

Lineout and maul taken apart today again. Combine that with our scrum issues and it's a familiar pattern.

Bulls pack were 30kg lighter than ours. Power isn't our issue, it's being able to play under pressure and our set piece, including maul that's the issue.

Such a disappointing way to end the season.

Bulls pack 30kg lighter? I would take that with a pinch of salt. It didn't look like that out there. If you go by the weights on the Bulls website [here: https://bullsrugby.co.za/profiles/vodacom-bulls/], I think it works out as pretty much even-steven.

Elrigh Louw 112kg [-2kg]
Arno Botha 108kg [+5kg]
Marcel Coetzee 116kg [+10kg]
Walt Steenkamp 121kg [+2kg]
Ruan Nortje 113kg [-2kg]
Mornay Smith 109kg [-16kg]
Johan Grobelaar 98kg [-13kg]
Gerhard Steenkamp 128kg [+14kg]

They had a bigger backrow, we had a heavier front row, second row cancelled each other out.

ESPN have us with 13 turnover knock-ons [source: https://www.espn.com/rugby/match?gameId ... gue=270557 ] ... I wasn't counting them, but it did seem like a lot. Between the knock-ons and the stolen/or disrupted lineouts, we put ourselves under pressure and, conversely, they did a great job of relieving pressure on themselves.

I can't recall a lineout taking us apart like that, and I have to take my hat off to them. A brilliant performance out of touch. They had obviously done some outstanding work in the limited time available to them, they executed brilliantly and absolutely took us to the woodshed in that part of the game.

I was very impressed with their tackling, their kick-chase and their intensity. Those South Africans worked hard and never let up. The penalty try/yellow card was the opposite end of the field from me so very difficult to see what happened there. I'll hold my whist on that until I see a replay.

Very disappointing to lose at home in a SF – very deflating. We don't lose many games at home and it's a tough scene. But we were second best out there today.

That's what the URC stats said yes.

It certainly didn't look like that out there, and my point was that even when we're actually a heavier pack we seem to not be able to get our set piece right.

I don't put this down to 'power' as many seem to as I've always thought it's way too oversimplified and doesn't tell the whole picture at all.

I don't think we lack the physicality to win these games.

I think our key issues are mental and structural technical (scrum, lineout, maul defence).

[Blueberry]

Hi all.

I won’t go into details with my opinion on the game because it won’t be welcomed by some, and will ruin the thread.

However I will commiserate with you all.
Unfortunately I know all too well what you are going through, but that is the joy of sport.

The last few seasons have shown where Leinster have deficiencies. The list of deficiencies is a lot smaller than other teams and very fixable imo.
With the introduction of the SA teams to the URC and the HC, and the fact that they are strengthening their teams for next season, means that other teams must up their games.
Failure to perform a complete evaluation will mean that the gap will only increase next season.

Agreed the SA teams have definitely stopped the procession like nature of the Pro 14 and provides a new challenge now going forward for all the Irish provinces and can only improve standards. That is very clear !!

Trophies are definitely going to be harder to come by.

By all means do post your views on the game, don't imagine it is anything too 'controversial' and jeepers we are all probably thinking the same thing !! In the cold light of day my own feeling is the camp assumed this would be a win, the Glasgow match was a total farce which was the worst possible prep and a level of arrogance in not starting Sexton was a major mistake. Why we made so many mistakes is harder to put the finger on but that can often happen when things don't immediately go the way you want and you have to chase a game. Leinster's season has very few examples of adversity or chasing games (so many including qtr and semi finals in the HEC were blown away in the first half) that the mindset needed to 'dog out' a game isn't always something you can turn on if it isn't regularly practiced. It is a hard balance. But we have young players the likes of Sheehan McCarthy etc who will learn so much from this we have a bright future.

We could do with a couple of key players coming through in the pack or imports , we are close but just need a sprinkling of bulk and nouse. We I feel were one Hines or Thorn away from two trophies this year.....

[wixfjord]

Interested to see the praise J10 is getting for his cameo.

He was a big step up on Ross who unfortunately doesn't look up to this level.

But I thought he came in way too hot headed and added to our sense of panic and lack of clear minds with some of his mouthing, body language and scuffling.

Obviously he was trying to change the game but needed to captain and control it more I felt as it was getting away from us.

[enby]

by paddyor

Luke Mcgrath hasn’t adapted well to eithe
1)the new game plan
B)becoming No. 2

A bit nervous of him being the guy to come on and close out/win a game.

Our inability to produce another scrumhalf to compete with him is a problem. I think next year we need to be more ruthless make a hard sell for Blade or Casey and explain competing with JPG will mean more success and most likely more International experience because right now we have the worst back-up scrumhalf in all the Provinces.

Couldn't agree more. Presumably IRFU wouldn't allow an approach to either of the two you mentioned if they are mid-contract. Is there a NIQ 9 currently playing for any of the provinces? If not, it is time to think outside the box here and consider recruiting the likes of Parra ( OK I know he has gone elsewhere), Care or Cubelli, a 9 with proven top level experience who is unlikely to be selected for 6N or Autumn Internationals. Such a player would add a lot to the squad.

A similar loose head would be great too. There must be a load of them in France or Argentina or even England....Marler??!!??

[LeinsterLeader]

Someone should but together a list of what the issues are according to this forum. From lack of power, to lineout issues, bad skills, concentrating to much on skills and not enough on physical contact, concentrating too much on trying to be physical and forgetting our skills, no viable second scrum half, no viable second out half, our on-field decision making is poor......... anything else?

Jaysus, I think we're in trouble lads

[enby]

Too many rubbish opponents like Zebre, Dragons and Munster

[LeinsterLeader]

Too many rubbish opponents like Zebre, Dragons and Munster

Good one. I forgot about that one the 'quality of the opposition'

It'll be good to have it listed in case the coaching team are looking in. They won't need to search around.

[Dexter]

Too many rubbish opponents like Zebre, Dragons and Munster

Good one. I forgot about that one the 'quality of the opposition'

It'll be good to have it listed in case the coaching team are looking in. They won't need to search around.

Don't forget no Will Skelton... although that's probably covered in one of the others.
But you can never have too many fatal flaws!

[LeRouxIsPHat]

Someone should but together a list of what the issues are according to this forum. From lack of power, to lineout issues, bad skills, concentrating to much on skills and not enough on physical contact, concentrating too much on trying to be physical and forgetting our skills, no viable second scrum half, no viable second out half, our on-field decision making is poor......... anything else?

Jaysus, I think we're in trouble lads

You joke but we do have some pretty big issues to address at this stage. With the exception of the apparent mental block we can get in certain big games I think they’re all fixable but in all honesty I would say that the last five years are likely to look better than the next five years.

I’m not saying we’re finished, and as I said I think we can improve a lot of our issues, but at the same time we have to be realistic about our shortcomings and the improvement in teams around us. It often just comes down to fine margins, although I didn’t think it did yesterday regardless of the final score, but right now I think we’re likely to end up on the wrong side of those tight margins more often than not.

Even just taking outhalf as an example, are we likely to be better with a nearly 38 year old Sexton this time next year? Will Harry or Frawley be anywhere near as good as him the following season? We might be less reliant on him than we used to be but that alone is a cause for concern and requires an in depth review. As I’ve said before I’d start with making Frawley the first choice number 22 regardless of who the second best outhalf actually is. Changes like that are needed from the start of next season if we’re going to actually see a difference in 12 months time. It’s not just personnel though, there are lots of things we could improve.

[LeinsterLeader]

Too many rubbish opponents like Zebre, Dragons and Munster

Good one. I forgot about that one the 'quality of the opposition'

It'll be good to have it listed in case the coaching team are looking in. They won't need to search around.

Don't forget no Will Skelton... although that's probably covered in one of the others.
But you can never have too many fatal flaws!

Of course...... and how could I forget out shite scrum!

Thinking about it now maybe we shouldn't be asking how we lost a final and Semi. Maybe we should be asking how we got there in the first place

Ah Laughter is healing!!!!

[OTT]

Interested to see the praise J10 is getting for his cameo.

He was a big step up on Ross who unfortunately doesn't look up to this level.

But I thought he came in way too hot headed and added to our sense of panic and lack of clear minds with some of his mouthing, body language and scuffling.

Obviously he was trying to change the game but needed to captain and control it more I felt as it was getting away from us.

I thought he was brilliant, I thought his fight showed us what we missed when he went off in Marseille (where he didn’t have his best game) Our performance up to his introduction was a bit nonchalant I thought it had already got away from us, he got the crowd going, he got his teammates going, the Bulls efforts to upset him showed they knew the red carpet we had rolled out for them was over for the next number of minutes. I think if he would have had another 10 minutes he would have dragged us over the line.

I think my real upset, and I’m still devastated this morning is that we have let him down over the two biggest games of the season, we are a team of Irish players but our dependency on this guy who’s nearly 37 is unreal, he should be able to have mediocre games and there should be enough other players to get us through them, we have loads of class players but do we have another guy who plays as hard as Sexton? he’s a f%~king winner and he wants to win every match be it shite opposition, alright opposition or the best. He will do whatever he thinks is necessary to win and when he doesn’t win it hurts him. He’s done it all but wants more, I’m not sure how you make someone else into his mould but we need someone who cares as much going forward, hated by the opposition because of his refusal to f%~king go away, loved by his own fans because he will give you a shot even when things are not going your way.

The second paragraph was meandering from the point and nothing to do with your point just thinking about life without him, it’s gonna be very different and scary for Leinster and Ireland going forward. We can talk about how we have moved away and not playing off him as much but he’s still very much our fulcrum. He’s basically been the backbone of the team since the 2007-2008 breakthrough league win

[LeinsterLeader]

Someone should but together a list of what the issues are according to this forum. From lack of power, to lineout issues, bad skills, concentrating to much on skills and not enough on physical contact, concentrating too much on trying to be physical and forgetting our skills, no viable second scrum half, no viable second out half, our on-field decision making is poor......... anything else?

Jaysus, I think we're in trouble lads

You joke but we do have some pretty big issues to address at this stage. With the exception of the apparent mental block we can get in certain big games I think they’re all fixable but in all honesty I would say that the last five years are likely to look better than the next five years.

I’m not saying we’re finished, and as I said I think we can improve a lot of our issues, but at the same time we have to be realistic about our shortcomings and the improvement in teams around us. It often just comes down to fine margins, although I didn’t think it did yesterday regardless of the final score, but right now I think we’re likely to end up on the wrong side of those tight margins more often than not.

Even just taking outhalf as an example, are we likely to be better with a nearly 38 year old Sexton this time next year? Will Harry or Frawley be anywhere near as good as him the following season? We might be less reliant on him than we used to be but that alone is a cause for concern and requires an in depth review. As I’ve said before I’d start with making Frawley the first choice number 22 regardless of who the second best outhalf actually is. Changes like that are needed from the start of next season if we’re going to actually see a difference in 12 months time. It’s not just personnel though, there are lots of things we could improve.

Yes, I do joke and of course we have problems, all teams have. And maybe it is all down hill from here but that's sport. Maybe that will take some of the pressure off the team and supporters can concentrate on us getting big wins instead of the current situation were winning doesn't seem to be enough we have to be the best in the world too.

There's in no doubt there's truth and merit in what you say but here's a sobering thought...... for all the problems you have listed and the one's I have joked about we were still one juddering tackle causing a knock-on in Marseille and one penalty kick last night from probably doing the double. In that case we wouldn't be having this conversation because nobody would care about our lack of power, or dodgey half-backs on so on. They just wouldn't. You might, but you'd be hard pushed to find someone to have that conversation with and that's the truth.

And that is sport. Small margins etc.

[jezzer]

I thought we coped perfectly well with the Bulls power. Collisions, scrum, redzone and maul were all, to my eyes, honours even at worst. We maybe even shaded them.

Where we fell down was on handling errors, lineout mistakes and ruck protection.

The Bulls, like LAR, play on the edge of everything. They both remind me of the Seattle Seahawks defence in its pomp around 10 years ago, who took the attitude that the refs won't blow up every play so they might as well be illegal in every play. Marry that with stellar defence, winning contestables and some star quality in the pack and back three....

The Bulls are the leagues second highest try scorers, create a huge number of linebreaks and offload it well. There were always going to be tries conceded to them and so it was. Where Leinster lost was in not punishing them with tries of our own. Just like with LAR, poor handling and abandoning our attacking principles killed us, as did the lineout.

Whereas in the Pro14 knockout stage we could roll out some depth players at key positions and still win, with the Saffers involved nothing less than our best XV is going to cut it.

[LeRouxIsPHat]

LL I don’t think that’s true tbh, even when we annihilate teams there’s still lots of criticism.

Just one thought I’m going to throw out there that could potentially improve things and have nothing to do with power. Should we be looking at bringing in a new coach with particular expertise on the maul/lineout? No disrespect to Leo but I think a new set of eyes would be good and given that Leo keeps signing one year deals it might be prudent to have someone else there helping in that area anyway for when he eventually leaves.

One more thing, a captain who’s there week in week out a la Isa and is used to making decisions or can speak up to someone like Sexton or Ryan in big games might be good. There’s no obvious candidate though tbf.

[OTT]

And that is sport. Small margins etc.

You’re dead right of course. Sure look we were winning the La Rochelle match with 90 seconds to go. This game last night ended a one score game. The two games we lost by a combined score of -4. One moment different in each match and we are still the best team on the planet and we don’t bother looking into our shortcomings.

I do think we had more to show in both games, I’m so upset for the boys because they have given us so much over an incredible season and they have nothing to show for it, I know they say you get what you deserve but these lads have had an incredible season and must be collectively devastated as coming up short in both competitions. I’m spinning wheels here this morning, this team give me/us so much. I think there are genuine posters and there are the usual few who just go to that dark place where they target things and individuals that aren’t really there but that says more about them. (Not talking about LRIP there btw a great contributor to the site). I think we are all just sad at the minute

Keep the positive posts coming because you are dead right. Roll on next year where we chase the dream again with an expectation that most teams don’t have.

[Leinster Lout]

In knock-out rugby in most competitions you have to pose problems or at least questions of the opposition. Even including the NZ teams, it is rarely enough to just play your normal style, you must surprise or un-nerve your opponents.

Listening to Jake White being interviewed / questioned on Premier Sports coverage, he was very frank about their desire to pressure Leinster, particularly at breakdown and at the front of line-outs. He was also very clear that they tried to avoid giving us line-outs and then trying to impose their physicality on us in carries & tackles.

Our fundamental game is based on trying to put players into space and constantly trying to maintain tempo in possession. Both of those objectives are the antithesis of trying to impose our physicality on teams. Accordingly we don't see it as a strength, nor do we practice it. We can't practice for it either because we just don't have physical specimens who can impose physicality on our starting XV in training.

For many Leinster fans, it appears that the concept of physicality as an asset is just alien, almost illegal. Unfortunately it remains a vital component of winning many games of rugby, often for teams that are less skillful. As a Club, this season should teach us that we must improve our physicality, possibly through the introduction of players like Jenkins, but also by a different form of preparation of players like Porter, Furlong, Kelleher, Sheehan, Ryan and Doris. JVdF has shown that real improvement in particular aspects is both possible and very valuable. Others may have to be pointed in the right direction.

It may sound like heresy but Porter, Furlong and Ryan, as the most notable examples, may have to work extra hard on their physicality in attack and defence even if it means they reduce the time spent on their ball skills. Physicality isn't purely a matter of size, it's also a function of how you apply the body-weight you have. Robbie Henshaw has physicality in every game he plays. Not every Leinster player exhibits the same traits.

I'd agree with a lot of this and also struggle to believe the Bulls were lighter. I do think that our gameplan of quick recycling and always thinking of the next phase inhibits our carrying: apart from Henshaw, you rarely see our carriers going at full tilt, probably on the basis that they are more focussed on recycling. That's probably the gameplan but maybe we need to be more gung ho and as above, we need to work on our power. VDF has shown massive improvements in this regard over the past year. I think it's reasonable to expect the likes of Conan and Doris - both of whom have been v poor the past couple of months - to stay on their feet longer in the carry.

Agree that Leo should be called out for some selections. Rhys shouldve started. So too Frawley.

Anyone have the link to Jake White interview? Aside from the disappointment of yesterday, I'm delighted and pleasantly surprised at how much the SA teams are adding to the URC already. Shows the depth of talent in SA and makes their relatively long odds for the World Cup all the more bizarre. I'd make them marginally second favourites behind France.

[LeinsterLeader]

LL I don’t think that’s true tbh, even when we annihilate teams there’s still lots of criticism.

Just one thought I’m going to throw out there that could potentially improve things and have nothing to do with power. Should we be looking at bringing in a new coach with particular expertise on the maul/lineout? No disrespect to Leo but I think a new set of eyes would be good and given that Leo keeps signing one year deals it might be prudent to have someone else there helping in that area anyway for when he eventually leaves.

One more thing, a captain who’s there week in week out a la Isa and is used to making decisions or can speak up to someone like Sexton or Ryan in big games might be good. There’s no obvious candidate though tbf.

I think they're good suggestions LRIP and I think your on the right lines in relation to smaller changes like that rather then having to look at changing our rugby style. We were close this year, dam close and I don't think it's time to tear up the script and start again (maybe ultimately it will come to that).

I'd rather we tried to adjust what we do now, like you have suggested above. I like the way we play, I enjoy watching us. I thought the Bulls were brilliant last night, hard and Cynical, real pantomime villain's but awesome with their power ......but I wouldn't like to support them. There's plenty to admire in what they do but there's little excitement. Right now I feel that If we have to become the bulls etc to become successful (or go that route) I don't think I'd bother. A big statement I know but that's how I feel right now. Others feel power is the only way as that's the way the game is going and we have to keep up with the times. Maybe they're right but I hope not. As long as there's a chance buy adjusting what we do we can at some point overcome the big powerful teams on a regular basis, then I'm happy to go through nights light Marseille and last night.

[LeinsterLeader]

Keep the positive posts coming because you are dead right. Roll on next year where we chase the dream again with an expectation that most teams don’t have.

Thanks man, I appreciate that!