Leinster ... 12 Montferrand ... 9This was about as hard-earned as it gets. The match was tryless but hardly lacked drama, and a capacity Donnybrook crowd were held spellbound until the last whistle as Leinster made it four from four in Pool Four of the Heineken European Cup.
At least they can enjoy Christmas more than most now.
Certainly more than Montferrand, whom Leinster have effectively evicted from the competition by inflicting a third pool defeat on them. Montferrand fought for their lives last night, and Leinster will rarely dig deeper physically to claw their way to the finishing-line.
It was hard, full-on, highly physical and unforgiving rugby. Stoppages were regular and the game finished with uncontested scrums and over eight minutes of injury-time.
The ball was largely kept in the hand and recycled well, but nothing came easy, least of all any holes in two grimly determined defensive lines. Montferrand's scrambling defence in the second-half was beyond belief. Against other sides, Leinster would have scored a few tries.
"Montferrand are a brilliant side," said a hoarse Leinster coach Matt Williams afterwards. "There were two sides capable of winning this tournament in this pool. You just have to applaud them. How we didn't score a try in the second-half I don't know."
In the first half, Leinster conceded too much territory by trying to construct too much from their own half and their kicking game, as such, was unexceptional.
Their touch-finds were often short, their kicks downfield easily dealt with and giving Sebastien Viars and Co ample time and room to return them with interest.
Leinster were altogether cuter in the second half, most of which was played in the Montferrand half. The pack upped the ante and you only had to look at the state of Keith Gleeson, Malcolm O'Kelly and Reggie Corrigan at the end to appreciate that. They looked like they'd been dragged through a hedge backwards.
Christian Warner probed much better than he did a week ago, as did the direct David Quinlan and the elusive Brian O'Driscoll, while Denis Hickie was close to his very best.
The Leinster heroes had originally returned to a standing ovation from what seemed a capacity 7,500 crowd, Shane Byrne leading Les Bleus out on the occasion of his 100th cap, then turning to sheepishly discover that his teammates were deliberately lagging well behind.
Gerald Merceron and Brian O'Meara quickly exchanged penalties, whereupon the game settled into a sort of stalemate.
A more vocal than usual Donnybrook crowd were feeding off isolated incidents; O'Kelly stealing a lineout or David Bory - a nervous-looking hate figure - barely touching the ball.
Much like last week, though, Leinster were struggling to construct their running patterns as Montferrand again pushed up quick and tackled hard, and twice O'Driscoll kicked downfield to no great effect.
The gain-lines were largely holding firm, though it was Montferrand who were asking most of the questions.
Excellent Leinster defence, first withholding the initial maul and then in midfield and on the blind-side over seven phases, was epitomised by Quinlan's rib-tickler on Raphael Chanal.
Significantly, Leinster looked at their most dangerous off broken play. In between another exchange of penalties - Victor Costello being done for not releasing when tackled from behind and Chanal playing ruck ball on the deck - Hickie counter-attacked from inside his own 22 with a show of the ball and turn of foot.
He fed Shane Horgan on the outside before the ball was adjudged to have gone fractionally forward when he was tackled prior to Girvan Dempsey's pick-up and pass to the supporting Keith Gleeson.
The half ended with another Montferrand maul being pulled down and Merceron being awarded a three-pointer, though it looked fractionally high and wide of the near upright, especially to the section of the crowd in line with the kick at the Bective end.
Needing a bright start to the second-half, instead Montferrand stole an intended lineout for O'Kelly, and then Corrigan couldn't take a hard, fast popped ball from O'Meara. Eventually, though, they began to penetrate.
O'Driscoll was the spark, spinning through the midfield jungle and making an astonishing left-handed flipped offload.
Costello rumbled upfield some more and slicker passing might have put Hickie over in the opposite corner though Gleeson's hands for a low gather were astonishing before Quinlan was held up just short.
Suddenly, chances were coming and going in rapid-fire succession. Christian Warner was held up just short, then glided through, but couldn't offload to Horgan, and from the recycle the back-row couldn't close out what looked a certain try as Alexandre Audebert scampered across to stop Costello.
After a 40-metre miss, O'Meara tied matters past the hour, and Hickie, O'Driscoll and Miller all probed tellingly in another searching move before Horgan was forced into touch just short.
From a defensive Montferrand scrum, blindside flanker Alexandre Audebert was spotted tugging O'Meara's jersey to enable Marc Raynaud a clear path up the blind-side and the scrumhalf exacted full retribution with the lead penalty.
It remained tough going until the very end.
Viars missed a kickable drop-goal, but reinforcements upped the big hits and a relieving penalty for crossing ensured Leinster saw it out away from danger.
Amid the mini-pitch invasion, Shane Byrne was lifted shoulder high and returned the crowd's applause. One for him to tell the twins about.
SCORING SEQUENCE
2 mins - Mercereon pen 0-3
4 mins - O'Meara pen 3-3
23 mins - Merceron pen 3-6
34 mins - O'Meara pen 6-6
40 (+5 mins) - Merceron pen 6-9
Half-time: 6-9
61 mins - O'Meara pen 9-9
68 mins - O'Meara pen 12-9
Full-time:12-9
LEINSTER: G Dempsey; S Horgan, B O'Driscoll, S Horgan, D Hickie; C Warner, B O'Meara; R Corrigan (capt), S Byrne, E Byrne, L Cullen, M O'Kelly, E Miller, V Costello, K Gleeson. Replacements: A McCullen for Costello (23-32 mins) and for Miller; N Spooner for Dempsey (30-40 mins) and for Warner (77 mins); P Coyle for E Byrne (68 mins); D Dillon for Costello (77 mins).
MONTFERRAND: S Viars; J Marlu, J Ngaumo, R Chanal, D Bory; G Merceron, G Sudre; S Delpuech, A Castola, S Bozzi, T Jaques, O Brouzet, A Audebert, M Raynaud, O Magne (capt). Replacements: D Ashvetia for Delpuech (30 mins); Y N Gog for Marlu (57 mins); R Cockerill for Castola (63 mins); L Vaitanaki for Brouzet ((68 mins); J Machacek for Asvetia (80 mins).
Referee: C White (England).
