Heineken Cup rematches will be tough as teams find chinks in each other’s armour

SUN TZU must have had the middle two matches of a Heineken Cup campaign in mind when penning The Art of War. “One may know how to conquer without being able to do it”. The sign of championship capability is the team that can change their game mid-match to adapt to two key issues.

The first key issue is pretty obvious; the opposition. Munster have been doing this brilliantly over the past weeks where three Heineken Cup wins have come from mastering the at-times superior opposition. Connacht, at times, managed Gloucester in similar fashion.

The second key issue is mastering not the opposition but yourselves. Leinster managed this brilliantly in Bath last Sunday where they could have scored several tries of the season, but didn’t and found themselves in a dogfight, not with Bath but with themselves. They recognised this and played accordingly.

The previous day in the Sportsground, Connacht failed to manage Connacht, having managed Gloucester brilliantly by keeping them to one try.

Unfortunately Connacht, having played and defended brilliantly, were unable to swing the pendulum their way when it really counted; on the clock, the scoreboard and the position on the pitch. Eric Elwood was bitterly disappointed in not winning and so he should be, as tomorrow in Kingsholm will be far tougher, but he should be mindful and so should his players that Leinster and Munsters ability to win close matches has taken years to perfect. I found myself in the Recreation Ground last Sunday and was very excited by the prospect. Although I know Bath rugby very well, this was my first trip to their beautiful city. For some days I had mulled over their English Premiership position and concluded it would be foolhardy to be lulled into an easy win for Leinster. Not because Leinster haven’t more than enough credentials for the task, but because All Black World Cup hero Stephen Donald was togging out for Bath. I made some assumptions based on his inclusion. Consequently, my eyes rarely drifted from him – and I was amazed by what I saw. The very obvious butchering of scoring chances came from the Leinster team, but it was the Bath outhalf who did untold damage to his very vulnerable team.

The statistics declare that he carried for 23 metres, but the vast majority were lateral, starving his outside backs of time and space. As his scrumhalf Michael Claassens fired the ball out to him he would consistently drift away from the source and in possession he would juggle before passing on. This was affording Fergus McFadden at outside centre buckets of time to line up his hit. Not content with this, Donald elected continually for the cut-out pass, spinning the ball in front of his runners to Dan Hipkiss or further wide Matt Banahan. Again, Leinster simply shifted their defence en bloc to easily cater for the Bath attack. It was a very poor performance by the outhalf. So much so that I had to erase the first quarter from my mind and start over assuming that I’d got it wrong. Could he be missing so many tackles (six)? Pre-match, I felt Bath would elect for monster Banahan, but at centre. Last Sunday he started on the wing and brought the only light to a very hard-working but limited Bath team. Interestingly, his influence came from kick-offs where he caused untold damage to Leinster’s receipts.

With Leinster selection this weekend in mind, his 7th minute cameo tells a lot. Bath threw to Francois Louw at the tail, who offloaded to Ryan Caldwell, who found Claassens. It was the first time the scrumhalf skipped Donald when he found Banahan charging on to the gainline between Jonny Sexton and Leinster’s openside Seán O’Brien.

There’s an awful lot of activity at the tail of these lineouts and Shane Jennings is far better versed in its defence. On 64 minutes Bath, through a Louw steal on the right, went all the way left and all the way back again through two breakdowns and 11 sets of hands before Banahan crashed over for a super try.

It was a cracker where the preceding phases were full of speed, lightness of hand, gainline threat, quick ruck ball and in Banahan’s case hard running at weak shoulders. The one notable absentee from the play was outhalf and World Cup winner Donald!

I was very disappointed in Bath, not their effort, but their application. Watch their alignment off turnover ball or multiphase ball. They are ill-disciplined and poorly aligned (flat). Then contrast this to Leinster.

“If you know the enemy and know yourself, you need not fear the result of a hundred battles.” Once again Sun Tzu has hit on the uniqueness of the middle matches because all combatants have a far greater understanding of their targets this weekend. Some years back, while with Leinster, we played and defeated the European champions Northampton Saints in Franklin’s Gardens.

Im not sure how well we knew them but six days later they knew us. By half-time we were wrecked and in trouble. They had managed in the few short days to wake up to the Leinster threat that in some way hoodwinked them earlier. We too had learned from the encounter and where our scrum had been mangled it was now very solid. The danger for Munster on Sunday is the lessons learned by Scarlets. For all Rhys Priestland has achieved these past few months, especially on the gainline, to see him moving into fullback was very disappointing.

Last Friday I spent much time on Stephen Jones, who against Ulster looked wooden and far from the player we’ve admired for so long.

Losing at home was a blow to Scarlets, but if Munster can get consistently beyond five phases in the opening quarter Scarlets will lose again. I’m still not convinced by Will Chambers who continues to be too sloppy in the offload. The ball passer is responsible for the arrival to the receiver and as Simon Zebo dropped the ball for Scarlets try I couldn’t but look at Chambers.

Contrast that to Denis Hurley’s line and offload for Niall Ronan’s try. Ronan had a big game, working very hard and offering consistently. If he can tidy up his fringe defence and be a little more selective in his carries he will have travelled a long, long way in this campaign.

Finally, if there’s a position on the pitch that our friend Sun Tzu might occupy then it must be outhalf. For Connacht to compete their outhalf must understand the principles of war to maximise their opportunities. In the past weeks both Jonny Sexton and Ronan O’Gara have implemented Sun Tzu’s arts beautifully; Bath’s Stephen Donald did not do so.