Although Leinster emerged a try short of a perfect 30-point haul from their opening six games in the BKT United Rugby Championship after a hard-earned 24-6 win over the Lions, no one was of a mind to complain, least of all Leo Cullen.
“If you wind the clock back six weeks and told us we’ll get 29 points, we’d have been delighted,” said the Leinster head coach. “With 20 minutes to go, you’d love to push on and get the bonus but ... we’ve used a good few players, like 47 players, that’s a big chunk of players, a lot of young guys. Some great experience over the past six weeks.
Cullen highlighted hooker as the prime example, where, as a consequence of injuries to both Dan Sheehan and Ronan Kelleher as well as Lee Barron and John McKee, Gus McCarthy made his fourth start of the season for his province, in addition to one for Emerging Ireland.
Furthermore, fellow academy hooker Stephen Smyth backed up his Leinster debut last week in Galway – when his family were present in the away dressing-room for the presentation of his first caps – by making his home debut here.
“Four senior hookers out, Gus started a good few games for us, Stephen Smyth coming off the bench today; I know it’s only for a couple of minutes but last week as well. It’s just getting them used to the experience of match days. The cohesion part is a challenge when you’re chopping and changing but it sets us up for the season is the thing.”
Having flown out of the traps to score a flurry of first-half tries and generally win pulling up, especially in their last three bonus point wins, a striking feature of this win was the patience shown by the team, and this was something Leinster had anticipated might be a virtue.
[ Leinster make it six wins from six against Lions but miss out on bonus pointOpens in new window ]
“Overall we’re pleased. The way the game played out was the way we’d talked about it during the week, making sure we don’t get frustrated, making sure we don’t get impatient with the ball. We’re probably still forcing things a little bit and the Lions are very tenacious the way they defend. They scramble really hard and they’ll go aggressively at the ball.
“We turned over possession in their 22 on a few different occasions. It’s a win for them, their energy levels go up, we’re maybe going a little flat. But we stuck at it okay, I thought. We get the job done. We win by 18 points. It seems like a decent win but there’s lots within the game that we’ll reflect on and go: ‘Okay, we probably knew this was coming but how did we deal with it in reality?’ It was probably a bit mixed but positive overall.”
On the plus side too, Leinster kept their try line intact.
“That’s the thing, the Lions are scoring plenty of tries,” said Cullen. “As the second half [goes on], you’re looking out and the rain is there, that makes it a little bit more difficult for both teams and we managed to keep them relatively away from our end of the field.
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“They [the Lions] are unbelievably tenacious and well-drilled in what they do. They’re four wins from four going into the game so they’re a bloody good team.
“We’re pleased to get over the line. This fixture, there was always a risk it would turn into that type of game, or worse, where they get a breakaway try or create something. They cut us in a lineout, some clever lineout plays, they cut us early and if they score from something like that we’re chasing the game and it becomes a right dogfight. You’d find out a lot about some of the you fellas in the group.
“Overall we’re pleased to get a win. Your natural instinct is you want to get the maximum. It wasn’t to be today, but we’ll take the win, bag the four points, and it’s ‘move on’ for the international break. We’ll all be watching with great interest, the November Tests.”
There were also no injury concerns, with both of Leinster’s midfielders coming through the full 80 minutes unscathed, namely Hugh Cooney on his full debut and Robbie Henshaw in his first appearance of the season.
“You have the mix, Hugh coming in for a first start, Robbie’s first game. There were some long passages of play in the first half in particular where guys are blowing. It’s taking legs out of a number of guys.
“It was good to get Robbie through the guts of 80 minutes, and similar for Hugh. He had some big moments in the game, nice and composed on the ball and he came up with a big defensive play. Lots of positives there.”
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