Sport tends to do funny things to the English language.
Over the past few years, for example, it seems “eye” has become a verb : “Leinster eye third Heineken Cup in a row”.
Also we often see “ask” used as a noun, and never more so than the week leading up to Leinster's trip to Exeter. The Premiership side had proven so tough to beat at home that the champions' mission to secure a bonus point victory there was considered by most experts as a “big ask”, in fact the term was used to describe the overall chore of getting 10pts in our final two pool matches.
So now it's Monday morning, and although our mission was accomplished, I feel compelled to do a writeup with a theme of failure, because thanks in part to a disinterested Toulon and an ill-disciplined Racing Métro, the three-in-a-row dream is gone.
Maybe it was my Spurs grabbing a late equaliser against Man United as well as my 49ers reaching their first SuperBowl in 18 years that has me seeing the glass as half full right now, but still I think there's plenty for Leinster fans to feel good about all things considered.
First and foremost in relation to this game has to be the credit due to the Exeter Chiefs. I was intrigued how they and the Scarlets would prepare themselves to play a team that was planning on running in a load of tries against them. The Welsh region seemed to focus on doing everything they could, legal or not, to thwart the Leinster offence at the breakdown.
Rob Baxter's outfit, on the other hand, took a rather classier option, deciding that the best form of defence was attack, as was shown by their naming of wrecking balls Naqelevuki and Mumm to their starting lineup rather than using them off the bench as they did at the RDS. Also you couldn't help but be impressed by the way they shunned early 3-pointers same as we did - going instead for 15-man lineouts - and they certainly reaped the rewards for doing so.
This approach together with all the reports of a warm reception by the local fans for the travelling Leinster ones tells me this is a club that totally deserves to be in this competition and I for one will be wishing them every success in their attempts to get back into it for next season.
Now, for our part in proceedings. The most impressive aspect of our displays for the past two matches has been our resolve from the opening kickoff in both halves. That is always the best time to make hay – many people seem to forget that there are 15 men opposite you doing all they can to stop you. Any team that can consistently come out of the gate all guns blazing deserves credit, and with tries in the 7th & 43rd minute against the Scarlets and 3rd and 44th against the Chiefs, Leinster were awesome at it.
Once all those tries were scored, the opposition takes time to regroup. Anyone who thinks that any team, even one as successful as Leinster, can automatically come surging back for a rake of extra tries just simply doesn't fully understand how this great sport works, I'm afraid.
The main protagonists in our successes going forward on Saturday were man-of-the-match Cian Healy and Sean O'Brien. Someone on Twitter called them “The Bash Brothers”...I really hope this term sticks! It reminds me of my favourite baseball team the Oakland A's from their glory days in the late 80s/early 90’s with Jose Canseco & Mark McGwire. The two potential Lions were unstoppable, by just one tackler anyway, which regularly made space for gain-like break after gain-line break and both of Leinster's first half tries, though scored by D'Arcy and Kearney, were made on the back of their efforts.
But like I said earlier, the home side had a good deal of bash themselves when they had the ball and an upset looked very possible when they went in to the break 17-12 to the good. Can the normally-reliable Leinster defence be faulted for letting them in for two tries? Perhaps...though it has to be said that something had to be sacrificed in order to come up with a bonus-point-securing gameplan.
Now, for the performance of Monsieur Roman Poite. Forced by “man-flu” to watch the match at home (extremely rare for me for Heineken Cup matches, I'm normally either in the pub or the stand) I got to experience the bulk of the reactions on Twitter and have to say I was amused by the consensus that the referee was somehow only missing infractions by the visitors.
The biggest outrage, not surprisingly, was for Jamie Heaslip's bonus-clinching try. Everyone (not of Leinster persuasion of course) seemed to see Sean O'Brien holding on to James Scaybrook in the scrum, though nobody bothered to ask why...maybe it was because the Chiefs flanker had clearly broken his bind before Heaslip picked up the ball?
And that same outrage was nowhere to be seen all the times Eoin Reddan was man handled at scrums, or when scrum-half Kevin Barrett broke early round the base then stood holding his hands up protesting innocence behind Jamie even though by simply being there he was disrupting our move and thus should have been penalised.
Nor did they question his failure to allow a lineout at the end of the first half or his way-too-brief penalty advantage at the end of the second. The fact is, Poite either misses a lot of things or tends to let them go, but on this occasion anyway he was by no means favouring one team over the other.
Next up for discussion, the decision to take a the three points with the penalty awarded on 74 minutes. At first, I was as “WTF?” as most Leinster fans were, but while I feel we still should have gone for the try at that point, the case for taking the three was a lot stronger than first seemed. Four tries were no good to us if we lost the game, and our lead on the scoreboard was only 6 at that stage. Also, the way the maths worked out, a five-try haul was no more good to us than a four-try one.
So maybe we can cut the boys some slack and take it as a measure of respect to the Exeter performance that we felt the need to cement the win? As it turned out the Chiefs with their 14 men came back at us full-throttle afterwards, forcing us to lose a man ourselves.
For me the biggest downside of our display was our back three. Even though Kearney got a dot-down I felt they lacked that spark we’d normally expect from them. I mean – how many times is Isa Nacewa pinged for holding after the tackle? There are regularly few better at contorting themselves into a position to present the ball in world rugby. And shortly after that penalty, a clearance fell to our star full back who looked uncharacteristically indecisive, and this led to a further penalty that resulted in the opening Exeter try. Still though, we have seen enough outstanding displays from all three of them over the years to assume this was merely a blip.
We also have to take a broader look at the four provinces' displays in the Heineken Cup. Ulster will be disappointed with an away quarterfinal but it's their third year in a row getting out of their pool and they will also feel well capable of turning Saracens over and after that, well they're undefeated at the Aviva, right?
Munster may have needed a bit of help from Messrs Battut & Barnes yesterday but still got the four tries they needed (with one extra for good measure) and with ROG & POC back could well give Quins a run for their money at the Stoop. And last but certainly not least, three Heineken Cup victories is an amazing achievement for a club with Connacht's resources whatever way you look at it and Eric Elwood should be immensely proud of his tenure there.
So... as the curtain comes down on Leinster's 2012/13 Heineken Cup season, should we be looking back on the negatives and dwelling on them? Sure, we left some points behind in the early rounds and that is on us. But there are several other factors that kept us out of the top 8 seeds (like injuries and playing all 6 pool matches against teams motivated to beat us, something not all quarterfinallists can say) and hopefully Joe Schmidt can bring the squad's determination from the past two weeks forward with us for the remainder of the campaign.
One question...if the rules would allow it...could Mike McCarthy come to Leinster now? Even if not for the Amlin, for the remainder of the Pro12 campaign? With Pat Lam coming to Connacht in April, he has to get used to being without him anyway, the westerners don't face us again this season, and anything that could help us win the Amlin would help Lam have a Heineken Cup campaign to prepare for next season. Just a thought, not sure if it's do-able with regulations and what-not.
But anyway...I for one am feeling good about the rest of our season. Because whatever you want to say about the value of the three trophies left on offer to us, they are there to be won, and you can be damned sure that any team hoping to beat Leinster between now and May will consider it a big ask. JLP
Also this weekend
