Leinster Team Talk Thread (Love you Furlong time)

Looking back over the Bulls game I think it was a good blue print on how to beat Tigers too.

I thought we were higher risk in attack willing to move the ball more both pre and post contact rather than recycle.

The more time the ball spends on the deck the more time a grizzled pack can try disrupt. We gave the Bulls very little chance to do that. And I suspect we'd look to do the same against the Tigers. Don't give Reffell a chance. Although he's good for like 3 steals on a quiet game so I need to make peace with that ha.

It's a weird point of this season with so many players rehabbing and injured. Tigers is a tough match and will be extremely physical. Just like last weeks match. I think we should win but it could be touch and go, depending on who's available. I wonder if Turner gets the call if Henshaw is out? Does dropping a cold Ringrose straight in make sense? Or playing J.O.B?

If all the injuries are true (Andrew Porter, James Ryan, Robbie Henshaw, Garry Ringrose, Luke McGrath, Ciaran Frawley, Hugo Keenan & Charlie Ngatai) Leinster should go with:

1. Cian Healy 2. Dan Sheehan 3. Tadhg Furlong

4 Ross Molony 5. Joe McCarthy

6 Ryan Baird 7 Josh Van Der Flier 8. Caelan Doris

9 Jameson Gibson-Park 10 Harry Byrne

11 James Lowe 14 Jordan Larmour

12 Jamie Osborne 13 Liam Turner

15 Jimmy O'Brien

Subs: Michael Milne, Ronan Kelleher, Michael Ala'alatoa, Jason Jenkins, Jack Conan, Cormac Foley, Ross Byrne, Rob Russell.

It should still be more than enough to see them off.

Leicester were down a few players before that game began and lost a few more to injury during the match.

This time round Leinster are without Ryan and potentially 3 or 4 other starters. We should still win, but I'm not 100% confident

It's a big opportunity for Turner if Henshaw and Ringrose are unavailable - assuming they don't drop JOB or Frawley in at 13.

Turner's pass out to Russell for his own try when he got the return pass was sumptuous. Just spot on execution. I'd say his 7s experience has helped develop his proficiency in throwing such passes.

Before the current season - and even a bit into this season - I had him down as squad filler and not really at the standard you'd want against quality opposition in big games. But he's continuing to step up through the levels. I wonder if he'll ever get capped by Ireland. There's been quite a lot of debate about whether Frisch should get capped. How does Turner compare to him? He still needs a bigger body of work in bigger games, but he's on a good trajectory at the moment.

He's got 19 starts for Leinster, 1 sole champions cup appearance, which was off the bench. He'll need much more of a decent body of work at Heineken Cup level before even considering Ireland talk I'd have thought?

Edit: you kind of said what I was thinking re:Ireland talk to be fair, I was referring to him moving up through the levels, where he hasn't really featured at Heineken level yet

I don’t think Arendse is fully utilized at club or national level. Once he’s through he can’t be caught by our guys.

He will more than likely leave Munster at the end of this season.

Do we know this for sure? His contract runs until the end of next season so it's not straightforward.

With regards signing them, yes. It's not as straightforward when one of them becomes NIQ mid-contract tho. By way of example, we have both Kleyn and Snyman this season.

He might well leave. I'm not certain it's "more than likely" tho.

Yes, RWC etc. for Kleyn Snyman so slightly different scenario, but the contact situation complicates it, compared to if he was out of contract.

They may very well keep him but I think Munster have a big need in the front row whether that be Loosehead or Hooker, they wouldn't have the ability to go out and get a NIQ front rower for next season, I think at this stage Munster would rather move on from Frisch and get compensated for it, replace him with say Liam Turner or Tom Daly or Tom Farrell which would be subsidized by the French team taking Frisch for cheaper and really bulk up there front row with a NIQ signing.

If it was going to be a Leinster centre, my money would be on Liam Turner but Connacht have the two Tom's out of contract. They are big lads, experienced and reliable.