Leinster Team Talk Thread (Love you Furlong time)

current centre partnership is blossoming, what where you watching out there?

Leinster in general were rubbish, only beat a team that could only just about make at most 2 pass before a knock on.

This Leinster side are soft as hot butter, the best rugby club squad the world has ever seen and still so bad with 3 weeks to focus on the game.

its time the cotton wool was taken off the Irish players, they should have all been down in South Africa try and knock the softness out of them

Doris obviously was goated today with the turnover at the end to save our arse but I’ve always felt that Leinster need a second jackler option, someone like Tadhg Beirne who can come in handy when we need to stop the momentum of the opposition. JVDF is not a proper jackal threat. It would really put us up another level, there’s a Scott Fardy sized hole missing there.

A bit closer than I expected it to be. Northampton are a good side, and were always going to score, I just expected Leinster to score more. In the end, I fancied a home win near the spread, which I think was 12 or so points.

There was definite signs of rust, mostly early handling errors, and you'd expect those to be remedied by the final.

But I also don't think today's Leinster performance is necessarily one that Toulouse would rip apart. That's somewhat a disservice to Saints. Once they stopped spilling ball they really did cause Leinster problems, and defended very aggressively themselves.

The name of the game in a final against Toulouse (presuming that's the case) will be to frustrate Dupont, and keep possession away from him. Could see LC/JN leaning selection toward their better carriers in the back-row i.e., Conan, vdF and Doris.

Agree with the Ringrose take. He's been unlucky to have missed out. He surely doesn't come right back in.

Was that incident mentioned on TV looked blatant at the game..

Just seen a few clips of the game. Have to laugh at the TNT commentary.

Dallaglio and Healey were screaming for a Leinster side entry at the ruck, but the footage shows two Northampton players piling in at the side before Jenkins entry which I'm pretty sure was legal anyway.

Would anyone argue for Osborne to start ahead of Ringrose for ireland?

I like Osborne, but the idea that he should start ahead of Ringrose is based on fairness of play time rather than contribution to the game. Ringrose is the better player and should start when he's fit.

that’s rubbish he was player of the match against LaRoch so let’s not be so fickle given he has so tirelessly added to our European credentials

Osborne did nothing wrong but I fail to see how anyone thinks he should start ahead of either Henshaw or Ringrose. Henshaw is a bigger man and often gets across the gain line when being hit by two tacklers, Osborne is much slighter. He has a great left foot but Leinster have that already. His real point of difference for me is his line running, which is excellent, and his off loads which are also very good. He’s definitely next off the rank but I’d still back Henshaw at 12 and GR at 13.

I'd say people have long memories when it comes to Ringrose. He's an excellent player, particularly in defence, but hasn't been a game changer for a while now. He rarely makes mistakes but doesn't do anything amazing either. He seems to be the latest in the line of players in Ireland who seem to get elevated to undropable status yet I doubt other top teams would want him over their existing options or spend time looking to negate him ahead of playing against him.

Osborne has shown he can put others through gaps with passing on the line, runs excellent lines to find gaps himself and he looks to offload out of the tackle. Henshaw's power is a big asset, he challenges in the air unlike most centres and he and Osborne swapping positions adds variation in attack. As a partnership, they compliment each other and seem to bring the best out of each other.

We just got to the final, hardly a guarantee we aren't winning a trophy this year ffs.

The amount of kicking in the second half was infuriating. When your opponents only really attacking advantage is running from deep, why would you just keep punting it to them,?

Agree with above comment re hooking VDF early, seemed like a preplanned switch but ultimately it hurt us.

Conversely, Ross Byrne was left on too long. He wasn’t playing well and looked to be carrying an injury.

Hopefully that’s the dirty diesel burnt off and we can focus on the final now.

On the plus side, JGP is absolutely unplayable these days, Frawley is doing an excellent job at FB and Baird continues to get better and better.

Five finals in seven years, it’s an incredible stat.

But if we could get one of the injured trio back for the final, I’d pick Ryan every time. We need more leadership and grizzle.

Final word for the Northampton fans who were all absolutely top class yesterday

No, they were garbage. Yet in typical Leinster/Ireland fashion, Leinster nearly imploded against them and laboured to victory in what should have been a 40 point win.