Leinster Team Talk Thread (Love you Furlong time)

Yes, bit they didn't play like a team that is stacked with game breaking players. Bath stupidly handed them tries on a plate by making mistakes and poorly executed kicks. They defended well against a very one dimensional Bath team. BB scored a nice try but was fairly quiet by his standards, as was Penaud.They just looked less that the sum of their parts to me and I can see why everything isn't going their way domestically. Anyway, Leinster's defense on its day should keep their opportunities to a minimum.

No, they're not going to do that.

Ciaran Frawley hasn't started a game at 10 for us all season - there is no way they're going to hand the reins to him now at the crunch point of the season.

And what do you do if it goes badly (something there is a strong possibility of being the case)? Who do you turn to then?

They're all flawed players, but Harry Byrne is our starting 10, we have to hope we can rebuild his confidence over the next couple of weeks.

Bordeaux were worthy winners, but Bath really undermined themselves throughout the game. Lineout success was just 73% and they flubbed at least two great set piece opportunities in the Bordeaux 22. They had 62% possession and 61% territory, but consistently failed to capitalize on the attacking ball they had. Bordeaux had to make over 180 tackles and Bath just 80. Russell had about his worst game in the last 5 years. He looked so flustered whenever he had the ball and made poor decision after poor decision.

Defensively they were even worse. They successfully completed just 53% of their tackles. Just killed any chance they had of winning the game.

Not hugely in all likelihood. I thought he played okay and defended okay with ball in hand, it was just virtually every time he kicked the ball (either from hand or from the tee) he got it wrong IMO. As I've said already though, there have been loads of days where he's gotten those pieces right, so I'm pretty confident he can back to that level.

I would still want him to get at least 60 good minutes over the next two games though and hopefully kick well off the tee going into Bilbao.

There's also the fact we need to win these next two games, and I also believe that right now he gives us the best chance of doing that.

agreed, Bath were their own worst enemies.

And if Toulouse hadn’t shot themselves in the foot with stupid cards when they were in front and looking pretty comfortable, I’m not sure Bordeaux would even have made the semi

Problem is that Frawley hasn't played ten all season. Maybe he has done at training but I'd doubt he's seen much with the other two in front of him and Gabriel presumably seeing some time training too. So its a big risk to have him on the bench were Byrne to go down early, less risky maybe than SP going in there to be eaten alive, but at least with SP you've got a decent chance of him delivering some scores, whereas Frawley won't be in much of a position to do anything except ship ball and go into contact given he hasn't run the team. Anyway, tough call for Leo but a bed he made for himself.

Luke would have folded him in half.

This "eaten alive" stuff just does not manifest itself when he's playing at 10. One of his best games for Leinster was against La Rochelle earlier in the season (goal kicking aside) where he was right in the middle of the rough stuff and actually had some really important defensive plays. He's started again Ulster/McCloskey twice this season and hasn't been exploited.

You'll have various liars pointing out he missed a tap tackle against France when the entire rest of the team were AWOL but that can be ignored.

I cannot understand what the Leinster coaches are doing with him at the moment.

He mostly was playing at 15 against La Rochelle, but he did have a few really good moments defensively that day.

He also had a great day defensively in the URC Final last year v Bulls, putting in one notable hit pretty early on which was possibly the best tackle I've ever seen him make.

He is definitely better able to defend at 10 with the benefit of a defensive line and support from the 12 and the openside. He has never ever looked comfortable defending in space though.

James Ryan got injured during the 6 Nations in 2024, he ruptured his bicep in training before R4 of the Championship. He didn't play any games from Feb 24th (6 Nations game v Wales) to May 18th (URC Round 17 v Ulster), and missed all of the European Cup knock outs up to the final through injury.

He wasn't dropped for the final, and it's not a selection decision (IMO) that the coaches deserve criticism for.