Muchos congratulationes to our Mexican cousins on their fine win against the over pumped but underperforming Guinness Premier champions. Yet again the overinflated league showed its shortcomings.
Leicester huffed and puffed and biffed and bashed but time after time their prime beef was repelled by the more skilled and resilient Leinster side who never looked like losing despite the tight score line.
Leinster started the more confidently and the opening ten minutes were really a war of attrition with both sets of players trying make their mark at the contact points, smashing into each other like butting stags. With Elsom absolutely brutal in the opening 20 and young Sexton having the game of his life Leinster built up a 9 – 3 lead but it appeared to be a scant reward for their dominance.
However when Leinster lost their rampaging prop, Stan Wright, to a cynical off the ball tackle it was the English champions who began to get the upper hand.
When are players going to understand that these professional fouls just not worth it? OK Wright might have stopped a try with his tackle but during his absence his team conceded 13 points. On top of this they had to play the bulk of the ten minutes without the highly effective Jennings which severely increased the workload of the rest of the team.
As it was Leinster managed to regroup after the break and got back on level terms with a try by Heaslip and when the supremely confident Sexton slotted over the winning penalty with ten minutes to go there only looked like one winner.
Leinster’s win and particularly the form of players like Heaslip and Sexton can give Ulster some confidence for next season. This time last year I had Heaslip down as a posturing show pony and Sexton down as, quite frankly, useless. However both have played with supreme confidence this year and added a much harder edge to their game and both are well worthy of their haul of medals this year. Players at Ulster, who’ve had an indifferent season, can look to these two for inspiration.
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3 Responses to “Leinster y’arriva andele andele!”
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Well done Leinster, enjoyed every second of it. Did anyone else get irritated by the posturing Tigers, like on more than one occasion they patted Leinster players on the head after they had made a mistake (Tuliagi the exception BTW). I would like to see the refs clamp down on this. In particular Giovanni slabbering all over Stan Wright being sent to the sin bin, plain cringeworthy to watch.
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I do hate that patting on the head. If it occured at junior level in my days I don’t think we’d have ever finished a game.
Leinster used to be particulary guilty a few years ago, Shaggy in particular, but I’m glad they seem to have removed it to the overall benefit of their game.
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I was a bit irritated at the time by it. Hoever the sight of Castrated at the end of the game when he looked pretty sick at been beaten more than made up for it.
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