Leinster cannot take a motivated Northampton for granted

Irish Times

30-04-2025

Phil Dowson knows more about
Leinster
than he might want to. A history that reaches back 14 years, in 2011 the current Northampton coach scored a try in the first half of his club's Heineken Cup final with Leinster in the Millennium Stadium. Then an openside flanker, Dowson touched down after seven minutes with current Leinster coach Leo Cullen also playing that day in the secondrow.
More followed with fullback Ben Foden and captain Dylan Hartley adding a try each as Leinster bled scores and saw the match precipitously falling away. At 22-6 down it took a rousing team talk at the break by Johnny Sexton to shake the Leinster players out of their slumbering start. It worked. Leinster scored 27 unanswered points in the second half to win the match 33-22.
Sexton scored two tries, three conversions and four penalties in one of the most remarkable bounce backs in the competition's history.
There is more than last season's semi-final defeat by Leinster in Croke Park to fuel the ambitions of the Northampton coach on Saturday in Aviva Stadium. Does he recall the day, almost a decade and a half ago?
READ MORE
'Big time,' he says. 'I obviously only played in one final and that was it. We were 22-6 up at half-time and it was a weird game to be honest. But it showed the class of Leinster, it showed the quality of those individuals, [Jamie] Heaslip and Sexton, and so many world-class players, and we didn't have enough to deal with that.
'That's a huge regret, but at the same time what I try to remember from that game is we were one of the first teams to go unbeaten to the final. And the Perpignan game, the Ulster game, playing away in all those games, I had a great time that season.
'Like I mentioned before Europe is special, for me personally. I love the tournament, and I think of that whole final escapade as a year-long journey which failed in the second half of the final and that was it.'
Leinster's Tadhg Furlong tackings Harlequins' Danny Care in the Champions Cup round-of-16 in Croke Park on April 5th, 2025. Photograph: Nick Elliot/Inpho
It may look like just as difficult a task this year. Then Isa Nacewa, and Nathan Hines were the overseas players with Brian O'Driscoll, Gordon D'Arcy and Shane Horgan among the backs. On Saturday RG Snyman, Jordie Barrett and Rabah Slimani measure up well as the non-Irish element, but Leinster have been impressive in the last two games.
The 'nilling' of Harlequins and Glasgow has turned heads, and as Dowson knows Harlequins with Marcus Smith are one of the best attacking sides in the Premiership. What Leinster achieved is not lost on him, with Jacques Nienaber's defensive philosophy taking a lot of the credit.
'Glasgow and Harlequins are two of the best attacking sides in the tournament. I think Quins with Marcus Smith and the nines they carry and people like Alex Dombrandt, they're unbelievable in attack, the same with Glasgow,' says Dowson. 'I think they've got more line breaks than anyone else bar Leinster in the URC so to be able to nil them on the big stage is very, very impressive.
'That speaks to two things in my mind – Nienaber's system and what he has instilled in those players, and the ability and the work of those players to execute the system. They've bought in, they're very physical, they're making good reads. If you've got those two things, the group are emotionally engaged and willing to work hard, and they're good players, and you've got a very strong system being coached really well, it looks like a difficult defence to break down.'
For the English side it is a type of voyage of discovery to Ireland. Dowson knows Leinster are favourites to win but there is no way they travel without hope. They won the Champions Cup once back in 2000 when they beat Munster 9-8 at Twickenham with Pat Lam, Paul Grayson, Ben Cohen and Scotland's Budge Pountney on the team.
Dowson is also a coach who believes in the concept of the European game and his team have bought into it, the variety, the South African aspect and the different teams from France and Italy that Premiership sides only ever meet in this competition.
'I think it's special because every year you play the same sides in the league, you go to The Rec, Saracens, you go to Kingston Park whereas we don't often get the opportunity to go to Pretoria.
'The same applies to Stade [Francais]. We hadn't played Stade for years and years, to go and challenge ourselves against a French side in Paris and experience Paris together. There are lads who had never flown outside of Europe. That's why it has that certain magic really.'
And why Leinster will take Northampton seriously. A dream of winning the European championship, no better motivation.