Leinster 'win ugly' as pain of Northampton lingers into URC title tilt

The 42

2 days ago

LEINSTER ARE TRYING to keep their focus on the immediate future but the recent past appears to be weighing on their minds.
Yesterday's URC quarter-final win against Scarlets contained many things you don't want to see from a team who had their mental temperament questioned after suffering a devastating home Champions Cup semi-final loss to Northampton Saints four weeks ago.
A strong, confident start against the Welsh side saw Leinster move 12-0 up in the opening 10 minutes before their performance grew increasingly disjointed. As Scarlets scrapped to make it a proper contest, Leinster looked nervy, disconnected and unsure of themselves. Two second-half tries kept the Welsh at bay but it was far from convincing stuff from the home team, who lumbered through this sticky quarter-final in front of an audience just short of 13,000.
Holes were exposed in Leinster's defence as the Scarlets again found space against Jacques Nienaber's system – the Welsh side also recording a 35-22 win over a much-changed Leinster team in April.
The result is all that matters in knockout rugby but there was no escaping the feeling Leinster will need to lift things for Saturday's semi-final meeting with Glasgow Warriors – a 2.45pm kick-off at the Aviva.
'Listen, we are pleased to get through to the next round. It's great to be in knockout rugby,' Cullen said.
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Leo Cullen was frustrated with some decisions. Dan Sheridan / INPHO Dan Sheridan / INPHO / INPHO
'When you finish top (of the league), you'd love to go, 'Can you hand us the trophy here?' But unfortunately that's not the way this competition is geared up.
'Some teams that are trying to get into the top eight are almost playing cup rugby to get there whereas when you have already qualified and guaranteed top spot, it can make those couple of games leading into the knockout game a bit tricky because you don't have jeopardy aspect – the real, 'If we lose this we're out.'
'Sometimes that creates a little bit of bad habits when you play games like that. Obviously we played Glasgow in our last (regular season) game here and maybe it was a little bit of the same for them. We had the Zebre game before that as well.'
Cullen's answer then wound toward that shattering loss to Northampton, before he highlighted Scarlets' try on the stroke of half-time – outlining that he felt his side should have been awarded a penalty before Ellis Mee and Blair Murray went the length of the pitch to score.
'We felt the pain of losing a knockout game against Northampton,' Cullen continued.
'And there are lots of big moments in the game (v Scarlets). I think we're well on top for large parts of, particularly the first-half.
'It's a big moment before half-time, isn't it, because we are on their line. If you look at it, there are multiple Scarlets players that are offside, but we play and we don't execute, so there's stuff in our control. And then they go the length of the field, in a perfect world it gets refereed and you have a penalty there, and we're eight points clear at that stage, we'd go into half-time 11 points up.
'Instead it's one point and you're like 'Ughhhh'. But I thought the composure was good at half-time. Again, it paints a completely different complexion on the game.
'We've lost a knockout game (v Northampton) where there's a penalty in front of the posts which (Henry) Pollock is off his feet which we should have had which we could have kicked to level the game.
There should have been a penalty try at the end of that game which means we would have won that game which meant we would be talking about how we got on in the Champions Cup final.
'We're not at that stage, so knockout rugby, there are so many different variables, and we need to get all of our bits right and we'd hope that the referees get their bits right as well.
'But that's what it's like. It's tense, there's pressure there for both teams. And I thought we applied pressure for large periods of the game today. That's pleasing and a credit to the players.
'That try was such a big swing. It's a 92-metre turnaround and call it a 10-point swing in terms of the scoreboard. To come back from that, get back on top again and make sure we had a two-score lead for most of the remainder of the game was pleasing.
'It's winning ugly sometimes, isn't it? You've got to do it, so I am pleased we won ugly.'
Two more ugly wins would be enough to end the season with a trophy. Anything less will ensure another long, tough summer for Cullen and his players.