IT’S ONLY NATURAL to focus on a last-gasp drop-goal attempt from Ciarán Frawley slipping just wide in agonising fashion, but one of the main reasons Leinster didn’t win last season’s Champions Cup final was their wastefulness in the Toulouse 22.
While the genius of Antoine Dupont and Toulouse was key in deciding the outcome, every team who is edged out in a big game has to consider what they might have done better.
Looking at the numbers now paints a stark picture of the opportunities that Leinster missed that day at Tottenham Hotspur Stadium in London.
They had possession inside the Toulouse 22 on 18 different occasions in the final but scored just one try.
18 entries into the 22 is a huge number for a team in any game, so Leinster had plenty of opportunity.
It wasn’t the only time last season that Leinster had plenty of visits to the opposition 22 but weren’t as efficient as they would have liked. Oftentimes, it didn’t matter as they still had too much quality for their opponents and won.
However, adding an extra edge of ruthlessness in the ‘red zone’ may have been among Leinster’s aims coming into this season. The evidence of the opening four games of the season suggests the province have been focusing on this part of their game under new attack coach Tyler Bleyendaal. Four bonus-point wins from four games is good going.
Their first half against Munster last weekend was remarkably clinical.
Leinster scored four tries and were awarded five penalties in the Munster 22 in that opening half. With most teams regarding a penalty as a successful visit, this means Leinster didn’t have a single unsuccessful entry into the Munster 22 in the first half.
That’s why the game was over as a contest at the break. It was impossible to miss how purposeful, aggressive, energetic, and clever Leinster were once they had the ball in the Munster 22. It was hard for Graham Rowntree’s men to live with.
A big defensive win earned Leinster their first red zone entry in the fifth minute and 30 seconds of crisp attack delivered James Lowe’s opening try.
Leinster use an 8+1 lineout here, meaning eight players in the lineout and one in the ‘receiver’ position, Josh van der Flier in this instance.
As RG Snyman goes up to win the lineout, we can see that van der Flier steps forward to accept a transfer of the ball from Snyman at the same time as two players drop off the back of the lineout.
These players dropping off are inside centre Jamie Osborne and right wing Liam Turner.
Having started as part of the lineout, Osborne and Turner are now very close to the gainline – they haven’t had to start 10 metres back to be onside like all the other backs.
So as van der Flier breaks away from the dummy maul set-up that ties in many of the Munster forwards and passes to Osborne – skipping Turner – the Leinster inside centre is further upfield than he would have been if he’d had to come from 10 metres back.
That means Osborne can catch, draw the rearmost Munster forward – Jeremy Loughman – at the lineout and pass to Garry Ringrose charging into the ‘seam’ behind Munster’s lineout.
The seam is the space between Loughman at the back of the lineout and Munster out-half Jack Crowley, the closest backline defender.
As we see below, Ringrose crashes into a double tackle from Crowley and Tadhg Beirne.
With Ringrose dominating that collision to instantly win the gainline, helped by van der Flier, Leinster don’t even need another player to get to the breakdown, meaning more attackers on their feet for the ensuing phases.
Not only do Leinster get a lightning-quick recycle, but Munster’s forwards now have to come back downfield to fold to the other side of the breakdown – reducing the time they have to get set for the next phase.
Leinster play at speed, with scrum-half Jamison Gibson-Park whipping the ball left for lock James Ryan to carry.
Number eight Caelan Doris and hooker Lee Barron are on hand to ensure another quick recycle of the ball.
While that’s happening, Turner [red below] is swinging back over to Leinster’s right-hand side, where Ringrose [blue] is back on his feet, the pair of them ensuring that Munster have to worry about a possible bounce back in that direction.
However, Leinster continue to the openside.
There are four forwards set up to Gibson-Park’s left – something we’ve already looked at in Leinster’s play – for third phase.
The most obvious recipient of the pass from Gibson-Park is lock Snyman, who would then have options to tip-on, tip-in, or sweep out the back.
We can see above how Snyman has promoted himself upfield ahead of Andrew Porter and Tadhg Furlong on either side of him, suggesting Snyman will carry.
But Gibson-Park rips the ball straight across the face of Snyman for Furlong to carry.
We can see above how Furlong wins the gainline for Leinster again, helped by the powerful impact of Jack Conan arriving from outside to clear tackler Alex Nankivell.
The deception involving Snyman is important. At first, Munster back row Gavin Coombes is coming forward thinking he’ll have to tackle Snyman.
But in the next split second, that ball beyond Snyman means Coombes has to turn out to Furlong.
Meanwhile, Nankivell starts with the possibility of a Leinster sweep pass from Snyman out the back to Frawley among his defensive concerns.
Nankivell does always have to consider the threat of Furlong here, including a tip-on pass from Snyman to Furlong, and he adjusts as the ball goes from Gibson-Park directly to Furlong.
But these factors combined mean Furlong can dominate the collision, all the more so with that power coming from Conan as he targets Nankivell.
With Snyman following up to act as a guard over the ball, it’s yet another rapid breakdown.
There’s something similar on fourth phase with another bit of deception from Leinster.
Van der Flier [red above] is the most obvious receiver this time, charging forward with his hands out as if to catch the ball. Porter [blue] on the inside has done similar, his body language looking to hold the fringe defenders.
But the real target for Gibson-Park is centre Osborne [yellow], who has crept up outside van der Flier, while Frawley [white] is tucked in behind.
Just one or two steps off the base of the ruck from Gibson-Park help to keep Munster’s eyes in towards the ball as the scrum-half then throws his pass across the face of van der Flier to Osborne.
It’s down low and Osborne does very well to collect it as he accelerates.
The angle below gives us good insight into what Leinster’s deception does to Munster. Note how Beirne is stooping to tackle van der Flier as the ball goes instead to Osborne, giving the Leinster centre a one-on-one against Tom Farrell.
Farrell has also had to have eyes on Frawley out the back and again, the combined effect is that the Leinster player can win the initial collision.
So even though Farrell lands a firm tackle low on Osborne, the Leinster man gets his hands through and can turn and offload to Frawley as the out-half swings up from behind. Frawley nearly scores.
Munster right wing Calvin Nash has to turn in from outside to tackle Frawley, working with hooker Niall Scannell to do a good job of preventing Frawley from finishing.
But as we see below, that in turn means fullback Mike Haley has to narrow in close to the breakdown, which Porter and Leinster fullback Hugo Keenan hit, as some of the Munster forwards come back downfield to fold to the far side once again.
Doris, Ryan, and Barron have all worked around the corner for Leinster, with van der Flier also reloading as a possible carrier, so Munster have to worry about those threats in close.
That leaves left wing James Lowe in space close to the touchline and Gibson-Park duly floats the ball wide for him to finish untouched on fifth phase.
The word ‘blitz’ is regularly used in the context of Leinster’s defence but it perfectly describes this attack too. Munster are trying to play catch-up immediately from the set-piece and Leinster’s ruthless, rapid, aggressive, deceptive attack proves unstoppable.
There were similar elements for Leinster’s second try, particularly on the phase just before Doris scored – a try which came after a flowing multi-phase attack that originated from a botched Munster lineout on their own 10-metre line.
Doris is part of a group of four forwards set up wider off the breakdown on this occasion, with Ringrose [blue] looking like a possible first receiver closer to Gibson-Park, while Frawley sits in the boot behind the 4-pod.
As we can see above, Furlong promotes himself forward ahead of Doris and van der Flier on either side.
But again, Gibson-Park fizzes his pass right across the face of Furlong to hit van der Flier.
And again, it means a favourable one-on-one as Crowley initially races forward towards Furlong, meaning Nankivell has to deal with van der Flier charging for the line.
In this area of the field, defences put a premium on making big front-on doubles tackles in order to increase their chances of winning the gainline.
Nankivell hangs onto van der Flier’s ankles as Loughman comes from inside Crowley to help get the Leinster flanker to ground. But with Barron and Furlong quick on the scene to recycle, there’s no time for Munster to recover.
Doris picks and backs himself to go past Crowley and Scannell, the latter of whom takes a blow to the head in the process.
Beirne nearly prevents Doris from dotting down but a TMO review backs referee Chris Busby’s on-field decision of a try.
Leinster’s third try came with Munster incorrectly down to 14 men but they clinically made their numerical advantage count from close range as Osborne and Frawley combined to send Keenan over.
The handling and timing from Osborne and Frawley are excellent under pressure from the rushing Munster defence and it’s also notable that this comes without Leinster having penalty advantage.
We often see teams waiting until they have penalty advantage before attempting to move the ball beyond the forwards in the opposition 22 but Leinster were confident they could finish through their backs on this occasion. As they know from the Champions Cup final, sometimes those decisions can be unsuccessful if the execution is off.
And while Leinster showed plenty of subtlety in the Munster 22 in this game, their sheer power was an obvious factor.
Just before Snyman’s try, number eight Doris carried explosively under the posts, benefiting from a strong latch from Porter and Furlong to eke out valuable metres.
It looks like Max Deegan will carry on the next phase but Gibson-Park flashes the ball wider to Osborne.
While Munster stop him, Osborne’s carry sucks in three tacklers and leaves them short for the next phase.
Frawley might have been tempted to demand the ball here and try to finish a little wider out through his backs, but watch below how the out-half just pats Snyman on the arse, telling him to get the job done.
Snyman has no latch support and there are numbers up outside him, Turner calling for the pass, but the Springboks lock isn’t in the mood to miss his chance.
He accelerates outside Stephen Archer and inside scrum-half Craig Casey, his power and size taking him to the tryline for Leinster’s bonus-point try.
Barring a stunning comeback from Munster, that was the contest essentially done and dusted with Leinster leading 26-5 at half time.
It would have been highly unrealistic for Leinster to expect to score another four tries after the break against a team as good as Munster but they’ll still have been somewhat disappointed with the looser edge to their attack in the second half.
As against Benetton a week before, it’s difficult to maintain full focus and execution when the bonus point is already secured and the fact that the opposition are fighting not to be left in the dust is also relevant, yet Leinster set high standards for themselves.
They didn’t score after half time and had just three visits to the Munster 22. Knock-ons from Porter and Thomas Clarkson ended two of those possessions, while Beirne pounced for one of his trademark turnovers on the other.
Those misses give Leinster scope for improvement but there was lots to like about their work in the 22 against Munster. That followed fairly clinical outings against Edinburgh the Dragons, and particularly versus Benetton when Leinster scored five tries in just six entries into the Italian side’s 22 – a ruthlessly efficient return.
No team in the URC has scored more tries originating in the opposition 22 than Leinster this season, so Connacht will be looking to limit their entries this Saturday in Galway.
