Leinster feel it's time they got on their bikes

RUGBY:LEINSTER HAVE been here before and bought the T-shirt. As the bulk suppliers to the Irish effort, they have again been the most discommoded by the absence of front-liners on later pre-seasons and by having the most players at last week's Ireland two-day training camp, whereas Connacht were lurking in the long grass.

Once again therefore, September has not been especially kind to them and as with their first season under Joe Schmidt two years ago, the onset of their annual Aviva showdown with Munster finds them scratching for form and desperately hoping that the sight of those red shirts will prompt a timely pick-me-up in performance prior to the opening salvos of the Heineken Cup.

But what compounds their worrying lack of form is the scale of their early-season injury list. “I’m a pretty positive guy by nature and I suppose I’m the eternal optimist,” commented Schmidt before yesterday afternoon’s training session in UCD, in noticeably better form than in the aftermath of Friday’s 34-6 defeat in Galway.

Noting that two years ago they came off a bonus-point defeat (32-24) in Edinburgh with “a full team out and a full week’s preparation” Schmidt admitted being “hopeful” of a similar turnaround. “But I would have to say that our injury toll is such that it is pretty difficult for us at the moment.”

On top of leaking a further five tries at the weekend, a lengthy long-term casualty list containing Seán O’Brien, Rhys Ruddock, Dominic Ryan and Dave Kearney was compounded by three more injuries in Galway which has effectively ruled Rod Kearney, Gordon D’Arcy and Quinn Roux out of Saturday’s showdown with Munster.

Kearney sustained “quite a bad haematoma just there (pointing to his lower back), with that bad blood being a real irritant and hopefully as that drains away he should come right quite quickly. He won’t be available for Munster but maybe beyond that we’d cross our fingers.”

Similarly, according to Schmidt, they are inclined to “cut our losses” with D’Arcy and afford him “a little time off” all the more so given the bruised ribs which forced him off in the first half of the scratchy win at home to Edinburgh two weeks ago was confirmed to be a “rib cartilage”.

Furthermore Roux “received a decent jolt and compression to his clavicle (collarbone), so he’s going to be out maybe for a couple of weeks.”

Offsetting this is the expectation that Eoin Reddan will return to training today, with Isaac Boss and Leo Cullen likely to be back in contention for their Heineken Cup opener at home to Exeter on Saturday week.

In the meantime, Schmidt has told those that are standing, which is liable to be buttressed by the return of Brian O’Driscoll, Jonathan Sexton, Jamie Heaslip and Kevin McLaughlin, as well as playing Cian Healy and Mike Ross from the start, that “they have a real responsibility to some of the guys who would love to be in their boots that are unable to play at the moment. And they are desperately keen to have something to play for when they get back.”

“We can’t really change what happened – we’re not happy, I’m not happy, the players are not happy with what happened. The one thing that I would mitigate against is that I actually think Connacht are a pretty good side, and if you go there and you’re just a little bit underprepared and not physically up for it, they’ll put a hole in you – and they certainly did to us.”

“We can’t do anything about that but what we can do is prepare better, have our mindset better for this weekend, and we know that we have to because Munster, as much as I’d be complimentary about Connacht, I think they are a step up.”

Most untypically, Leinster have conceded 18 tries in their five league games, giving them the most porous defence in the league.

“We are only 10 off what we conceded in the whole of the Rabo last year and that would suggest to me that it’s not as good as it needs to be, so if we can sort something out there that’d be great.

“Again, you need continuity. You need guys linking and knowing what the other guys is going to do and we looked like we hadn’t played a lot together last Friday night.”

Although Munster had their own setback away to the Ospreys on Friday night, in particular Schmidt likes the width which the Rob Penney regime has added to their game. “That’s giving them attacking opportunities. I really like the way they are using (Casey) Laulala and (Keith) Earls to both threaten and link and offer opportunities to guys wider out.

“They have a few conundrums as well. Ian Keatley has done really well. He has been at fullback and he has been at 10 but I hope Rob has got as many headaches as I have. We’ll wait and see what we get up against us.”

“I still think that, no matter what the preparations of the two teams coming in to a fixture like this or no matter what the previous results are – and you can’t change them anyway – this game gets people a little bit stirred and motivated and concentrated and that’s what we need this week.”

One other glimmer of good news is that Greg Feek has been released from his dual Irish commitments to work full-time with Leinster again, which clearly seemed to please Schmidt. “Yeah, Greg came back about five weeks late, after the New Zealand tour so he still hasn’t had a lot of time with the players. He has been doing a little bit more of the defensive stuff, which is great for us. That will actually grow and we will see profit from that as the season goes on.”

Ticket sales for Saturday's game have passed the 40,000 mark and are on sale now from leinsterrugby.ie, the Leinster Rugby Store (Donnybrook), Spar (Donnybrook) as well as Ticketmaster outlets nationwide.