Ex-Ireland hooker hits back over Jacques Nienaber after claims Leinster’s defence is the ‘easiest to penetrate’
Leinster head coach Jacques Nienaber and former Ireland hooker Mike Sherry.
Ex-Ireland and Munster hooker Mike Sherry has explained why Jacques Nienaber’s tactics can be so successful after his style of defence was criticised.
Former Leinster fly-half Andy Dunne believes that top quality players will always find a way to break that extreme blitz which the Dublin-based outfit employ.
Leo Cullen’s men did struggle to keep La Rochelle at bay at the weekend, with the French team scoring three tries and creating a number of chances, and they have been vulnerable on other occasions since Nienaber’s arrival in December 2023.
Leinster have also had success with it and ended their four-year quest for silverware when they won the United Rugby Championship title last season, but Dunne is not convinced that it is the best way to defend.
‘All systems can break’
“There’s no such thing as a perfect defence, all systems can break. To me, it is the easiest defence to penetrate in terms of rugby defences,” he told Off The Ball.
“If you can retain composure and be comfortable playing with slow ball, it makes decisions for the attack very clearly.
“If you rush up in top players’ faces, they have the composure to absorb that. It’s footwork then and an off-load, and if everyone’s rushing through a line to suffocate you and you get one off-load free, you’re literally into open country with the support runner.
“That happened so many times against a French team who are highly capable of footwork and passing under duress to a support runner.”
Leinster must be credited for their ability to track back when breached in the Investec Champions Cup victory on Saturday, but La Rochelle could have easily had more tries.
“Had they played what was more traditional rugby defence, which is the drift, you’re not making the decisions for La Rochelle,” Dunne added.
“You’re shadowing them, you’re watching them in front of you. They can try and off-load. You might concede a yard or two, it’s less aggressive in terms of territory, bit you’ll smother exactly what they did.”
Ex-Munster star’s view
Sherry then appeared on Off The Ball and was asked about Dunne’s comments. The former front-rower was part of the Munster squad when Nienaber was there and has first-hand experience of how his defence operates.
“The reason it’s so successful would be the buy-in and the players that you have. Nienaber didn’t have a specific way that he wanted you to tackle, as long as you got the job done and as long as you stopped them behind the gain line,” he said.
“The outside channels, the freedom and license he gave to wingers to get up on the outside. He made them, even though they might be 10 players away from a wide breakdown on the far touchline, the most important people in the defensive line.
“His goal was to shut them down on the inside. If they got to the sideline, it was seen as a failure.”
Sherry duly praised Nienaber’s ability to get the best out of players having enjoyed working with him at Munster.
“He, along with his partner in crime Rassie [Erasmus], had an amazing ability to make it personal and no one wanted to get shown up in the video, no one wanted to be seen as a soft touch or not be able to commit to what was quite a simple system,” he added.
“It requires amazing buy-in and he is brilliant at getting that, particularly at Munster and South Africa.
“Jacques is a qualified physio and when he was down on the pitch, his voice and his direction I can’t understate the impact that would have. He really was like a 16th player on the pitch.”
