Ex-Ireland player explains why ‘supporter animosity’ at Leinster hasn’t reached ‘tipping point’ but feels Ciaran Frawley ‘punishment didn’t match the crime’
Leinster head coach Leo Cullen and, inset, Ciaran Frawley (INPHO/Dan Clohessy and James Crombie)
The sombre post-mortem into Leinster’s latest Investec Champions Cup final failure is continuing in Ireland, with retired fly-half Ian Madigan the latest to join the debate about the team’s 41-19 hammering in Bilbao.
It was 2018 when Leinster won their fourth European title, but they are now stuck in the rut of losing finals. The margins of defeat to Saracens, La Rochelle twice and Toulouse were respectively 10, three, one and nine points in 2019, 2022, 2023 and 2024.
However, last Saturday’s loss to Union Bordeaux Bègles in Bilbao was a very different experience. Whereas in the previous four finals, they were seriously competitive and arguably should have won three of those showpiece fixtures, they were blown away at the San Mamés, trailing by 28 points at the interval and ultimately beaten by 22.
It was a chastening ordeal, and the fallout hasn’t been pretty. There have been questions about the future of head coach Leo Cullen and bemusement that Ciaran Frawley, the substitute fly-half in last Saturday’s final who came on and was their best player on the day, is leaving at the end of the season to join Connacht.
Bottom line
The 37-year-old Madigan, a Leinster teammate of Cullen’s when the club won three Heineken Cup titles in four seasons between 2009 and 2012 before moving to Bordeaux, Bristol and Ulster, has now had his say about the fallout generated by the Dublin-based club’s fifth Champions Cup final loss.
Appearing on the Indo Sport podcast reviewing a disastrous weekend for Irish rugby, as the combined aggregate loss for Leinster and Ulster in their finals versus Bordeaux and Montpellier was 100-45, Madigan said: “Look, the CEO of Leinster, Shane Nolan, he is also looking at stuff like supporter sentiment but it’s also you’re the CEO, it’s bottom line and you look at the number of games that Leo has consistently got in the URC knockouts, the Champions Cup knockout games and that has a significant influence in the playing budget of the squad.
“But there is also fan sentiment, and the feeling is that it will all be resolved when we get back to the RDS (next season after the ground’s redevelopment). The only way is finding out there, but there is definitely a supporter animosity towards the style of play as well and that can come to a tipping point, but I certainly don’t think it’s there.
“Had they won at the weekend, it would have helped that and that is how sport works. It’s winners and losers and big things change on that. You mention David Humphreys (the IRFU high-performance boss), look at the job that Leo has done as regards the IRFU and the number of players Leinster have consistently provided to the Irish national team over the last five years, for example.
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“When Leo took over (in 2015), there was a much more even split. Leinster were still one of the dominant provinces, but there was a more even split between Munster, Ulster and to an extent Connacht. That has been massively outweighed, in particular, in the last five years. He’d be looking for the other provinces to step up and replicate what he has done.
“Yes, they haven’t got over the line winning trophies, but the point I am making is I don’t think Shane Nolan and David Humphreys are putting Leo under pressure to step aside, and the most important one for Leo is the players.
“Do the players still have the belief in him, and you look at the snippets from the likes of James Ryan, (Jamison) Gibson-Park, Caelan Doris, my belief is they still believe he is the man for the job. Leo has given his whole adult life to the club, bar the couple of years he had with Leicester, and if he didn’t have the belief that he was the best man for the job, he would step aside because that is the love he has for the club.
“At the same time, you have got to look at it and go, if you keep doing the same thing and expecting a different outcome there will come a tipping point there. But there is also a level of admiration you have for the person who keeps dusting himself off and gives it another go and another final. Look, it’s really disappointing, and I am certainly feeling it.”
Leinster will pick up the pieces this coming weekend with a home quarter-final versus the Lions in the United Rugby Championship, the competition they won last year after a five-season wait for a league title.
“The next three weeks will probably tell a lot as well. I don’t think they will be massively tested this week against the Lions, but if they were to come away from this season empty-handed, the conversation takes a different route again,” said Madigan.
“I’m not exactly sure what that is. I am probably in a bit of a mourning phase, but it is certainly part of the conversation. The reality is with the Leinster supporters, getting to finals doesn’t satisfy them and the sentiment will tell you that they need to see trophies being won and part of that is because they have been successful in the past.”
Madigan also shared his thoughts on Leinster losing Frawley to Connacht. When the decision emerged last December, there wasn’t much of a fuss. However, with Sam Prendergast’s form and confidence falling off a cliff since then and Harry Byrne short of statement performances in the No.10 jersey, Frawley demonstrated in recent weeks that he remains a capable out-half but he hasn’t had much of an opportunity to show that.
It was November 2024 when things changed for him at Test level, with some errors contributing to Andy Farrell’s decision to promote Prendergast into the fly-half mix with Jack Crowley. That was the upheaval that negatively changed the trajectory of Frawley’s career as a 10.
Reflecting on how Frawley fared in Bilbao last weekend after replacing Byrne early in the second half, Madigan said: “Full credit to Harry after a tough first half, he came out and fired a few shots in the second half, he had a nice over-the-top pass that got Leinster into their attack down that left-hand side.
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“Look, there is an element of the line speed softening as the game is going on from Bordeaux, and there is also Leinster throwing caution to the wind and you have a 28-point deficit to try and get back.
“But on the eye you look at Frawley, his threat and his squareness at the line and his ability to draw defenders which then has a knock-on effect for creating space for the players outside him because he is attracting one, two, three defenders, he is faster than Harry, his speed and agility, he is drawing players to him or if the gap opens up he has got that acceleration and strength to go through and get his hands free.
“And then there was a real fizz in his passing. Just got the ball into the space accurately, players who were receiving the ball were running on at speed and the fluidity that wasn’t there in the first half, Leinster were suddenly finding it in the second half.
“Look, I felt terrible at half-time and felt even worse at full-time with the realisation that probably Leinster’s best player on the day is leaving the club. I have been a huge fan of Ciaran Frawley when he is playing at out-half, in the centre or full-back. He is an unbelievable get for Connacht.
“I am delighted for him in the sense that he is going to get that consistent game time that he has craved, but he is ready to get it at his boyhood club now. I think back, how have we ended up in this situation? Why wasn’t he the guy who got all the opportunities over the last few years?
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“And look, it’s not just a one-way thing where we blame coaches and clubs, he will take a bit of ownership on it himself as well and say I was given certain opportunities and maybe I played a little bit too loose trying to prove a point as opposed to playing the long game.
“In particular, the cameo against New Zealand. You think back to that, and the punishment didn’t match the crime. That was overkill for a couple of individual errors. There was a game against Fiji where maybe there was a looseness to his game, but those international opportunities are important because you take those with both hands and suddenly the provincial coach is under pressure to pick you.
“And then the reality is over the last two, three seasons it’s been Ross Byrne, Prendergast and in recent times Harry who has had those opportunities and look Leinster haven’t gotten over the line with those guys. You think back to Toulouse, and he [Frawley] is the width of the post away from being the hero, the same hero that he was against South Africa (in Durban with a drop goal).
“He is a big game player, and he showed his true character at the weekend in really tough circumstances, and I certainly wish him well for the rest of the season and on to Connacht, what an unbelievable get it is for them.”