Leinster v Sale: Five takeaways as ‘lion king’ roars again during ‘ugly duckling’ of a quarter-final
Leinster v Sale: Five takeaways as 'lion king' Keenan roars again during 'ugly duckling' of a quarter-final
Following Leinster’s 43-13 quarter-final win over Sale Sharks in the Investec Champions Cup, here are our five takeaways from the Aviva Stadium.
The top line
Hugo Keenan ended seven months of injury hell to book Leinster a home Champions Cup semi-final against Toulon and raise hopes that the quest for the elusive fifth star will end in Bilbao next month.
The British and Irish Lions series winner has barely played this season due to surgery and then a training ground injury. But just as in Melbourne, with his try to clinch the Lions series last summer, he popped up to deliver when most needed.
The full-back scored a try, gave two assists and diffused George Ford’s famed spiral bombs to send Leinster to a sixth consecutive semi-final in Europe’s blue riband tournament.
Sale made the Blues work hard, restricting the scoreline to 7-3 at half-time despite losing the first of two players to the sin bin.
But Keenan sparked the home side into life after the break, and four tries in the last 26 minutes – from Ryan Baird, Rieko Ioane, Tommy O’Brien and Jamie Osborne – turned a close contest into a comprehensive victory.
An ugly duckling of a quarter-final
Make no mistake, this was the ugly duckling of this round, given the brilliant attacking spectacle that was Bath-Northampton on Friday night, the defensive masterclass Toulon turned in to break Glasgow hearts, and the fireworks show we confidently expect Bordeaux and Toulouse to put on for us on Sunday.
Leinster will not worry about that. In fact, they will be chuffed to bits with how the day unfolded, given that at the start of play, they would have predicted a best-case scenario of a semi-final away to Glasgow at a sold-out Murrayfield.
Instead, it is the Aviva that will be full on the first weekend of May to cheer on a Leinster team finally getting out of second gear after a spluttering campaign to date.
No matter that the Rouge et Noir were outstanding against Scottish opponents who next to never lose on home turf, Leinster will be favourites to reach the showpiece game in Bilbao, the scene of their fourth and most recent title back in 2018.
Lion king Keenan roars again
When Keenan finally returned to rugby last month, he said: “It really only feels like my season’s getting going now, over halfway through it.”
It was a statement of fact. The Lions series winner had returned from Australia a conquering hero. He then missed the autumn to have hip surgery.
That was bearable as it was a procedure he had long needed. What was not was the fractured thumb he suffered in Portugal on the first day of Ireland’s pre-Six Nations training camp.
It cost him his participation in the tournament and meant he had to wait until late March to return to colours, battling frustration for seven months as Ireland won a Triple Crown without him.
His joy, therefore, at the contribution he made to this victory was easy to understand. Put simply, it had the full-back’s fingerprints all over it.
When Sale were making life distinctly uncomfortable for their hosts in the first half, Keenan steadied the ship with exquisite high ball work; fielding George Ford’s spiral kicks generally considered uncatchable.
The 29-year-old then moved his side onto the front foot with devastating effect. He bagged the try that put two scores between the teams for the first time on 44 minutes, then brilliantly beat Ford in the air to claim Harry Byrne’s kick and lay the platform for Leinster’s bonus point score, finished by Ioane.
He was not done, breaking down the short side just past the hour mark for O’Brien to dot down try number five and set the seal on an ultimately convincing win.
“Hugo’s brilliant, he adds so much to the club,” senior coach Jacques Nienaber said afterwards. “To have him back on the pitch is amazing, like having an extra coach there.”
Unsurprisingly, Keenan left the field to an ovation from what was a disappointingly small crowd. Sheehan was named player of the match. It is hard to imagine what more Keenan could have done.
Depleted Sale do themselves proud
Alex Sanderson spoke beforehand about staying in the fight, and Sale heeded their master’s command in a first half notable for the depleted visitors’ dominance at scrum time.
Sharks knew they were up against it long before kick-off, given they travelled without Tom and Ben Curry, Raffi Quirke, Bevan Rodd, Luke Cowan-Dickie and Nathan Jibulu.
But, honouring their combative DNA, the cream of Manchester took the game to Leinster at the set-piece. The Blues were not helped by the loss of loose head Alex Usanov to a calf injury inside the first five minutes, though Sale had already won a scrum penalty by then.
Given they were without England front-row duo Rodd and Cowan-Dickie it was some effort.
Trailing by only four points at half-time, they had Leinster panicking that, for a second season, they were about to be upset by English opposition on their own patch.
They had aspirations of their own of reaching a first Champions Cup semi-final after last-eight defeats to Biarritz, La Rochelle and Racing in 2006, 2021 and 2022.
The words spoken to Planet Rugby in midweek by Sale forwards coach Dorian West must have been ringing in Leinster’s ears as they headed to the sheds.
“We play with a physicality and an attention to detail in the set-piece,” West had warned. “I think we’ll be more than a challenge for them.”
Ultimately, discipline and a lineout, which faded as the game went on, let them down. Losing Dan du Preez and Si McIntyre to the sin bin either side of the interval meant they were down to 13 just as Leinster finally clicked into gear.
It meant that their 11-6 quarter-final loss to Biarritz in San Sebastián’s Estadio Anoeta 20 years ago remains their best quarter-final effort in this competition.
But the effort they put in, allied to the impending arrivals of Courtney Lawes, Nicky Smith, Alex Lozowski, Joe Marchant, Tomas Francis and Christ Tshiunza, means Sale can look to the future with a lot of positivity.
Sheehan not fooled by scoreline
Leinster captain Dan Sheehan admitted a 30-point margin of victory flattered his side, and they have much to work on before Toulon come to town in three weeks.
“We were probably stuck in third gear for a while, and it took a while for us to sort of go through the gears,” the Ireland hooker told Premier Sports.
“A semi-final at the Aviva is exactly where we want to be. It’s been a bit of a weird season for us, ups and downs, but at the end of the day, we’ve got a home semi-final that we can get excited for.
“We had to work hard for our points. It took us a while to break Sale down. But that’s probably been the theme of the season. We’ve had a lot of games that are close, that we have had to grind out.
“Hopefully that’ll stand to us in good stead because that scoreline probably flatters what the actual performance was. We have a lot to work on.”