Gerry Thornley: Provinces won’t be easy prey in Champions Cup

By this time next week we’ll have a good idea already as to how the Irish teams are facing up in the European Champions Cup, especially in comparison to the Top 14, a quartet of whom provide the opposition on the opening weekend. Yes, this will tell us much.

On balance, the brace of derbies in the Pro12’s round six try-fest was well timed and has left the provinces certainly better prepared than they were going into the first round last year. Then, Leinster’s sobering 33-6 defeat to Wasps all but undid their campaign from the off.

The same applied to Ulster, who were derailed by Saracens also achieving a bonus-point win at the Kingspan a week after Ulster’s scheduled match away to Oyonnax had been postponed due to the Paris atrocities. As Munster’s game away to Stade Francais in round one had also been called off, it meant the only Irish victory on the opening two weekends was Munster’s win at home to Treviso.

Leinster and Munster were then all but evicted by the back-to-back defeats to Toulon and Leicester, with only Ulster’s double over Toulouse sustaining a flicker of light before Christmas.

Connacht have now joined the fray and backing up their bonus-point win at home to Edinburgh with another five-point haul over Ulster was hugely significant for the province and, indeed, the league as a whole.

Double whammy

They can entertain four-time winners Toulouse knowing that their culture has survived an early-season buffeting. Their playing systems and strength in depth have come through. Ulster’s post-interval double whammy, which erased Connacht’s 14-point lead, would have been too damaging in times past or at clubs whose culture was not as strong. In its way, it was as testing a mini-crisis as any they faced last season and as impressive a response. They just slipped back into their systems, and everyone knew what was required.

That they did it without such standard-bearers as Tom McCartney, Kieran Marmion and Matt Healy is testament to their strength in depth, with Dave Heffernan, Caolin Blade and Cian Kelleher all handsome contributors – as was Craig Ronaldson on his return for Peter Robb.

Toulouse are beatable, are perhaps more so than on their previous two winning visits to Galway, and even ravaged by injury, Connacht are undoubtedly better equipped this time. The caveats being that it is probably a must-win game and they are already looking threadbare entering a month which was always going to test them like no other last season.

That Ulster lost, and in the manner they did, may even prove beneficial, all the more so if, as is likely, they retain the apparent candour and anger of their post-match de-brief in the away dressing- room last Friday. Much of the key mistakes and defensive blips are fixable.

Their backplay is still the best of the provinces, and as they showed with last season’s double over Toulouse, when you dine at Europe’s top table you need to bring your top hat and tails, to be able to strike stealthily off limited opportunities, especially for a fixture such as Sunday’s opener away to high-flying Bordeaux, for whom Ian Madigan is likely to return to the starting line-up.

Charles Piutau has added to their X-factor with his rare blend of pace, footwork and strength, and with him and Ruan Pienaar back they’ve every chance, although despite their backline riches, they are already down to the bare bones too. The nagging suspicion remains that after the departure of Nick Williams, losing Marcell Coetzee for the first few months of the season has left them seriously short of ball-carriers up front.

There’s no doubt Leinster remain the best equipped, and with the best schools feeder system, resources and player base, they should be. Last season’s return of five defeats in the pool stages ought to rankle.

The nature of the win over Munster undoubtedly owed plenty to Munster mistakes, and a few borderline decisions in their favour. Yet it confirmed their scrum is potent, their lineout assured and their back-row resources the most plentiful.

Most encouragingly of all, Johnny Sexton is on top of his game and Robbie Henshaw’s debut added to the feel-good factor which has in part been generated by the arrival of Stuart Lancaster.

The competition, and Irish rugby, needs a resurgent Leinster. The signs have been moderately encouraging, but they are a work very much in progress, and given the memory of last season, only the next two weeks will really inform.

Castres at the RDS is the most winnable of the four Irish tête-à-têtes, but then again it is a must-win, all the more so with the trek to Montpellier eight days later.

Ironically, given the term was previously most associated with them, last Saturday’s game at the Aviva appeared to underline that Munster have the least X factor of the four provinces. Granted, even at their zenith, Munster had to work harder than most for their scores, and that seemingly hasn’t changed.

Typically muscular

They have paid the price for last season with the toughest draw. Handed the most daunting of the four opening matches, away to French champions and last season’s beaten European Cup finalists Racing Metro, they can ill-afford to lose possession in contact as freely as was the case last Saturday, not least against a typically muscular Top 14 side for whom collisions are king.

They are unlikely to have as many bouts of pressure next Sunday in Paris, and will need to be way more accurate to turn those periods or moments into points.

Munster have seemed the least tested to date. Last Saturday was a step up, and next Sunday will be again. Then again, that probably applies across the board, and in different ways, they are all a little better for last weekend’s skirmishes.

There are reasons to be moderately more optimistic.

gthornley@irishtimes.com