Leinster leave Cardiff black and blue

Leinster 59 Cardiff 22:AT LEINSTER training in UCD you can sometimes hear the shrieks and appreciative cheers of the players after somebody pulls off a move not listed in the coaching manual. To do that on Saturday night in the RDS was cheeky but a barometer of how comfortable the home side was as they mercilessly thrashed their occasionally soft Cardiff visitors.

Fergus McFadden’s flick for Ian Madigan’s try after seven minutes, Jonathan Sexton’s crossfield kick to Dave Kearney a few yards from his own line: cameo moments from Leinster’s nine try win and Cardiff’s night of horror.

Leinster may have lost Brian O’Driscoll on 22 minutes but had their bonus point wrapped up four minutes later. By 31 minutes they were looking at a record score and in the end fell three points short of that, the 59-22 win a little lighter than the 62 points racked up in their previous best.

The moot point was how good were Leinster or how bad were Cardiff, who haemorrhaged more than nine leaked tries.

What that will do for national confidence before a sizeable rump of the team head off to Wales for their November series of internationals is anyone’s guess, although the red shirt of their country seems to evoke much greater passion from the Welsh players.

From Joe Schmidt’s point of view his satisfaction in the performances of players like the impressive Jordi Murphy in the backrow will be tempered by the frustration of having to let his Ireland contingent go just as they hit a sharper bit of form and momentum. For the coach it is back to the familiar patch-up side to face Ospreys later this week.

Dave Kearney and Rhys Ruddock came through okay but Brian O’Driscoll did not, which was a disappointment not just for Ireland coach Declan Kidney but the 17,236 fans that came to watch. O’Driscoll had been frustrated with his previous performances but he looked like his cutting edge had returned before he hobbled off with a sprained ankle to a standing applause after he had unsuccessfully tried to run it off.

“Disappointed but realistic,” was Schmidt’s reaction to the outcome, the three tries conceded in a glass half-empty moment. “Begrudgingly you like to stop them all but sometimes you can’t. Brian is a man who judges himself very harshly. He’ll still find a lot of things that was wrong tonight but I felt there was a lot right.”

Kevin McLaughlin and Cian Healy banged heads in a tackle but are okay. They both felt they could continue and jogged off. Fergus McFadden got a nick on his ear and had to be bandaged, while Murphy got a stinger on his shoulder with just Isaac Boss remaining on the bench.

“Bossy was pretty quick to say look, I’ve played flanker before,” quipped Schmidt.

Utility back Andrew Goodman arrives from New Zealand today, while Seán O’Brien is still due to return to action at the end of next month.

Leinster started off their processional 80 minutes with a curtain -raiser on four minutes with the man of the moment Richardt Strauss celebrating his Irish status by barrelling in. Madigan followed, then Jamie Heaslip for the first of his two. Kearney finished off good work from Murphy on 26 minutes and Heaslip landed his second after Leinster crushed Cardiff in the scrum and he picked up and dived in. Cian Healy bashed out some hard yards to make it 40-3 at half time.

As is often the case, teams with the match won flag somewhat and with the bench emptying, a repeat second half was unlikely. Leinster made it known that the game was still travelling in one direction when Murphy was rewarded two minutes after the break and Damian Browne 12 minutes later.

Cardiff hit back with three from Alex Cuthbert, Leigh Halfpenny and James Thomas. But they left with their heads down just about as far as they had ever been.

Fionn Carr’s last-minute touchdown capping a truly miserable night for the Welsh team.

LEINSTER: I Madigan; D Kearney, B O’Driscoll, G D’Arcy, F McFadden; J Sexton, E Reddan; C Healy, R Strauss, M Ross; L Cullen (capt), D Toner; K McLaughlin, J Murphy, J Heaslip. Replacements: B Macken for O’Driscoll (22 mins); D Browne for Cullen (40 mins); S Cronin for Strauss (46 mins); R Ruddock and H van der Merwe for McLaughlin and Healy (49 mins); F Carr for D’Arcy (53 mins); J Hagan for Ross (56 mins); I Boss for Murphy (64 mins).

CARDIFF; L Halfpenny; A Cuthbert, D Hewitt, J Roberts, T James; J Tovey, L Williams; F Taufa’ao, M Breeze, S Andrews; B Davies, J Down; J Navidi, S Warburton, A Pretorius (capt). Replacements: N Trevett for Navidi (28 mins); L Jones and R Williams for L Williams and Breeze (56 mins); T Williams for Hewitt (64 mins).

Referee: L Davies (WRU).

CENTRE STAGE: O'Driscoll could be fit this week

Leinster are hopeful that Brian O'Driscoll will be fit to take part in the Irish training this week after spraining his ankle in the first half of Leinster's PRO12 match against Cardiff on Saturday night. O'Driscoll tried to continue but limped out of the match on 22 minutes.

"A really positive picture; he thought he could probably play on," said Leinster coach Joe Schmidt. "He's pretty uncomfortable now because those things tend to swell up after the game. He's got a bit of swelling around his ankle but it's not puffed up massively. We think he's sprained his ankle.

"We'll probably get it scanned to just to make sure but I'll defer to the medical team as to whether or not that takes place. Initial prognosis would be that he should be up on his feet training at the latest . . . he may not be available for training on Monday or Tuesday but even with that the man bounces back fast. We'll be trying to get the information to the national camp as soon as we can."
Johnny Watterson