RUGBY:The former Ulster and Ireland number eight tells CIARAN CRONINthat Northampton are well aware of the task they face in Cardiff on May 21st
NORTHAMPTON’S ROGER Wilson has not been fooled by the ease of his side’s Heineken Cup semi-final victory over Perpignan and believes Leinster under Joe Schmidt are a different beast altogether.
While there has been a rush in some quarters to laud the Saints’ demolition of the Catalans, the former Ulster and Ireland number eight is fully aware Leinster are playing rugby at a different level entirely to his side’s semi-final opponents, particularly now, according to Wilson, that Schmidt’s side have succeeded in developing the same kind of bloody-mindedness more usually associated with Munster.
“It will be a big step up,” said Wilson, who was an intelligent physical presence for the Saints against Perpignan on Sunday. “Speaking to a few of the boys today after the game, in terms of intensity and pace we thought that the quarter-final against Ulster was tougher than the semi-final, with no disrespect to Perpignan.
“Leinster will be a big step up again. They don’t have any weaknesses in their team. To win the game, everyone on our team is going to have to play the best games of their lives, every single one of us. It’s within our capabilities, but it’s going to take a massive, massive effort.”
Wilson took time out from his preparations for Sunday’s semi-final to watch the encounter between Leinster and Toulouse. Needless to say, he was impressed with the quality on display.
“It was a great game of rugby. I thought Toulouse threw everything at them but Leinster, they almost play like the Munster team of a few years ago. They absorb all the pressure, and with 20 or 30 minutes to go, they find that extra gear to step things up.
“They don’t have many weaknesses in their squad. Their defence is absolutely outstanding, their set-piece has improved massively over the past few years and their attack, you don’t need to say too much about that. They have world class players. I can’t think of any weaknesses at all.”
It is a different Leinster to the one he used to encounter regularly with Ulster before he took leave of Ravenhill in June 2008 to throw in his lot with Northampton.
“They’ve always had the backs and whenever I used to play against them for Ulster, they didn’t have that killer instinct in the pack. Certainly now they’d be one of the best forward units in Europe and that’s the main difference I think. A lot of the games I’ve seen they’ve dominated up front and it’s going to be a challenge matching them in the final.”
Despite the undoubted strength of Northampton’s frontrow, Wilson is slow to talk up the possibility of Soane Tonga’uiha and associates doing a similar job on Leinster.
“If you look at the way Ireland played against England in the Six Nations, Ireland had the upper hand in that and they pretty much have the Irish frontrow. Hopefully we can get dominance.
“It’s something we try to aim for every week, but we’ll see.”
Wilson, of course, might well be deliberately talking his own side down but he is less reticent when it comes to explaining what it means to him to play in a Heineken Cup final on the back of having witnessed Ulster’s 1999 triumph at Lansdowne Road in the flesh.
“It was fantastic, I’ve never experienced anything like it before,” he said of that famous win over Colomiers in Dublin.
“It’s certainly given me a taste, it was always something I wanted to do in my career and I felt that moving to Northampton a few years ago was the best option for me (to achieve it). I guess, looking back on it now, it’s proved true.”
