Leinster Team Talk/Gossip/Rumours Thread XII (The Byrne Supremacy)

12 weeks for Connors with a bicep injury.

8 weeks for both Harry and Ronan.

That 8 weeks will likely see Kelleher miss November series too. Huge shame

https://www.leinsterrugby.ie/leo-cullen-issues-injury-update-ahead-of-munster-game/

I'd like to see Ngatai and Henshaw in the centres and Ringrose on the wing v Munster. We're very light on the wing and Ringrose was excellent there v the Sharks, as were Ngatai and Henshaw in the centre.

Is Ross Byrne not the back up 10?

probably true - but then there are only 12 regular season URC games left after this weekend- so if Sexton plays in 4 of them (not unreasonable to expect him to play a few),that would be 33%.

Desperately unlucky for Connors and Kelleher. There was a lot of debate about who would be the starting hooker, but if Sheehan maintains this form, then surely he'll be in possession of the jersey at leinster and Ireland and it will be up to Kelleher to take it from him.

Anyone know how ticket sales are looking for Saturday?

There's a distinct lack of hype going into this game. The rivalry being one sided for years hasn't helped. Leinster have dominated and Munster have gotten worse and worse.

But I think what hurts this fixture most right now is that neither side are anywhere near top gear yet. The way the season is structured means European Rugby doesn't begin until after the November tests. It used to be that the provinces would start to go up a gear intensity and accuracy wise for this fixture and then go straight into the Champions Cup. This year, I get the impression that Leinster still aren't at the level where ramping up is required.

To me, it just feels like a run of the mill league fixture. I might be wrong and we'll get a proper game at the weekend. But both sides are still relatively subdued.

It's an interesting conundrum for Farrell. Does he want to experiment with the side and risk losing, or try and consolidate on the excellent summer tour and only make changes where absolutely necessary.

Cullen has already ruled out Lowe, JGP and Keenan for this weekend, but they may be fit for the Scarlets fixture the week after. I think if Keenan and JGP are even half fit, they start for Ireland. They're just so important to the gameplan and I don't think any other 9 or 15 on the Ireland comes close to replicating their strengths. Keenan is also one of the best 15's in world rugby. He's one of the first 5 names on the team sheet.

Lowe isn't quite as important, but I think some people don't recognise all the good work he does in green. He's another auxiliary playmaker and is constantly popping in field to act as a decoy, gainline carrier or linking passer. Robert Baloucone is a gifted athlete, but I don't think he has the same ball playing skills as Lowe. At least not yet anyway.

I think Lowe's left boot is very important to Ireland and Leinster.

If Lowe doesn't play, who fulfils that role of regularly getting us out of our half from inside the 22 on the left hand side of the pitch? (Stockdale? )

I may be sounding like a broken record on this, but I’d hope the coaches already have a very good handle on who is up for games against top tier sides and that they don’t need to chuck guys into games to find out. If they don’t then they aren’t doing their jobs properly.

We’ve seen plenty of new faces under Farrell as well so this take of “same players in every test” is really hollow. Every side has their core group of players that they use in big games. And they generally use the first couple of years of a RWC cycle to bring guys in lot that group with the last year being about building momentum etc. We’ve done similar.

There's a pre-sale for Ireland A vs New Zealand A exclusive to Leinster Season Ticket holders. Goes live tomorrow.

I get that, but it isn’t all about just the individuals either. For example I’d see the SA game in particular as a massive one. They play very differently to how others do and how we approach playing them, how we adapt to how they defend and attack (especially as they’ll be in our pool) could tell us a lot about what we need to tweak heading into the RWC. And in that case then the less variables we can introduce into that game the better as they may dilute what we can take from it.

Its always hard figuring this stuff out from the outside looking in. We don’t really know what the coaches wanted to tweak from the NZ tour or what weaknesses/opportunities they can see in opposition sides. So we’re always commenting from a point of ignorance. If the coaches don’t give too many guys a go this Autumn, or at least less than some would like, that isn’t necessarily a sign of conservatism. And given how willing they’ve been up to now to give guys opportunities then we should try to give them at least some benefit of the doubt. If they’d stuck with the same 23 as much as possible for the last 3 years then they wouldn’t deserve that benefit, but they haven’t. So if they select Lowe, for example, as soon as he’s available then we should wait until we see how he performs before making a call on whether it was the right thing to do or not.

Thornley is reporting that only 35,000 tickets have been sold for Saturday's game which is well short of capacity. Whilst its a bit more than the game last May, it's a shame that full houses are becoming few and far between in the Aviva. It's a tricky spot to have demand well in excess of what the RDS can hold but well below what can fill the Aviva.

Leinster need to consider moving the Ulster game to the Aviva, Munster there every season has been stale for years now.