No team has a divine right to win the Champions Cup, as Leinster know better than most. Maybe winning their first four finals in 10 years set the bar too high. Even so, in the aftermath of Saturday’s 37-34 semi-final exit to Northampton, a return of one Champions Cup in 13 years seems poor for all the investment in the playing squad, facilities and coaches in that time.
The final in Cardiff in three weeks on Saturday, May 24th, will be between Northampton and first-time finalists Bordeaux Bègles, for whom Joey Carbery played the last 11 minutes in Sunday’s semi-final as his team dethroned the six-time winners Toulouse, prevailing 35-18 in Bordeaux. The final will be a hard watch for Leinster supporters, management and players alike.
“I can’t, unfortunately, comment on how you get judged over a long period of time,” said Leo Cullen when the return of one European title in 13 years was put to him after his 10th Champions Cup campaign as head coach.
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“If you wind the clock a bit further back, if you asked us in 2009, in 16 years’ time you’ll have, what, four Champions Cups? In the previous 14 years we had doughnut. So, it depends again how far you go back with some of those questions.
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“We would have loved to have won more. If you ask every team in the competition, they would have loved to have won more but we know how bloody hard it is to do it. We understand the pain that we’re in at the moment. It’s a horrible feeling for everyone in there, I can assure you. But what do we do? Dust ourselves off and go again.”
Cullen has often cited how the Leinster/Irish model operates in contrast to the French and English clubs, who are backed by wealthy benefactors, although Leinster cannot really play the poor mouth. The playing budgets of Northampton and the other Premiership clubs are capped at €7.2 million, while the salary cap in the Top 14 is, in theory, €10.7 million.
As Leinster’s budget is swollen by 11 players under central IRFU contracts, their annual wage bill is unknown. Most likely it is around the €12-14 million mark, but in any event, Cullen disputed the latest claims in the French and English media that Leinster’s annual players’ budget is €17 million.
“It is wild. That’s miles off,” maintained Cullen. “Unfortunately, people can write whatever they want. As we know, the system here is a little more complex than in other countries but we don’t have a published salary cap. I don’t think it’s a conversation for this moment in time. I’ve seen some of those figures and they’re just not accurate. How do you correct people who write things that aren’t true in the current media?”
Coming up short again hurts all the more after investing in a dual World Cup-winning defensive coach, a renowned French scrummaging prop, a two-time World Cup winning lock and a world-class, 68-times capped All Black utility back.
But as well as the debatable decision to leave Jordie Barrett on the bench for the first 50 minutes after his man-of-the-match display in the quarter-finals, a defence that had kept two attack-orientated sides scoreless in their previous two knock-out ties was clinically dissected.
“There will be a bit of head scratching there in terms of some of our mentality around defence and were we really clued in enough for some of the threats Northampton have,” admitted Cullen. “We’ve seen them attack. The players have seen them, they know, but that’s a big score to concede in a play-off game.”
Cullen and Jacques Nienaber are both under contract next season and for all the disgruntlement among Leinster supporters, both will assuredly be in situ next season.
A little taken aback by being asked if he was the right man to one day take Leinster to that cherished fifth star, Cullen responded with increasing defiance.
“Yeah, I think I am. Yeah. I believe that I am, yes. I think we’ve worked hard to try and improve the group year on year on year and I think the group is very strong right now. That’s not something that’s just created last week; it’s year on year.
“We’ve lost three finals over the last three years, but I believe we’ve a stronger group now than we’ve had and that’s the way I will continue to approach the day-to-day in preparing the short term, medium term, long term. So, yes. And I’m very committed to that as well.”
If there was any complacency in this semi-final after 62-0 and 52-0 wins in the previous rounds, it could only have been compounded by leaving Barrett on an all-international bench boasting 358 caps, as against Northampton’s seven.
“I will look back on lots of different things, over the course of the next few weeks,” said Cullen. “And, yes, when you don’t win a game, particularly in a semi-final, everyone is going to second-guess everything.
“Jordie brought huge impact, and that is what we wanted from him. Similar with Jack Conan, as well, and a lot of other players that were on the bench. You look at us at the end of the game, we looked like a strong team, attacking the game. There’s probably bits before where we weren’t quite accurate enough. But I don’t have regrets about that plan, specifically.”
