Earning a record dozen places in the British & Irish Lions squad looked like a double-edged sword for Leinster’s shot at redemption in the United Rugby Championship (URC) run-in.
Jamison Gibson-Park joined Hugo Keenan and Tadhg Furlong, as well as injured captain Caelan Doris, in the stands for Saturday’s final. Despite such an array of unavailable talent, the team convincingly clinched a first trophy in four seasons.
Hunger for silverware superseded that significant distraction. For all the successes some of them have enjoyed at Test level, 15 of the match-day 23 in Saturday’s 32-7 win over the Bulls at Croke Park didn’t play in the 2021 Grand Final win over Munster at an empty Aviva Stadium.
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Dan Sheehan was one of those 15 and, having only started two games in that 2020-21 season, this felt like his first true winners’ medal for the province.
“[This is] the first one that I feel properly a part of,” he said. “It was definitely on my mind over the last couple of years that you work so hard during the season and you’re spending the majority of your time with this group of players and it hasn’t changed a whole lot.
“So, the hunger was there today and I think you saw from the first whistle. Incredibly enjoyable, incredibly rewarding. That feeling after the final whistle went for Cian Healy, for Ross (Byrne), for Liam (Turner) and for Rob (Russell), all the lads leaving us. It gives us a boost, I think, and gets the monkey off the back.”
Addressing the issue of Leinster’s Lions contingent, Sheehan added: “I think we were so hungry as a group to get silverware, to win a URC, that we parked it pretty easily.
“We were left alone by the Lions. We didn’t hear a thing from them, which is exactly the way we wanted it to be and we could just solely focus on the URC. We knew that we needed to get a job done and we needed to focus solely on the URC. If you look too far in the future, you’ll slip up.
“I think we did a good job as a group by addressing it early. When it (the Lions squad) was first announced, it was important to say congrats and ‘right, move on – we’re committing to this fully’.”
As the biggest suppliers to the Lions squad, it’s far more preferable to finally acquaint themselves with their new squadmates in Dublin this week as URC champions than with another near-miss.
“Yeah, it would have been a sickener to go into camp there with nothing after missing the first two weeks of camp. But we’ve got the medal now and will enjoy tonight and enjoy tomorrow hopefully,” said Sheehan in expectation of the celebrations and farewells.
For 46,127 to lend the final a worthy sense of grandness was a remarkable turn-out at just six days’ notice. The crowd were also engaged by every nuance of the game and the occasion; witness the reception afforded Ross Byrne for his introduction in the 69th minute.
It was entirely fitting that Byrne would sign off with a try assist for Fintan Gunne. He closed out the scoring with his sole kick when landing the conversion in his final game for Leinster before joining Gloucester.
So, Leinster’s third highest points scorer brought his haul to 1,196 over the last decade. That conversion drew louder approval than would ordinarily be the case. As the players received their medals, the biggest cheer was also reserved for Byrne.
“Ross is an unbelievable player, an unbelievable professional and the standards he drives are like no one else in our group at the minute,” said Sheehan.
“I think he gets a hard time over the last ten years and he doesn’t give a f**k, really. He just gets on with it. He loves Leinster, he loves winning and he loves the group. I was happy for him today.
“He got a good reception from the crowd and he’ll be truly missed as a person in the changing room, as someone that drives what we try to do incredibly well, similar to a sort of Johnny Sexton character, of just being ruthless with what we expect of each other and holding people accountable.
“But also, a great man off the field as well.”
