Leinster hold off Edinburgh fightback to bank bonus at RDS
Despite a spirited fightback from Edinburgh in the closing stages of an intriguing encounter, Leinster came away with their second bonus point triumph in the space of seven days in the United Rugby Championship at the RDS on Saturday.
Facing Leinster for the first time since Munster’s URC semi-final victory over the eastern province at the Aviva Stadium a little under six months ago, Tipperary native Ben Healy broke the deadlock for the visitors by calmly slotting a penalty between the posts on 18 minutes.
The former Ireland U20s international was one of 11 players from Scotland’s World Cup squad to be included in the Edinburgh match day 23 for this game. Leinster are yet to welcome back their own Irish contingent to the fold, but the Blues nevertheless opened their account when hooker Lee Barron drove over off a line-out move just past the first-quarter mark.
Edinburgh suffered a further setback when lock Glen Young was sent to the sin-bin in the 31st minute and Leinster unsurprisingly made hay in his absence. Either side of another Healy penalty, Max Deegan and Ciaran Frawley claimed converted tries to leave the hosts 21-6 in front at the break.
A bonus try inevitably arrived for Leinster when Tommy O’Brien sprinted over the right flank 13 minutes after the resumption and while Edinburgh replacement James Lang immediately breach the home team’s whitewash at the opposite end, Leinster were back in control when James Cuhlane bagged his first try in professional club rugby off a line-out maul.
Even though the final outcome appeared to be beyond doubt moving into the final quarter, Edinburgh did give themselves a fighting chance when Connor Boyle and Boan Venter joined fellow replacement Lang in dotting down past the opposition line. Yet with Sam Prendergast knocking over a penalty in between these scores, Leinster had done enough to make it two successive wins and temporarily move up to fourth in the URC table.
Tries – L Barron, M Deegan, C Frawley, T O’Brien, J Culhane. Pens – S Prendergast. Cons – H Byrne (4).
Tries – J Lang, C Boyle, B Venter. Pens – B Healy (2). Cons – B Healy (3).
C Frawley; T O’Brien, J Osborne, C Ngatai, J Larmour; H Byrne, C Foley; J Boyle, L Barron, M Ala’alatoa; R Molony, J Jenkins; M Deegan, S Penny, J Culhane.
R Ruddock for Deegan, B Murphy for Foley, S Prendergast for Byrne, R Russell for Ngatai (all 55), P McCarthy for Boyle, R McGuire for Ala’alatoa (both 62), B Deeny for Jenkins (62), D Donnellan for Barron (67).
B Kinghorn; W Goosen, M Bennett, M Currie, D van der Merwe; B Healy, C Shiel; P Shoeman, D Cherry, WP Nel; G Young, G Gilchrist; T Dodd, H Watson, L Crosbie.
M Sykes for Watson, C Boyle for Crosbie (both h-t), J Lang for Bennett (53), E Ashman for Cherry, B Venter for Shoeman, J Sebastian for Nel (all 55), C Dean for Currie (72).
M van der Westhuizen (SARU)