Cullen: Form will dictate XV for final
United Rugby Championship
Leinster v Ospreys
Daire Walsh
As his side prepare for a return to United Rugby Championship action at the RDS this evening, Leinster head coach Leo Cullen remains open-minded when it comes to making his selection for the Investec Champions Cup decider against Toulouse.
While there might have been a temptation to make wholesale changes, Cullen has retained 10 starters in his first 15 from last weekend’s tense European semi-final win over Northampton Saints for tonight’s URC bout with Ospreys in Ballsbridge.
Dan Sheehan, Josh van der Flier and Jamison Gibson-Park are named amongst the replacements and while Joe McCarthy and James Lowe are absent, they are only nursing minor niggles that aren’t thought to be serious.
The Blues will also face Ulster at the Kingspan Stadium in Belfast next Saturday and in addition to aiding their cause in the URC, several players within the set-up will be looking to cement spots in the matchday 23 for that crunch showdown against Toulouse in London on May 25.
“It would be unfair for me to even have a fixed view on that [selection for Toulouse] because things will happen tomorrow that will have to be judged on what is taking place. The form of how guys are training. There is always different little bits going on in the background, body management and loads of stuff,” Cullen remarked at a pre-match press conference.
“It all feeds in and you want to have an open mind for guys, so they have a genuine window. A genuine opportunity. Clearly some level of opinion has been formed over time for us, but when guys go out there, you want to reward the guys who are in form and playing well based on not too far, historically. It is based on who is going to deliver in the here and now.”
In between beating defending champions La Rochelle and Northampton in the knockout rounds of the Champions Cup, Leinster dropped down to second in the URC table after suffering comprehensive losses to the Lions and the Stormers on a mini tour of South Africa.
Given their desire to secure a top seeding for the knockout rounds of the competition, it is understandable that Cullen isn’t willing to leave anything to chance over the next fortnight.
He is also taking into account that a 10th-placed Ospreys side, captained by former Welsh international flanker Justin Tipuric, have plenty to play for.
“Ospreys, they want to play in the Champions Cup. They want to make sure they make the play-offs. There is so much there for them in the game. Do we understand that? It’s not just us playing out there. They’re going to play their part and they’ve a lot of experienced Welsh international players.
“A pretty cohesive group, they’re well coached. Good attention to detail around some of the basics of the game, set-piece in particular. They’ll be a right handful. What do we want to see? We want to see us improving on what we delivered last week. You want to go a level up all the time.”
Meanwhile, Cullen was able to give a positive update on the fitness of key trio Hugo Keenan, Garry Ringrose and James Ryan, troubled by respective hip, shoulder and arm injuries in recent times.
“They’re going pretty good. It’s down to what is the exact right game to put them into.
“It’s not this week, but I think hopefully we’ll see a few of them in action next week.
“We’ll see, it’s day-by-day,” Cullen added.
LEINSTER: C Frawley; J Larmour, J Osborne, R Henshaw, J O’Brien; R Byrne, L McGrath; A Porter, R Kelleher, T Furlong; R Molony, J Jenkins; R Baird, W Connors, C Doris.
Replacements: D Sheehan, M Milne, T Clarkson, J Conan, J van der Flier, J Gibson-Park, C Ngatai, T O’Brien.
OSPREYS: M Nagy; L Morgan, O Watkin, K Williams, K Giles; D Edwards, R Morgan-Williams; N Smith, D Lake, R Henry; J Ratti, H Sutton; H Deaves, J Tipuric, M Morris.
Replacements: S Parry, G Thomas, T Botha, V Sekekete, J Morgan, L Davies, J Walsh, E Boshoff.c