WHILE IT IS perhaps only in recent times that some of those on the outside have taken notice, Leo Cullen stressed that he and his fellow Leinster coaches were always aware of Tommy O’Brien’s potential.

A debutant for the province as far back as December 2019, the former Blackrock College student has been a member of the Leinster senior squad since the summer of 2020. While he had accumulated 21 appearances in blue by May 2022, an anterior cruciate ligament injury meant it was another 11 months before his next outing at provincial level.

He did manage eight starts across the 2023/24 season, but issues with his ankle and hamstring have halted O’Brien’s momentum at certain stages in recent years. Yet the past couple of months has seen him enjoying an extended run in the Leinster side and having crossed the whitewash in his first European start against Glasgow Warriors eight days earlier, he maintained his impressive form at the Aviva Stadium on Saturday.

In addition to displaying his pace and skill on the way to scoring the opening try of the game on the stroke of 20 minutes, a delicate kick from the 26-year-old released Dan Sheehan for the first of his three tries as a replacement in a 41-17 victory over interprovincial rivals Ulster in the United Rugby Championship.

“We would have always seen it from a training point of view. It’s just staying sound, consistency. We would have seen it for a long time, but he’s just been unlucky. That happens with players, but we’ve all seen it for a long time and he’s a great competitor Tommy,” Cullen remarked.

“You can see 50/50 balls, he just makes his own. From his own kick through [for Sheehan’s try], it’s a 50/50 which he wins. Similar off the chip through [for his try], the 50/50 that he wins. He’s going well.”

Another man who has had his injury troubles in the past – albeit before his arrival at the eastern province – is South African international RG Snyman. During his time at Munster from 2020 to 2024, it was largely due to a brace of ACL injuries that the Springbok second row was restricted to just 20 appearances.

He has already managed 17 outings with his current employers, but there was some concern on Saturday when Snyman was withdrawn on 71 minutes – just 18 minutes after he had been brought on to replace Joe McCarthy.

Yet Cullen was quick to allay any fears that he had a serious issue to deal with in the aftermath of the game.

“He’s fine. Max [Deegan] is on the bench. We’re like ‘who are we going to bring him on for?’ He [Snyman] just got a bit of a dead leg and we said we’d take him off. The lads are getting into him inside there. No, he’s fine.

“Max is there. He’s the last person and we’re like ‘how do you get him on’. The lads [in the back-row] we thought were going pretty well. Alex [Soroka], Scott Penny and James [Culhane]. So we left them out there and made the call. Not a big deal.”

Snyman was the only one of Leinster’s three overseas signings for the current campaign to see game time at Irish Rugby HQ on Saturday with both Rabah Slimani and Jordie Barrett afforded rests for a win that saw the Blues moving nine points clear at the URC summit.

The absence of Barrett opened the door for Robbie Henshaw and Garry Ringrose to reconnect in the Leinster midfield. As well as being pleased with how this centre partnership performed on the night, Cullen was pleased to see Jamie Osborne and Jimmy O’Brien producing some good passages of play alongside the aforementioned Tommy O’Brien in the province’s back-three.

“Competition is no harm for all of us, is it? Robbie and Garry were excellent. Really pleasing. Everyone knows they need to go well and everyone is coming up with big moments at different stages,” Cullen added.

“Jamie comes up with some good moments, Jimmy comes up with big moments. Particularly defensively, whacked a couple of guys. Obviously Tommy took his try incredibly well. Lots of good stuff from everyone really.”

Daire Walsh