This is a contest between the two best sides in Europe.

Leinster and Saracens are – by a bit of a distance – the two best sides in the competition when fully loaded and this is a fitting final when looked at through that context.

In some ways, I think we were denied this match last season even though both sides actually played each other in the quarter-final. In my opinion, the Saracen side that Leinster dispatched in April 2018 in the Aviva wasn’t as good as the one Leinster will face this weekend in St. James’ Park.

Will Saracens have learned their lessons from last season? Or will Leinster prove they still have too much of everything Saracens couldn’t live with just over a year ago?

Let’s have a look at the teams;

Red Eye Report :: Leinster vs Saracens (H)

I’ve decided to change this up slightly. I’ll be assessing specific facets of the opposition’s set piece, defensive structure and other stuff in the Blood & Thunder Podcast – and here – so here I thought it would be cool to show where I rate the opposition as a whole in a European context as first choice units and then, depending on the how far away both Munster and the opposition are from what I would consider “full strength”, how the teams actually taking the field rate against each other.

S – Elite level
A – Top European Level
B – Good Domestic League Level
C – Average Domestic League Level
D – Poor Domestic League Level
E – Minor League Minnow 

Heineken Champions Cup Final: Leinster vs Saracens

Full Strength Red Eye Rating: Leinster (S) – Saracens (S)
Teamsheet Adjusted Red Eye Rating: Leinster (S) – Saracens (S)
Red Eye Rating from Last Meeting in 2018: Leinster (S) – Saracens (A)

Battle of the Big Boys

Around the field, I think both sides are pretty evenly matched. Sure, I think Leinster’s midfield is a little better and that Saracens have more ball carrying options in the pack, but overall I think both sides are pretty close to each other when we consider how effective they are at bringing teams into their structure and their overall quality. I say quality – a bit of an x-factor word in some ways – because of the sheer number of top-level players in both lineups. If you go back to the Lions tour of 2017, you’ll see a lot of the same faces lining up here.

Furlong, O’Brien, Sexton, Henshaw, McGrath, Farrell, Vunipola, Itoje, Kruis, George, Williams.

Cian Healy, Billy Vunipola, Rob Kearney and others missed out through injury and, if there was a Lions tour flying out in the morning, you’d probably have James Ryan, Gary Ringrose, Ben Spencer and Luke McGrath earmarked for a seat on the plane.

These are two big sides with big, big players.

As such, I wouldn’t expect there to be a dominant physical advantage for either side when it comes to the phase play aspect of this game. Leinster are a little sharper off their lineout set plays – which might explain Saracens’ back five make up – but overall I think both sides should cancel each other out. When we look at quality heavy ball carriers – as we must in this game – I think Furlong, Healy, Ryan and Conan are well capable of standing up to Mako Vunipola, Billy Vunipola, Titi Lamositele, Will Skelton and Maro Itoje but it’s the performance of Sean O’Brien that will really dictate things. If he can perform at his best, then Leinster should have the firepower they need to just about edge this contest but if he’s at the level he was during the Six Nations, Leinster could well find themselves looking a little underpowered here.

What Leinster want to avoid is a re-run of the Ireland vs England game from the Six Nations from a ball retention point of view.

Saracens, like England in that game at the Aviva, are very good at being “heavy” over the ball on defensive breakdowns and Munster really struggled with that aspect of their game in the semi-final.

Here’s a good example of Lamositele making a nuisance of himself over the ball but it isn’t just him – both Vunipolas, Kruis, Skelton and Itoje are equally “sticky” when it comes to the opposition’s offensive breakdown.

I felt Munster lacked a little physicality with our breakdown work against Saracens for the most part and it cost us on a few of our phase play options. However, when we did manage to string together quick ball possession in and around their 22/10m line we found penalties and a few opportunities that we didn’t quite take.

Furlong, Healy, Toner and Fardy will be vitally important to Leinster here. If those four guys – Furlong in particular – can dissuade Saracens from sitting on Leinster’s breakdown, then Leinster will be half of the way there. I expect this aspect of the game to be particularly brutal, and I use that word deliberately. This will not be for the faint of heart and don’t be a bit surprised to see yellow cards for ruck entry at some point from the likes of Skelton etc.

That said, Saracens have become really good at using their physical threats to manipulate space. Billy and Mako Vunipola, the best ball carriers on the field, are really good at shaping the opposition defence and then playing the ball out of the carry.

Look at the isolation this inside ball from Billy Vunipola created;

George’s line on his inside shoulder sold a possible tip on and that disguised his passing shape into the second layer to Farrell. All of a sudden that’s a three on two isolation created by the natural tendency defences have to zone in on both Vunipola’s. Or they Vunipoli?

Boot War

I expect both sides to cancel each other out once we head to multiphase play – do not be surprised to see Leinster score off Billy Vunipola/Jackson Wray’s positioning in midfield on a shortened lineout play, however – so the real key to this game will be the use of kicking from both sides.

Against Munster, Saracens’ kicking game was a real point of difference and much of their best work was based on it. In this game, Saracens will be paying close attention to Leinster’s kicking game.

First of all, they’re really good at blocking off the 5m channel on angle box kicks from the flank.

The blocking lines on Conway are really good here, and this regained possession gets Billy Vunipola into the game as a transition player, where’s he’s really effective.

In the aftermath of this kick, Saracens showed their intelligence on these transition plays.

The high bomb from first receiver isn’t the obvious play from this position but it played into Sarries own kick chase schemes. They weren’t interested in having a straight up contest in the air against Munster – and I don’t they will be here either with Rob Kearney patrolling the backfield – but they will look to target Larmour and Lowe under the highball for plays just like this. They aren’t looking to catch the ball necessarily, but they are looking to win the contest by retaining the ball on their side by any means. If that means batting the ball down to a support runner, so be it.

If they can bat that ball down and retain it, it’s the same as taking it clean over the head. For Leinster, it’ll be about winning that second ball.

Look at how Saracens play after the kick;

A swivel play off Vunipola? Don’t be surprised. They use him like that all the time – as I showed you above – but especially on transition plays. He drew in two tacklers and then passed off to Spencer to an easy linebreak. This is exactly the type of scenario that Saracens are looking to generate.

From there, Saracens get good width on their phase structure. Farrell is the connection between ruck and a wide attack pod as the phase develops.

The presence of Vunipola demands a cluster of defenders. Last season, Leinster didn’t have to face Saracens with all of their primary ball carriers so the likes of Dan Leavy could really dominate their secondary carriers in situations like these.

Munster can’t afford to step off his line and Scannell is the guy who has to pinch in. Have a look at this phase and the phase after.

Munster have to stretch their defensive structure here and that’s a problem with Billy Vunipola standing in the wide pod off Farrell. His presence builds in a gap to the Munster line that needs deliberate lateral action to fill and that isn’t easy to do in the heat of collisions like these.

We have good numbers after the fold but the presence of Itoje coming around narrow preserves the gap created by Vunipola on the previous phase and almost leads to a linebreak.

The presence of both Vunipola’s creates and maintains space on subsequent phases because they narrow your defensive line at the contact point and then pressure your defensive positioning on the next phase – do you stay tight or fan out? They are very good at finding those holes and exploiting them.

Saracens play a lot of their best ball off the back of these kick transitions. In a way, they’ve become an excellent transition team because of their ability to generate these “chaotic” spaces where they have a 60/40 edge.

They will play hard off any kind of kick transition event and their forwards have deceptively good hands.

Munster’s work under the high ball in this game wasn’t high quality and it gave Saracens an easy way to play ball. They’re like any other team – and especially like a team that’s carrying four/five very, very big men in the pack – in that they have to play in a way that conserves their energy. Saracens don’t want to have the likes of Lamositele, both Vunipolas, Skelton and Kruis carrying a lot of ball phase for phase against the likes of Munster/Leinster for too long.

They need the transition opportunities that a successful kicking game gives them. With Williams, Goode and Maitland I think that Saracens have an edge in the high ball contest as long as they can successfully target the fringes of the Leinster backfield to keep Kearney out of position. It’ll be on the second ball that Larmour/Ringrose can pick up the scraps that could lead to an easy Leinster try. That’s the risk for Saracens – if they kick and contest as they did against Munster then they do so knowing that the second ball is much more dangerous with Leinster’s backfield counter-attackers.

It’ll be fascinating.