[su_dropcap style=”flat” size=”4″]L[/su_dropcap]einster weren’t as affected by the transitional period after the 2015 World Cup cycle as much as Munster were when it came to the loss of iconic players and key injuries, but that didn’t mean that there weren’t massive changes in the air.
Key men like Shane Jennings, Kevin McLaughlin and Gordon D’Arcy retired, Jimmy Gopperth left for Wasps, Kane Douglas popped back to Australia after his disappointing solitary season at the club, and guys like Brendan Macken, John Cooney and Quinn Roux left for more game time and expanded roles elsewhere.
Leinster had looked to reshape their second row with the addition of Hayden Triggs and Mick Kearney to compliment Mike McCarthy and Devin Toner but the biggest additions were in the backs. Jimmy Gopperth was replaced with the returning Jonathan Sexton from Racing 92 who signed on a massive, four-year contract that was similar in its structure to the three-year deal signed by the then 30-year-old Jamie Heaslip in January 2014.
This contract was a huge priority for Leinster and the IRFU. Joe Schmidt and the IRFU were clearly chafed by the inconvenience of being limited international release windows for training camps while Sexton was in Paris. Laurant Labit illustrated the scope of that chafing in an interview with Gavin Mortimer after Sexton’s departure.
The extent of Sexton’s standing in his native land was brought home to Labit in October last year. Ireland had a three-day training camp, originally scheduled for Monday to Wednesday; but because Racing had played Treviso on the Sunday Ireland coach Joe Schmidt had extended it to the Thursday in order that Sexton could be present for three full days. Labit pointed out to Schmidt that the international release window closed on the Wednesday evening, so he would expect Sexton back at Racing training on Thursday morning. “To which Joe replied: ‘If Johnny is not there, we can’t train’.”
If Johnny is not there, we can’t train. In that environment, and with a four-year deal on the table from Racing in late 2014, it’s no surprise to see the IRFU table a massive deal that would ultimately bring Sexton back into the system just two years after his departure, much to the relief of Joe Schmidt and Leinster.
Sexton’s importance to Leinster had been clearly illustrated to them during his absence, in much the same way that O’Connell’s absence would be illustrated to Munster during 2015/16. Jimmy Gopperth had made a decent fist of trying to duplicate some of what Sexton brought to Leinster in the interim – at the expense of Ian Madigan’s prospects at #10 over the same period, it must be said – but now Leinster would be getting back the man that had and would go on to be the man driving the bus during their four European Cup-winning seasons.
Leinster also convinced Isa Nacewa to come back after his early departure in 2013. He signed on a one year deal, nominally as cover during the World Cup window, and was immediately named captain after Kevin McLaughlin’s unfortunate retirement. Nacewa was still a fine player at 32 years of age and the two seasons away from the grind of the pro-game had done him the world of good. He was another experienced, inspirational winner to add to Leinster’s mix but, not only that, he was still incredibly productive. He scored nine tries in 23 games for Leinster during 2015/16 and only missed out on the PRO12 final that year because of an arm injury. Nacewa would stay at Leinster for three seasons in his second spell and would play a massive part in the coming success.
Leinster had also made big changes behind the laptops. Matt O’Connor had left/was let go from the club with one season left on his original three-year deal during the off-season to be replaced by Leo Cullen as head coach just one season into his coaching career post-retirement, first as an interim replacement and then as a full-time replacement in August 2015 on a two-year contract.
Kurt McQuilkin was appointed as defence coach on a two year deal around the same time, John Fogarty took over as scrum coach and Girvan Dempsey took over the backs/attack on a short term basis during the World Cup that would extend for the rest of the season. Richie Murphy would return as a kicking and skills coach after the World Cup to round out the group around Cullen but there was no escaping from the fact that Cullen was incredibly inexperienced at this point in his coaching career.
I think Leinster’s performances during 2015/16 bear this out quite starkly. Despite the return of Sexton and Nacewa, Leinster looked flat, uninspired and underpowered for much of the season, especially in a vicious Champions Cup pool, where they shipped five defeats and only managed one win at home to Bath. A 51-10 away loss to Wasps on the last day of the pool was an exclamation mark on an alarmingly poor campaign where Leinster scored the lowest amount of tries in the entire pool stage (5) and looked bang average at times. This, again, has to be taken in context.
There was a definite World Cup hangover for much of Leinster’s international contingent. Mike Ross, for example, was coming to the end of the road as a productive player at an elite level and Sean O’Brien suffered a litany of injuries during the season that limited him to a handful of starts post World Cup. You also had various niggles and dips in form, especially to key forwards like Cian Healy who was struggling to properly recover from a serious neck injury and surgery the previous season.
“I had the insurance forms filled out and everything. I was pretty much ready to sign off,” he told the Sunday Times’ Peter O’Reilly during an interview in 2016/17. That wasn’t so much of an issue for Leinster when they had Jack McGrath performing at a really high level but he wasn’t the kind of physically dominant ball carrier that Cian Healy was, and Healy’s best form was palpable by its absence.
Mike Ross was 35 in 2015/16 and succession was an immediate priority for Leinster and Ireland. Marty Moore had been a regular presence for Leinster at tighthead since 2013 but his progress had been stalled by two pretty serious shoulder surgeries during 2014/15, to the point where he fell out of Ireland’s World Cup contention. Competing with Moore for the post-Ross starting berth was Michael Bent, an Irish qualified New Zealand born tighthead who had settled into an invaluable squad role for Leinster since his arrival in the country in October 2012 to immediately play for Ireland, and Tadhg Furlong. Furlong had gone to the World Cup as a novice who could, in theory, cover both sides of the scrum, but he was a player with immense, long flagged potential.
Was Furlong’s potential enough reason for Leinster to only offer Moore a one-year extension in late 2015? They later offered a two-year deal once it became clear that Moore was talking to Wasps but it wasn’t enough to prevent Moore signing heads of agreement on a three year contract with Wasps in late 2015. He later changed his mind to try and get out of the move but Leinster were unwilling to pay Wasps €200k+ to release him from the deal.
Why would Leinster look to sign Moore to a deal that would put him on the same rough contract expiry terms as Furlong, Bent and Ross?
Whenever you see a club stacking a number of players – experienced, novice or otherwise – in one particular position or rough grouping (like the back three where positions can be somewhat interchangeable) it’s because they want to have as many options as possible when it comes to selecting their contracted players after that contract point.
The last thing a club wants is for their entire depth chart in a certain position to be expiring in consecutive, separate seasons because that limits your options in the position, especially when there is an established player to be replaced. That’s why you’ll see teams looking to sync up a position with a one year deal when they can get away with it because it gives them the chance to pick the best options (both outside the club, in your own senior ranks and in the academy), re-establish the depth chart for the new contract cycle in the most cost-efficient way and then allow the rest to leave the club.
In this example, Leinster lost a player that they probably wanted to hang onto, at least for a time, but given how Furlong turned out it seemed to work out OK for them.
I think what they would have preferred was a situation where Furlong/Moore would compete for the position over a synced up contract term, pick the one who played the best in that examination time to be your #1 guy going forward, contract him accordingly, keep Bent in situ as experienced cover, and then offer a reduced deal to your #2 guy with the idea that he would compete as a #2/bench impact guy. You can de-sync the senior contract expiry dates once the depth chart has been re-established.
The second row in 2015/16 was still an area of concern for Leinster and their recruitment over the following seasons would still focus on this position until the emergence of James Ryan.
In the back three, Leinster had a lot of decent players who were in their mid-to-late twenties at varying levels of quality. Some guys, like Fergus McFadden and Dave Kearney, were in and around the test bubble but they were never comfortably top class test options if I can say that with respect. Other guys, like Zane Kirchner, were pretty decent options but were never going to be long-term options for Leinster beyond the short term. Rob Kearney was a clear top guy at fullback for both Leinster and Ireland but, at 29 in 2015/16, was closer to the end of his career than the beginning.
You then had the sad case of Luke Fitzgerald, who was nominally a top-class option on the wing or at fullback but had found his career increasingly dogged by injury. He was a foundational talent for Leinster in 2009 but 2015/16 would be his last as a professional when he was forced to retire due to a neck injury suffered in the PRO12 final. That left Leinster with a lack of top-end pace, power and quality on the wings as the squad stood in 2015/16, in my opinion, and it would be something they would look to rectify in following seasons.
In midfield, Leinster had run into some trouble. Ben Te’o had been really effective for Leinster since he signed from Rugby League two seasons prior and, in a contract year at 29 years of age and on the verge of qualifying for Ireland, Leinster would have probably liked to have kept him around but a massive three year deal from Worcester (£300,000+ a season) and the immediate promise of test eligibility for England was enough to turn Te’o’s head.
Leinster had the impressive Gary Ringrose developing nicely in the academy (and he saw a lot of PRO12 time during 2015/16) but he was a very different player to Te’o. Leinster badly needed a physical option in midfield to replace what Te’o gave them so they pursued Robbie Henshaw from Connacht in an acrimonious inter-provincial transfer saga that spread out over late 2015.
You can get a hint of that acrimony in the IRFU announcement and David Nucifora’s comments at the time.
“I am disappointed for Connacht that Robbie has decided to leave but pleased for Irish rugby that he has committed to a further three years. I know that the decision Robbie has taken to move from Connacht is not one he has taken lightly.”
It was the right choice for Leinster at the time. Signing a 22-year-old current Irish international with the pace and power of Henshaw to a three-year deal is an absolute no-brainer. It didn’t matter that Connacht and, it appeared, the IRFU wanted Henshaw to stay out west, Leinster wanted a Sexton/Henshaw/Ringrose axis to power their attack and did whatever they could to make it happen.
The addition of Stuart Lancaster in September 2016 was Leinster’s best coaching hire since Joe Schmidt and they felt the benefits almost immediately but that wouldn’t have happened if Leinster didn’t already have the majority of the playing pieces in place.
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The biggest factor of 2015/16 wasn’t Leinster’s poor showing in the Champion’s Cup or their disappointing performance against Connacht in the PRO12 final, it was the emergence of key foundational talents in a number of positions where centrally contracted players were already in situ.
In doing so, Leinster avoided a problem that can arise with central contracts. Furlong replacing and, in some ways, upgrading on Mike Ross’ output was a welcome development. Ringrose’s emergence during 2015/16 and the addition of a 22-year-old Robbie Henshaw cemented the midfield, in theory at least, for years to come.
The second row was still a while off from producing a top-class option but Leinster weren’t overly exposed to any one player in contract terms. Toner was in the first year of a two year contract extension in 2015/16 and would sign a three year central contract with the IRFU at the end of that deal in December 2016. The emergence of James Ryan as a top-end, international tier player straight out of the academy solved a 10-year long problem for Leinster when it came to locks could affect games at the set-piece and with the ball in hand.
The back row was an area of considerable development too. There’s no such thing as “lucky” injuries but when it came to the development of guys like Van Der Flier, Conan and Leavy, Leinster had a near-perfect succession.
Leinster’s academy promotions ahead of 2015/16 were;
Tadhg Beirne (Lock/Flanker)
Bryan Byrne (Hooker)
Ed Byrne (Loosehead)
Dan Leavy (Flanker)
Cathal Marsh (Flyhalf)
Gavin Thornbury (Lock)
Josh Van Der Flier (Flanker)
Beirne was someone that Leinster were quite excited by for a while prior to his promotion but he suffered from consistent injuries to the point that he was cut at the end of his first season. Thornbury suffered the same fate and, while the Byrne twins ended up having decent careers with Leinster, the real focus here is Josh Van Der Flier, Dan Leavy and Jack Conan.
O’Brien’s injury-ridden final seasons at Leinster began in earnest in 2015/16. That gave Josh Van Der Flier – a high potential young player – top-level game-time for much of the Champions Cup campaign. The next season, Van Der Flier missed a tonne of game-time which allowed Dan Leavy to emerge in the same position. Jamie Heaslip’s proposed IRFU/Leinster contract that was in the air before his retirement was only set to expire this summer, so if you think Leinster’s back row looks stacked right now, imagine what it would be like if Heaslip was fit and available over the last three seasons?
If Heaslip was contracted and available from February 2017, would Jack Conan have been given the prominence that he’s had since then? If Jack Conan hadn’t been injured this season, would Doris have taken up the role he’s had since then? The same goes for O’Brien’s injury which opened up space for Van Der Flier and Leavy over the intervening three seasons between 2015 and his eventual departure.
I would argue that Conan isn’t as good a footballer as Jamie Heaslip but I would say that he’s got the kind of size, physicality and ball-carrying that better suited Leinster’s style of play as they climbed back to the top of European rugby in 2017/18. O’Brien showed that he was still an elite player during the Lions tour of 2017 but he only played six times for Leinster the following season. In his absence, Leinster produced two test calibre options, who emerged one after the other because, again, of “injury opportunity” in what could have been a position dominated by a centrally contracted player.
The emergence of Van Der Flier, Leavy, Conan (continuing the work of the previous season under O’Connor), Ringrose and Furlong in the immediate aftermath of the 2015 World Cup was a key driver for Leinster and the addition of Larmour, Porter and Ryan as test ready players straight out the academy in 2017 was the final ingredient they needed.
That was augmented by clever recruitment – Lowe and Fardy, in particular – and the emergence of Joey Carbery as a play-making foil to Johnny Sexton. The Carbery situation is still a sore one for most Leinster fans and it’s something I can completely understand. It’s the perfect illustration of the central contract “problem” that the provinces can sometimes run into.
Joey Carbery was ear-marked by Graham Henry – who Leinster brought in as a consultant in the summer of 2016 before eventually hiring Stuart Lancaster as a Senior Coach in September of the same year – as “Leinster’s flyhalf for the next 10 years“. Carbery’s rise was certainly meteoric in the aftermath of this endorsement. He started at flyhalf for Leinster in that season’s PRO14 opener, scored two tries and eventually went on a run that would see him playing against the All Blacks in Chicago before the end of the season. An injury to Rob Kearney would see Carbery line out at fullback to great effect in Leinster’s Champions Cup run that season and the future was looking really bright for Carbery as a future Leinster stalwart.
Injury, once again, provided an opportunity for a player to come in and upset a centrally contracted player and hint at how he might eventually replace Sexton as Leinster and Ireland flyhalf.
The next season was a key one for Carbery. It’s clear at this point that the IRFU and Carbery himself saw himself as a #10 but Leinster used Carbery almost exclusively as a fullback in his last season at the province. Carbery started 10 games for Leinster in 2017/18 but only one of those was at #10 – the rest was as a fullback. When the big games rolled around in Leinster’s run to a PRO14 and Champions Cup win, Carbery was an unused bench option with Kearney preferred to start the Champions Cup final.
Carbery started at 15 in Leinster’s PRO14 semi-final win over Munster with Ross Byrne preferred at #10. The PRO14 final saw Carbery sitting on the bench again, with Kearney starting at fullback.
Carbery would move to Munster with a year left on his Leinster contract that summer with the promise of being the starting #10 a key factor in his move.
When we look at how Leinster play, you can see why Cullen would have seen Carbery as a second playmaker, at best, for the big games. Everything that Leinster do from an attacking perspective is set up to work with Johnny Sexton at #10 and it has been for the guts of a decade. When Sexton wasn’t available, Cullen tended to use Ross Byrne as his #10 because, like Matt O’Connor and Jimmy Gopperth before them, Byrne was better suited to the narrow, physical, possession dominant game that Leinster play against top opposition on both sides of the ball.
To get the best out of Carbery as his primary flyhalf, Cullen would have had to radically restructure the pace at which Leinster play, possibly work tilt more towards transition attack as a primary source of attack, and in my opinion, likely have to sacrifice Ringrose to accommodate a bigger, more powerful midfielder alongside Henshaw, especially in an environment during 2016-19 where Rob Kearney was still a central component of the Irish test side.
Johnny Sexton was 33 when Carbery decided to move on in 2018 and had just won the World Rugby Player of the Year award. Sexton will be 35 this year and the Leinster and Ireland captain doesn’t look like a guy who’s going to be retiring any time soon unless injury steps in. Sexton thinks he can play until 40 and whether he’ll still be productive by the time his current contract ends in 2021 when he’ll be 36 remains to be seen. But do Leinster look like they’re going to move on from Sexton anytime soon?
Not on this year’s evidence when it comes to meaningful games when Sexton is fit and available.
Does that mean that Sexton is a potential choke point? Is he “blocking” a younger player who might potentially be better than him? Not at Leinster, I would posit, at least in their current style.
But COVID19 has changed the world and rugby on this island will not be immune.
Leinster’s current depth is their biggest advantage and the economic conditions have allowed it to flourish. Cian Healy, Johnny Sexton, Devin Toner, Tadhg Furlong, Gary Ringrose, James Ryan, Robbie Henshaw and Rob Kearney were or are on central contracts as of this season. Those players alone take the guts of €1.5m+ off Leinster’s provincial wage bill. That allows Leo Cullen to retain a vast array of talent in the second layer of his squad at, you would imagine, pretty competitive wages.
Something will have to give somewhere.
And in the next episode of this series, I will examine how Munster can use some of the issues we’ve explored here – along with a few others – to finally Derail The Big East.
