Leinster took a step closer to adding a fourth star to their blue jersey after sweeping aside Scarlets at the Aviva Stadium in their Champions Cup semi-final.
Leo Cullen’s side ran in five tries across their 22-point hammering of the Welsh outfit and are unlikely to hold any fears about their potential final opponents.
The winners of Racing 92 and Munster will compete with Leinster for the European crown in Bilbao next month, but can expect a daunting challenge against arguably the best team on the continent.
And Keith Wood, speaking in the aftermath of Leinster’s victory, believes Leinster’s in-game intelligence sets them apart.
“Other teams have elements of it and Ireland have it,” Wood told Off The Ball.
“I think Munster are maybe two or three years behind that, but that doesn’t mean Munster couldn’t go and win in Bilbao. It’s just that style, that particular type of play is not as refined.
“And it won’t be the same because Joe Schmidt coached here and was part and parcel of what Leinster was. [Johann] van Graan has a different way of doing things, but you can see a lot of different subtleties in Munster that weren’t there 12 months ago.
“And that’s really impressive to try and get some of that moving through – but it is different. And it takes a long period of time to do it and it’s all in the trust of the skill level.
“And you have to say when you look at Leinster’s squad – their squad is impressive. There’s far more depth within it, there’s a lot of pressure coming beneath, that level of depth isn’t in Munster at all.
“Leinster have something that everybody envies and it’s that full conveyor belt of young kids coming out of good secondary schools that have very well-rounded programmes, and they’re almost bypassing their academy system in Leinster at the moment.”
Reflecting on Leinster’s performance against the Scarlets, Wood shared his disappointment about the losing side’s display.
“Leinster were very impressive – they did everything they needed to do comfortably,” Wood said.
“They showed up with a high level of aggression with some great ball-carrying from the centre and the forwards doing very well with Johnny Sexton pulling the strings.
“Jamison Gibson-Park had a really fine game and they were impressive from start to finish. But on the flip side of that, Scarlets barely got out of the changing room. They never really raised a gallop, they didn’t get outside of their 22 for the whole game.
“And for the last seven or eight minutes they showed a little bit of something but not anything we would have expected. It was incredibly one-sided [and] very relaxed for Leinster, but they were impressive.”
Written by James Hopper
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