High pressure as clash of European giants cues start of knock-out season

There will be massive pressure and high stakes as a hectic period of five weeks of knock-out rugby starts with a clash of the two historical giants of the Heineken Champions Cup at the semifinal stage of the competition on Saturday.

Leinster will be at the Aviva Stadium, the venue for the Champions Cup final late next month, for their semifinal against Toulouse rather than their usual home ground of RDS Arena, where they lost to the Vodacom Bulls in the semifinal of last year’s Vodacom United Rugby Championship, and that is a measure of the magnitude of the game.

Next week Leinster host the Cell C Sharks in the URC quarterfinal, and if they want to do the double of winning both competitions they compete in, the HCC and the URC, they will be in playoff games over the next five weekends.

No game they play will be tougher though than Saturday’s. Toulouse have won the HCC five times and Leinster have done the trick four times, and came agonisingly close to making it five when they lost the 2021/22 final in Marseille off the last move of the game to LaRochelle.

The same t Gewo teams met at this stage of last year’s competition, with Leinster winning fairly easily (40-17), but last year generally much more of a struggle for Toulouse, who only edged out Ulster by one point in the double round last 16 tie and then effectively drew with Munster before knocking the Irish side out on extra-time penalty kicks.

TOULOUSE HAVE MORE MOMENTUM THIS TIME

Toulouse are in a tight tussle for the Top 14 title in France, but they’ve been comfortable in the Champions Cup, fairly easily getting past the Vodacom Bulls in the round of 16 and then running up 50 after being held for long periods by the Springbok laden Sharks in the quarterfinal. They do appear to have a lot more momentum this time around. And they are also determined to make up for previous disappointments by making the final, and would love nothing more than to do it at the expense of their arch-rivals.

As Toulouse flank Jack Willis said during the week, the key is going to be for the French team to blunt the momentum that Leinster could get up if they start strongly in front of their home fans. It is true that Leinster have a habit, in both the HCC and the Vodacom United Rugby Championship, of forcing the issue early and effectively making sure of the win early.

“We want to get the result in this more than anything, but I think we need to get our processes right throughout the game and make sure that we’re still in the game. Because Leinster come out of the blocks quite hard in a lot of their games, the first 25 minutes you always see that,” said Willis.

“If we’re still in a position that we’re happy with after 25-30 minutes, we know we’ve got a game on our hands and can really go after it.”

Willis knows though it is going to be a tough job for him and his teammates: “Their workrate and fitness, their mobile pack as well as the back line – they also have a lot of strength off the first phase. They clearly work very hard on their lineout plays and set plays, tap-and-goes, things like that. They’ve got a lot of detail that they layer in, which is pretty impressive.

“You see the quality throughout, they really work for each other,” he added.

LEINSTER COACH WARY OF THE HYPE

Leinster are clearly nervous about the challenge that Toulouse bring because their head coach Leo Cullen hit out in the Irish media at the media hype around his team and the tendency to make them overwhelming favourites in every game they play.

“It’s just disrespectful to everyone we play against, isn’t it? I’m sure it’s just winding up the narrative in their minds,” said Cullen

“I said it about hype. It’s week on week, on week. We’re up against the best teams in Europe, Toulouse are the most successful team in the competition and lost at this stage last year.

“What do you think their motivation is? It’s through the roof. They rested their team last week, didn’t send their starting XV to Paris (to play Stade Francais), so what do you think their motivation is?

“That defeat last year stung them.”

Indeed, it’s a narrative that is likely to be played out on several fronts in the coming weeks, for instance next week when the URC resumes and we head into the quarterfinals of that competition. The DHL Stormers have had the wood over the Bulls for a while now, but that will just make the Bulls more motivated and determined, and everyone knows anything can happen in a one-off game. The pressure is always more on the team that finishes higher in the league for the obvious reason that there should be higher expectation.

For instance, on the same weekend Leinster host the Cell C Sharks, and will be under pressure in the sense that a team that is asked after a league season that they dominated to then depend their advance to the semifinals on a game against the eighth seeded team should always feel that system is a little unfair. Which in truth it is. There are 18 games in the league, that surely tells you who the best teams are, and rewards consistency, and there shouldn’t be an opportunity for a team that has done so poorly over the whole season to have a chance of still winning the competition.

But it is what it is, and the Sharks might be helped by Saturday’s HCC result, but will not know how until next week’s game arrives. Will a Leinster defeat on Saturday make them more determined to win the URC, or will they suffer another hangover like they did last year after the agonising defeat in the HCC final. Conversely there should be questions about the strong momentum Leinster will pick up with a good win against Toulouse.

POSSIBILITY OF AN ALL FRENCH FINAL

What most people will probably be hoping is that it is not an all French HCC final, which it certainly could be given that Exeter Chiefs are traveling to LaRochelle on Sunday. The Chiefs beat a jetlagged Stormers team in their quarterfinal but generally haven’t been that great this year and the champions will start as strong favourites on their own ground to knock out the English interest in the competition.

Along with the main event of Champions Cup comes the secondary thrill this weekend of watching the teams battle it out in the Challenge Cup semifinals, with two games scheduled in both competitions for each respective day.

On Saturday the Champions Cup semifinal will be followed by what could be a highly entertaining face off between hosts Scarlets and Glasgow Warriors. The Scarlets’ impressive recent run of form was halted by the Dragons last week but Scarlets would have been training their eyes on this week’s game and that would have impacted on both their motivation and selection.

On Sunday the stronger of the two Italian teams in the URC, and 2021 Rainbow Cup champions, travels to Toulon for what looks a tough assignment but Dewald Duvenage and his team do have the motivation of playing for a Champions Cup place for next season following the route through the URC league placings being closed off to them.

2022/23 Heineken Champions Cup semi-finals Leinster v Toulouse (Dublin, Saturday 16.00)
Prediction: Leinster to win by 8
LaRochelle v Exeter Chiefs (LaRochelle, Sunday 16.00)
Prediction: LaRochelle to win by 10
2022/23 Challenge Cup semi-finals
Scarlets v Glasgow Warriors (Llanelli, Saturday 18.30)
Prediction: Glasgow to win exciting game by 5
Toulon v Benetton (Toulon, Sunday 13.30)
Prediction: Toulon to win by 15