Cullen cool on red-hot Leinster
LEO CULLEN insists his increasingly ruthless Leinster are still a work in progress, even though they comfortably blasted their way into a home Champions Cup quarter-final date next April with a group match to spare. Leinster hit hapless Glasgow for eight tries on a gripping European weekend where they were the only one of the five pool leaders to win. Munster were among the losers, coming out on the wrong side of a 30-34 thriller at Racing. Leinster’s 55-19 dismissal of Glasgow means they are the only side so far definitely through to the quarter-finals. However, knowing that a point is still needed at Montpellier next Saturday to guarantee the No1 ranking and a home semi-final, Cullen last night played down the impressive strides made this winter by his unbeaten side. ‘We’re a work in progress,’ he claimed
in the wake of their latest success, the coach mindful his trophy-starved side exited both European and Pro14 tournaments last season at the semifinal stage. ‘It’s definitely something we need to keep working because it’s that feeling of the semi-finals last year, did we have a ruthless streak in those games (against Clermont and Scarlets)? Maybe we weren’t as comfortable as we should have been in that setting. ‘For us it’s making sure we get back to that place again, to learn from the mistakes in the past if we get to another semi-final and be better prepared. We still have a huge amount of work to do to progress. ‘There were a lot of good things (against Glasgow) in terms of being ruthless, but the main thing is we just need to focus on getting better because we will need to be better when it comes to later in the season so that the same thing that happened last year doesn’t happen to us again.’ As it stands, Leinster are ranked top of the potential eight quarterfinal qualifiers. However, they won’t forget that when they went to France last January occupying the same No1 seeding for their round six match, the draw at Castres saw them tumble from first to fourth and ultimately left them with an away semi-final they lost to Clermont. With the four-try bonus point secured against Glasgow as early as the 35th minute, Cullen withdrew a pile of his star names early with a view to their pool finale in five days’ time. The coach later confirmed Robbie Henshaw, one of those to exit, had been minding a knock, but he gave Johnny Sexton the all-clear despite the out-half jarring his back when scoring just before halftime.