There might be a temptation to give them the title now. Certainly, the impression, which has long settled in, that the Champions Cup these days is basically a competition between Leinster and a handful of French teams was not alleviated in the wet west country, where Gloucester copped another fearful hiding from what is more or less the Ireland team.
Leinster were not even at full strength. Never mind. If 21-year-old Jamie Osborne, a whirlwind force at inside-centre, is not a full international, he will be soon. The Dublin production line continues. Indeed, there are four more Osborne brothers, one of whom is a few places back on that conveyor belt.
Ross Byrne, who didn’t miss a kick, is already ensconced in the No 10 shirt, but Leinster looked no less classy there for the absence of Johnny Sexton. Then his brother Harry came on and landed conversions from either touchline. When the Lion Jack Conan replaced Ryan Baird in the second half, it was difficult to tell the difference.
After the drubbing in Dublin, this seven-try defeat of Gloucester leaves the cumulative score across the two matches at 106-14. Leinster are all but assured of a home tie in the knockout phases. They will host Racing 92 in the last round of the pool stages. They have already beaten the Parisians in their own backyard, 42-10. Racing were semi-finalists last season. They are fifth in the Top 14.
“The speed Leinster play at and the accuracy,” said George Skivington, Gloucester’s head coach, “we’ve not had to defend anything like that. It definitely caught us out.”
Gloucester are fourth in the Premiership. It is true, there is not much difference there between fourth and last, but they were made to look what they are – a well-drilled outfit who can execute the basics and all that. In terms of angles, imagination, pace and power, Leinster were in a different class – that of an international team.
Gloucester were awarded two penalty tries, both at a lineout and drive, both of which came with a yellow card. The French referee reached for his pocket and ran to the posts earlier than one might expect in the Premiership, so one could argue they were lucky for all of their points. Each time Leinster were down to 14 they extended their lead, the first time with a brilliant try by Osborne, Leinster’s third, when he picked a fine line off a lineout and rounded Ben Meehan with an outrageous step. That is what classy teams do off an attacking lineout.
Osborne’s try put them 21-7 up, having notched two tries in the first 10 minutes. Jordan Larmour is well used to the epithet “without a finger laid on him”, as was trotted out again when he went over in the fourth minute from another bewitching lineout move, but Michael Ala’alatoa, the Samoa prop, is less so. All the same, he strolled over from an imaginative tap-penalty routine.
Leinster brought up the bonus point, just before half-time, a rather sweatier effort by Caelan Doris from close range – another tap penalty. When, a few minutes into the second half, Hugo Keenan managed to skip down a corridor that did not seem to exist between George Barton and the touchline, after a gallop by James Ryan and a finger-tip pass by Ross Byrne, even the Shed fell silent to hear the unplayable symphony.
Mark McCall believes Elliot Daly has done more than enough to make Steve Borthwick’s England squad after a player-of-the-match performance in Saracens’ 48-28 win over Lyon.
Daly was at his best as Saracens sealed qualification for the last 16 of the Champions Cup with a game to spare, scoring a hat-trick in just seven minutes and 20 seconds in the first half.
Other tries from Alex Lozowski, Marco Riccioni, Andy Christie and Ben Earl saw Saracens to an impressive victory over last year’s European Challenge Cup champions.
Saracens head to Edinburgh looking to continue their unbeaten European streak next week, but sealing qualification a week early is not something to take for granted and McCall was delighted with his side’s efforts.
He said: “We are happy with that. If you had told us before we would score 48 points and get another 20-point win playing the way we did in the first half then we would have taken that.
“Elliot had an outstanding game, I think everyone knows he has been outstanding all season, he was playing well before tonight and he showed all his qualities again tonight ... I would be very surprised if he is not in Steve’s squad on Monday.”
Meanwhile, Northampton’s director of rugby, Phil Dowson, conceded that a “poor” first-half display left them with too much to do as Saints went down 27-23 to 14-man Munster in their encounter at Thomond Park.
The Saints, for whom Courtney Lawes made a first start since September, are without a win and bottom of Pool B after failing to take advantage of the Munster flanker Jack O’Donoghue’s 22nd-minute red card for a high tackle on David Ribbans.
Trailing 24-0 at half-time, Fin Smith converted tries from Tommy Freeman and James Ramm and kicked three penalties, but time ran out on their comeback bid as Munster hung on.
“We played some really good rugby in the second half and I was really pleased with the group. First half we were poor, discipline was poor again and we conceded far too many opportunities,” said Dowson.
“When they had those opportunities we conceded far too easily. We conceded two tries from four phases and that’s just not good enough."
Player of the match Gavin Coombes crossed twice, either side of an O’Donoghue effort, and a 75th-minute penalty from replacement Jack Crowley made it back-to-back wins for the Irish province over Saints.
Jaden Hendrikse and Marnus Potgieter each scored a pair of tries as the Sharks booked their place in the round of 16 with a 32-3 win over Bordeaux-Begles. It was a third win out of three for the South African franchise in their debut European rugby campaign, with Bordeaux not helping themselves after picking up four yellow cards.
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Gloucester were awarded their second penalty try with quarter of an hour to go, so 14-man Leinster responded at the front of a lineout to send Ronan Kelleher away and Josh van der Flier finished a couple of phases later.
Finally, Leinster scored from yet another attacking lineout, this time the old-fashioned way – up the guts. Just to show they can. And they can. Boy, they can.
