Leo Cullen humble in defeat

Leinster boss Leo Cullen has been candid regarding his team’s defeat against Munster yesterday.

Cullen, who has one eye on the Champions Cup semi-final next weekend, elected to rest his big guns and field a second-string side packed with youth. He would have hoped, however, that they would have fared better than they did, although they were up against a quality Munster outfit.

“In terms of the contact area we were well and truly second best,” Cullen said. 

“Munster are very aggressive in that area and unfortunately that leads to a lot of problems.

“We actually created a lot of opportunities, we weren’t accurate around some of the set-piece pieces as well.

“So overall, we were well and truly second best, I thought.”

News that will have Leinster fans smiling is the imminent return of heavyweights Garry ringrose and James Ryan next weekend.

“Garry and James are OK, it’s just trying to manage guys who haven’t been in for a while,” Cullen said.

“It was disappointing with Harry going off very early, he has a hamstring so we’ll see how bad that is. Caelan (Doris) had a tight hamstring here yesterday, Ciaran Frawley, he had a tight hamstring but nothing major for him.”