{"id":600659,"date":"2026-04-11T19:53:08","date_gmt":"2026-04-11T19:53:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/600659\/"},"modified":"2026-04-11T19:53:08","modified_gmt":"2026-04-11T19:53:08","slug":"leinster-blow-away-sale-to-set-up-champions-cup-semi-final-with-toulon-champions-cup","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/600659\/","title":{"rendered":"Leinster blow away Sale to set up Champions Cup semi-final with Toulon | Champions Cup"},"content":{"rendered":"

Semi-final number 17 beckons for Leinster<\/a>. The one-time serial champions of this competition will take another, against Toulon, back at the Aviva in a couple of weeks\u2019 time. Sounds epic. Probably will be. But Leinster are still not quite convincing.<\/p>\n

This was a Sale<\/a> team missing a host of their best players. No one gave them a chance, but they made a real nuisance of themselves for a good 50 minutes before yielding to the inevitable. Four Leinster tries in the last half-hour put them away, but after the home team\u2019s struggle to do the same here against Edinburgh last week Toulon, who are hardly a study in eloquence themselves at the moment, will fancy their chances.<\/p>\n

We are spoilt for breathtaking games of rugby these days, but this was not one of them \u2013 for the first half certainly. The contrast with the extraordinary skills on display in Bath the night before<\/a> was getting on for painful. A stubborn drizzle set in just before kick-off, and it would not let the ball stick in the hands very many times before precipitating some spill or other by an international rugby player, usually in the blue of Leinster. Usually in the blue, because Leinster hogged the majority of possession throughout.<\/p>\n

For 40 minutes, they could not achieve more than a Dan Sheehan try in the 10th, the prolific hooker sliding along the soggy turf to the posts after a series of solid Leinster carries off a lineout. The home side, nearly 10 points shy of their customary place at the top of the United Rugby Championship, have been attracting some scrutiny of late, their slick attacking game looking less assured than usual.<\/p>\n

So it was again here, but matters were not helped in that department by their travails at the set piece in that first half. Sale had a clear edge at the scrum and found joy at the lineout too in the first half, before the latter set piece fairly fell apart in the second.<\/p>\n

Dan Sheehan scores Leinster\u2019s first try against Sale. Photograph: Dan Sheridan\/INPHO\/Shutterstock<\/p>\n

George Ford landed a penalty from around 40 metres out five minutes from the break. The fact he went for the posts with the penalty, rather than the ever-fashionable corner, almost felt like something worth celebrating. Sale\u2019s reserves were only four points behind at the break \u2013 and appeared to mean business.<\/p>\n

That all changed courtesy of two yellow cards, one either side of half-time. Dan du Preez\u2019s just before was for a deliberate knock-on \u2013 more of a faintest-of-brush-forwards, but they all count. Fairly faint contact was responsible for the next too, when Si McIntyre\u2019s head knocked into that of James Ryan during a nothing tackle. On such minute contacts do contests swing.<\/p>\n

The McIntyre incident occurred in the build-up to Leinster\u2019s second try, three minutes into the second half. The excellent Harry Byrne, now seemingly first-choice 10 for Leinster, sparked it with a beautiful pass, and soon Ryan Baird was galloping down the right. He turned the ball inside to Hugo Keenan for the score. A TMO seance straight after did for McIntyre for 10 minutes.<\/p>\n

Quick GuideTeams and scorersShow<\/p>\n

Leinster Keenan (Frawley 71); T O\u2019Brien, Ringrose (Henshaw 60), J Osborne, Ioane; H Byrne, Gibson-Park (McGrath 64); Usanov (Cahir 4), Sheehan (capt), Furlong (Clarkson 55), J McCarthy, Ryan (Kelleher 67), Baird (Deegan 62), Van der Flier (Penny 50), Conan<\/p>\n

Tries Sheehan, Keenan, Baird, Ioane, O\u2019Brien, Osborne Cons Byrne 5 Pen Byrne<\/p>\n

Sale Carpenter (Wills ht); Roebuck, R du Preez (Louw 60), Ma\u2019asi-White, O\u2019Flaherty; Ford, Warr (Hanson 68); McIntyre (McEachran 64), Caine (Longstaff 64), Opoku-Fordjour (Harper 64), Van Rhyn (capt), Vermeulen (Logan 71), Dugdale (Gilmore 71), D du Preez<\/p>\n

Sin bin\u00a0D du Preez 37, McIntyre 44<\/p>\n

Try Wills Con Ford Pen Ford<\/p>\n

Referee Pierre Bousset (France)<\/p>\n

Thank you for your feedback.<\/p>\n

While Sale were thus down to 13, Leinster scored again. Ford pulled back another three points with a penalty, this one from an angled 45 metres, before Rieko Ioane\u2019s finesse put Garry Ringrose away on the right. Sweet hands swept the ball to Baird, who galloped again, this time down the left, this time to the line.<\/p>\n

Two more Leinster tries in the next 10 minutes, either side of the hour, killed the game off against a Sale side who had barely strung any attacking moves together by that point. Ioane finished the first, then Tommy O\u2019Brien dotted down after Byrne\u2019s chip had caused chaos in the Sale defence. Inevitably, the game now long gone, Sale put together their first piece of artistry to send Alex Wills over in the corner, but a Byrne penalty in the last 10 minutes put the hosts 23 points clear.<\/p>\n

Jamie Osborne rounded off the match with Leinster\u2019s sixth at the death to add a touch of gloss. But Toulon won\u2019t be fooled in three weeks\u2019 time.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Semi-final number 17 beckons for Leinster. The one-time serial champions of this competition will take another, against Toulon,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":600660,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[567],"tags":[64,63,760,85],"class_list":{"0":"post-600659","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-rugby","8":"tag-au","9":"tag-australia","10":"tag-rugby","11":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/600659","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=600659"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/600659\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/600660"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=600659"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=600659"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=600659"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}