{"id":421475,"date":"2026-04-28T10:42:14","date_gmt":"2026-04-28T10:42:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/421475\/"},"modified":"2026-04-28T10:42:14","modified_gmt":"2026-04-28T10:42:14","slug":"leinster-put-benetton-defeat-behind-them-and-take-buddhist-approach-to-toulon-clash-the-irish-times","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/421475\/","title":{"rendered":"Leinster put Benetton defeat behind them and take Buddhist approach to Toulon clash \u2013 The Irish Times"},"content":{"rendered":"

The glass remains half-full with Leinster<\/a>. After their disappointing loss in Treviso<\/a> last weekend, this week\u2019s positive approach involves looking at the failures against Benetton through the prism of team growth. A little bit of Buddhism also enters the equation.<\/p>\n

\u201cAt the same stage of last season, when we went away to the Scarlets and lost before facing Northampton, my learnings from that was don\u2019t waste your time looking backwards. It\u2019s all about Saturday in front,\u201d says forwards coach Robin McBryde. <\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s a Buddhist story about avoiding the second arrow. If you get shot in the back with an arrow, you spend so much time worrying about the first arrow you forget about where the second arrow is coming from.\u201d<\/p>\n

Leinster face Toulon in Saturday\u2019s Champions Cup semi-final at the Aviva Stadium (3pm). It\u2019s a different team in a different competition with different consequences. <\/p>\n

McBryde acknowledges the team could not dodge the slings and arrows in Italy. This week\u2019s imperative is to deal with them differently.<\/p>\n

\u201cSometimes you\u2019ve just got to pay your dues and take it on the chin and learn from the experience,\u201d he adds. \u201cAnd sometimes you can only learn from getting things wrong, unfortunately. Ideally you don\u2019t want to get them wrong in the first place. Listen, it\u2019s a great opportunity for growth.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe knew it was going to be tough [against Benetton]. Talking to their coaches, it was the last home game for them and the last home game for quite a few of their players. <\/p>\n

\"LeinsterLeinster forwards Coach Robin McBryde says the players have already moved on from the defeat to Benetton and are focused on Saturday’s Champions Cup semi-final against Toulon. Photograph: Grace Halton\/Inpho <\/p>\n

\u201cIt was pretty emotional before the game, players crying etc, so you knew they were going to come out fire and brimstone.\u201d<\/p>\n

It is also a week of waiting as Leinster count the cost of the last few matches after a long season. Tighthead prop Tadhg Furlong limped off against Benetton and will be assessed later in the week<\/a>. <\/p>\n

The same goes for loosehead prop Andrew Porter, James Lowe and Jordan Larmour. Ed Byrne, having been brought in on a short-term contract from Cardiff, started at loosehead last week, so there is much to hang on what the medics report says later in the week.<\/p>\n

\"\"How concerned should Leinster be for Europe after Benetton defeat?<\/p>\n

Byrne can play in Europe if Leinster are down to the bare bones and if Porter does not make the squad \u2013 four injured looseheads would seem to meet that description. <\/p>\n

\u201cHe\u2019s been monitored,\u201d said McBryde of Porter. \u201cWe\u2019ll just see \u2013 again \u2013 with the nature of his injury. You\u2019re not going to force anything at this stage, it\u2019s important that he\u2019s 100 per cent fit first and foremost.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"JamesJames Lowe is one of several Leinster players trying to shake off an injury. Photograph: Grace Halton\/Inpho <\/p>\n

The cupboard is less bare on the other side of the scrum. <\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019ve got to monitor Tadhg [Furlong]. You can understand with his recent history with injury, the first sign of anything is going to be a concern really,\u201d added the coach. <\/p>\n

\u201cFortunately, we\u2019ve got Thomas Clarkson, who I thought came on and did very well. The experience of someone like Rabah Slimani as well. And then we\u2019ve got two youngsters coming through in Niall Smyth and Andrew Sparrow.\u201d <\/p>\n

Leinster have lost to Toulon on four occasions in the Champions Cup, which the French club won three years in succession from 2013-15. In breaking the sequence, Leinster may look to Slimani\u2019s knowledge of French rugby.<\/p>\n

The 36-year-old, apart from 59 appearances with France, also played with Top 14 clubs Stade Francais and Clermont before coming to Dublin and will return to France next season to play with Toulon.<\/p>\n

\"JordanJordan Larmour, Ciaran Frawley and Rieko Ioane during Leinster training at University College Dublin on Monday. Photograph: Grace Halton\/Inpho <\/p>\n

\u201cToulon obviously rate Rabah highly enough to sign him for next year, but even if he wasn\u2019t playing this week, he\u2019d have a role in terms of what he knows about the players he\u2019s coming up against, the French strong culture, all that sort of stuff.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe\u2019s always got a role to play from a scrummaging point of view because he sees things differently as well. He\u2019s very knowledgeable when it comes to frontrow players in France.\u201d<\/p>\n

Ryan Baird is unavailable to play due to complications around the initial injury to his leg sustained in November. Baird returned impressively for Leinster\u2019s win over Edinburgh before the injury flared up again. <\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s not as bad as it was previously,\u201d said McBryde of the Irish flanker.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The glass remains half-full with Leinster. After their disappointing loss in Treviso last weekend, this week\u2019s positive approach…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":421476,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[32728,61,60,11287,28577,112,69607],"class_list":["post-421475","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-sports","tag-champions-cup","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-leinster-rugby","tag-leo-cullen","tag-sports","tag-tadhg-furlong"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/421475","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=421475"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/421475\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/421476"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=421475"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=421475"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=421475"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}