{"id":438985,"date":"2026-05-08T16:41:14","date_gmt":"2026-05-08T16:41:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/438985\/"},"modified":"2026-05-08T16:41:14","modified_gmt":"2026-05-08T16:41:14","slug":"leo-cullen-confirms-leinster-wont-replace-rieko-ioane-with-another-all-black-as-james-lowe-deal-remains-unsigned","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/438985\/","title":{"rendered":"Leo Cullen confirms Leinster won\u2019t replace Rieko Ioane with another All Black as James Lowe deal remains unsigned"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><img decoding=\"async\" alt=\"Rieko Ioane of Leinster and head coach Leo Cullen after the Champions Cup semi-final win over Toulon at the Aviva Stadium in Dublin. Photo: Brendan Moran\/Sportsfile\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/Sports3443857.jpg\" loading=\"eager\" width=\"100%\" data-testid=\"article-image\"  \/><\/p>\n<p class=\"indo-ebe0ecc6_root indo-ebe0ecc6_caption1 indo-300db776_none indo-91174671_secondary indo-66f0fec7_regular indo-1d70522a_marginbottom0 indo-1d70522a_marginleft0 indo-1d70522a_marginright0 indo-1d70522a_margintop3 indo-b48c4984_left\" style=\"color:var(--color-grey-60)\">Rieko Ioane of Leinster and head coach Leo Cullen after the Champions Cup semi-final win over Toulon at the Aviva Stadium in Dublin. Photo: Brendan Moran\/Sportsfile<\/p>\n<p class=\"indo-ebe0ecc6_root indo-ebe0ecc6_paragraph indo-300db776_none indo-91174671_primary indo-1d70522a_marginbottom0 indo-1d70522a_margintop0 indo-b48c4984_inherit\" style=\"color:var(--color-primary-80)\">It looks increasingly unlikely that Leinster will sign a marquee overseas player, as Leo Cullen ruled out replacing Rieko Ioane with another All Black and highlighted the difficulty of recruiting in a World Cup year.<\/p>\n<p class=\"indo-ebe0ecc6_root indo-ebe0ecc6_paragraph indo-300db776_none indo-91174671_primary indo-1d70522a_marginbottom0 indo-1d70522a_margintop0 indo-b48c4984_inherit\" style=\"color:var(--color-primary-80)\">The head coach confirmed that Springbok RG Snyman would be with Leinster next season, but as of yet, they have not announced a replacement for Ioane or departing prop Rabah Slimani. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Rieko Ioane of Leinster and head coach Leo Cullen after the Champions Cup semi-final win over Toulon at&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":438986,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[42,11287,28577,43,40,38,41,39],"class_list":["post-438985","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-headlines","tag-headlines","tag-leinster-rugby","tag-leo-cullen","tag-news","tag-top-news","tag-top-stories","tag-topnews","tag-topstories"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/438985","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=438985"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/438985\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/438986"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=438985"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=438985"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=438985"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}