Leinster v La Rochelle, Saturday, Stade Vélodrome, Marseille, 5.45pm local time/4.45pm Irish - Live on Virgin Media, Channel 4 and BT Sport
Leinster, and even La Rochelle to a large degree, have each had a two-week build-up to this final. But in truth Leinster have been building towards this game, and it seems now like this specific game, for almost 13 months. Now comes the acid test in the ultimate game, with the ultimate reward of a record-equalling fifth star and confirmation of their status as European royalty.
No defeat prompted them to rethink and redesign their game more than last year’s semi-final defeat by the same opponents. Coming on top of the losses by Saracens in the previous quarter-final and final, the Leinster think tank resolved to do everything in their power to ensure they’d never be bullied like that again.
Over a year on, while allowing for the availability of established players such as Johnny Sexton, Jamison Gibson-Park, or newer ones such as Caelan Doris, Ross Molony and Dan Sheehan who weren’t there last year or, in the case of Andrew Porter in an altogether different guise, they retain nine of last season’s starting line-up. But in many respects, as a team, they are almost unrecognisable.
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Their attacking game is far less reliant on the success of one-off carriers who were lined up and tailor-made for the Ronan O’Gara-designed La Rochelle defensive system which focuses on the ball and smashing the ball carrier.
Aside from carrying into contact, the first receiver now also has well-grooved options flat to his inside and outside, as well as out the back. Nobody is better equipped for this than Tadhg Furlong, whose fitness is as significant for Leinster’s attacking game as for their set-piece.
[ Matt Williams: Leinster’s running game key to victory over La Rochelle in Champions Cup final ]
With Molony, Doris and others all equally comfortable, Leinster are inestimably better equipped to vary the point of contact and attack for big bad Will Skelton, Danny Priso and La Rochelle’s cast of wrecking balls.
While Leinster will still have to cope with La Rochelle’s array of ball carriers - headed by the remarkable Grégory Alldritt and Skelton - and offloading game, they have also sharpened their tackling, both single and double tackles.
James Ryan seemed almost to welcome Skelton’s selection, describing it as adding to both the excitement and increased physicality of the challenge.
“For us as a forward pack it’s being really accurate with our lineout on both sides. Defensively it’s working early, it’s setting early, it’s being connected, it’s scanning, all these little bits that allow us to be physical.
“In the ruck it’s arriving early, it’s not watching and waiting. So it’s making sure that we’re nailing on the process that allows us to impose ourselves as a forward pack, if that makes sense.”
In addition to the emergence of Doris and Sheehan, the late blooming of Josh van der Flier and James Lowe have added further oomph to Leinster’s carrying game and, of course, Gibson-Park’s blooming has quickened Leinster’s tempo and added to their X-factor.
Lowe’s hefty left boot will also add to their kicking weaponry on a pristine football pitch that looks shorter than the Aviva, and judging by the way even O’Gara was spiralling the ball vast distances on Friday there could be a 50:22 or two today.
In temperatures of around 30 degrees, with more of the same forecast right until kick-off, the heat will also be a factor.
“It’s not too bad out there,” ventured Leo Cullen. “I think if anything at 5.45 tomorrow, the pitch is in the shade. Conditions will be great, a massive occasion, two great teams going at it, I don’t see it as a major issue.”
The presence of O’Gara, and Donnacha Ryan, in La Rochelle’s backroom adds more than a hint of concern as to what Leinster might face, and O’Gara is rich with experience of Champions Cup finals - four as a player and now a third as a coach.
He admitted he “froze” in the 2000 final against Northampton and noted that can happen to players, but another lesson was from the 2006 win over Biarritz.
“There was a feeling from Paul [O’Connell] to the rest of the players: ‘We’ve got to play boys’. I think what excites me is that my team can play. We need to get the ball into [Jérémy] Sinzelle’s hands, we need to get outside and then we’ve got juicy forwards. So we can play both games, we just need to play.
“Yeah, Leinster have got great threats but it excites me coaching this team, it really does. I don’t know where it will end. It may not be a happy ending tomorrow but I’m hopeful it will. I wouldn’t be surprised if it did and I’m just trying to instil that in the boys.
“I think where we are now mentally is that I’d like to think we won’t lose tomorrow. We may get beaten, but there’s a massive difference, and I think it’s important that the players understand that.
“With the quality of team we’re up against, Leinster won’t lose it. We’re going to have to beat them. So that excites me, being part of tomorrow, because it’s possible. If we’re accurate we can do something.”
Ultimately, the best team usually wins the Heineken Champions Cup and this season that team has been Leinster. Provided there are no unforeseen earthquakes, such as the trigger-happy yellow card for Lowe in last season’s semi-final, or a card of another colour, or scrum carnage, then if Leinster keep on truckin’ as they have been, they can narrow the La Rochelle defence, reach the edges, manipulate mismatches and score more tries.
This will be Leinster’s toughest test of the season, but they’re equipped to pass it.
LEINSTER: Hugo Keenan; Jimmy O’Brien, Garry Ringrose, Robbie Henshaw, James Lowe; Johnny Sexton, Jamison Gibson-Park; Andrew Porter, Rónan Kelleher, Tadhg Furlong; Ross Molony, James Ryan; Caelan Doris, Josh van der Flier, Jack Conan.
Replacements: Dan Sheehan, Cian Healy, Michael Ala’alatoa, Joe McCarthy, Rhys Ruddock, Luke McGrath, Ross Byrne, Ciarán Frawley.
LA ROCHELLE: Brice Dulin; Dillyn Leyds, Jeremy Sinzelle, Jonathan Danty, Raymond Rhule; Ihaia West, Thomas Berjon; Danny Priso, Pierre Bourgarit, Uini Atonio; Thomas Lavault, Will Skelton; Wiaan Liebenberg, Matthias Haddad, Gregory Alldritt.
Replacements: Facundo Bosch, Reda Wardi, Joel Sclavi, Romain Sazy, Remi Bourdeau, Arthur Retiere, Levani Botia, Jules Favre.
Referee: Wayne Barnes (England).
Forecast: Leinster to win.
