Harlequins coach Danny Wilson has not shied away from casting his side’s trip to Croke Park on Saturday to take on Leinster as a visit to the lion’s den. The English side make the journey as the third English Premiership team to play in the GAA ground and arrive with mixed recent form, a first away win over Saracens in 13 years and a defeat by Bath at The Rec 47-28 last weekend.
The London team are also taking inspiration from their win over Bordeaux-Bègles last season as they aim to rise to a challenge that on paper they look unlikely to win. In heat touching 30 degrees Harlequins edged out the French side 42-41 to qualify for the club’s first Champions Cup semi-final.
Harlequins are also only too willing to place Leinster high on a pedestal in the hope they can reprise the Bordeaux experience. They can also draw lessons from the vim and enterprise that Northampton showed last season in Dublin when forcing Leinster into a hugely uncomfortable end to their meeting.
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“We’re extremely excited,” says Wilson. “You get to the knock-out stages of Europe and these are the exciting opportunities. You get to go to play against one of the best teams in Europe for a long time at Croke Park. It is amazing. The boys are really excited about it.”
“We’ve built a reputation now that on our day ... we’ve had some big wins this year, the double win over Saracens was, in a big stadium like Tottenham in a big game, fantastic. Now we go to play a massive side in Europe in a stadium that they will be very motivated to play in and we get the chance to have a crack at a very, very good side.
“They are one of the giants of the game. But we also know going there as underdogs, as Harlequins, is a good place for us in Europe. Several times in the history of the club we’ve had big wins as underdogs and no more so than Bordeaux last year.”
Against Bath, Harlequins drew two yellow cards in the first 20 minutes and, after going 19-0 down, they couldn’t recover from the worst possible start. They know that it is imperative to kick off strongly in Dublin.
Wilson, like Leinster coach Leo Cullen, rested his international players after the Six Nations and he is hoping it will make a difference and that clear heads and fresh legs will help stun last year’s beaten finalists.
“Our approach was built on lessons learned from last year,” says Wilson. “We all know players come out of those international periods emotionally, physically, mentally pretty spent. There is a lot asked of them.
“But the emotional side of is the one I think drains and it probably is less recognised. So we made a decision that first game back, once they had finished the Six Nations, go on your break, get away, recharge the batteries.”
Harlequins will not be staying in Dublin overnight on Saturday because should they beat Leinster, they will be back in action for a quarter-final match the following Friday.
But Saracens away, Bath away and now Leinster away makes for a testing run of matches and Wilson knows it. He also understands that Harlequins have a puncher’s chance, even if Cullen decides to line out with RG Snyman and Jordie Barrett in the starting team. The bigger the names in Leinster, the more freely Harlequins will swing.
“Leinster are still a very effective attack,” says Wilson. “They have a certain style you can recognise in Ireland and in Leinster. I think they are a very rounded team. They have a ridiculous representation of Irish players that played week in, week out in the Six Nations, a quality, quality outfit and they seem to recruit well on top of that with some foreign players.”
