Needless to say I was gutted when I realised that I wouldn’t mke it from work to Croke Park in time for kickoff on Friday, but it’s also needless to say watching such a comprehensive victorious display from the boys in blue did much to make me feel better!
And when it came to the wrap pod recording, although we normally aim to be finished by 9pm, myself and Conor had no qualms with going over until about quarter past as he did an excellent job not only harping on the final itself, but also paying tribute to all the lads leaving the province for the bonus chat.
If you missed the pod recording be sure to check it out you’ll find it here.
SUCCEEDING LEO
…as club jobs go, there are few anywhere near as attractive
While it was of course a very satisfying weekend for Leinster fans, spare a thought for the legions of rugby followers for whom the success was literally the last thing they wanted to see. No doubt the news bothered them so much that they would follow anything else in the news cycle, possibly even including the round ball World Cup.
Given how the week following defeats in finals are always followed by days of articles telling us all “what’s wrong with Leinster” (see flow chart below), it’s only natural to assume that after a victory the focus might change to eyeing the province through a more positive lens (cue JK Simmons GIF) but I guess we’ll never know since on Monday the news of Leo Cullen’s impending departure dropped, also offering a perfect distraction for the vast “ABL” community.
Well, I say impending…it is to be a long goodbye of an entire rugby season but that certainly won’t stop us all speculating over who will eventually replace him.
I suppose the first question has to be this – will they necessarily appoint a direct replacement or his position? It always has been something of a unique role. He had only been coaching a year when he assumed it and the remit was slightly different to that we know for a “head coach”, while the buck did stop with him he was also of a public face of a coaching ticket where the unit coaches appeared to have more responsibility, as demonstrated by the appointment first of Stu Lancaster and then Jacques Nienaber as “Senior Coach”.
Eventually I will wade into the debate over who is to fill his shoes, or indeed over what he himself is to do next, but to be honest with him to be there for another full season I just don’t see the point in doing so right now. All the proposed candidates seem fine, yes, even ROG. I know a lot of people assume Leinster fans would pull their hair out at the thought of him taking the reins, but my own reservations would be less about what province he played for in the past and more about how he continuously got into trouble with the 🔝🐱🐴 for bad mouthing the officials.
Anyway, this article is one of several looking at the various possible candidates, all a decent read, but personally I’d rather bask in Leo and Leinster’s back-to-back title glory for a little longer.
Slightly different 80+ column this week, with no Leinster match next weekend, we’re posting a day early to take a wee break from content creating and will be back with the next column on Wednesday June 17.
Our URC semifinal wrap this week feature Cian “RugbyKino” O’Muilleoir, a long time contributor to the pod who of course now has his own excellent pod MudderRucker that focuses on Irish women’s rugby.
To be clear, when I ask a contributor to help me out with a wrap pod, I could say that “I honestly don’t expect them to waste time with preparation, sure just hop on the Zoom and have an aul chat” but that wouldn’t be strictly true. I am hoping that at least they rewatch the match in question although I do appreciate that it’s not always easy to find the time. And to a man I have to say they are all more than ready to go when it comes to our regular recording time of 8pm on a Sunday.
But a distinction needs to be made. There’s “prepared”, and there’s “Kino prepared”. He has allowed me to share his notes for the Stormers show, and below you see just the portion that covers the opening section that features in our YouTube clip. Full respect. I almost feel guilty asking him to come on now since I feel I’m imposing this much work on him! Although in my defence, we have been operating a “volunteer system” this season which has been working well. I honestly do wish I had the discipline to be this prepared for pods, it would certainly help take away all my stutters and humming and hawing!!!
We all heard the rumours but most of us hoped there was still a chance of an extension until an official announcement was made, and it eventually happened on Monday, with an official announcement due to drop Tuesday.
I have said before on these pages that I am of course sad to see him go, he is a proven match winner, a Leinster record-breaker and also a mainstay for Ireland since he qualified. In fact it’s hard to believe he has actually been here as long as he has – I remember following him in his last season at the Tasman Makos for the final NPC season before he moved north and completed three full years in blue before donning the green.
I have also said that I can see the IRFUs POV a little bit in that a line needed to be drawn and that it could not be a case whereby there was no offer from foreign shores we wouldn’t match. He was considered a “PONI – Player of National Interest” but clearly not enough interest to force the issue based on age profiles and World Cup cycles. I absolutely don’t like the outcome, but I can have a level of respect (albeit a low one) for the decisions made FWIW. I just hope he has the same levels of understanding because we certainly don’t want to think he is leaving on bad terms.
But I will say this…Lowe’s departure take’s a lot of air out of the tires on the “Leinster get everything they want from the IRFU” bus. Next time you hear someone toeing that particular line (and it won’t be long, trust me), be sure to set them straight.
Obviously we wish James all the best at Sungoliath, who finished 4th in this season’s League One with 9 wins and 9 defeats and went out in the semifinals to the eventual winners the Kobe Steelers.
I don’t make a secret of the fact that I do enjoy other sports apart from rugby, and if I lived elsewhere growing up, this content-creating passion project could have had a much different theme.
For example, had I stayed in the USA and not moved to Ireland as a boy, the chances are strong I would have taken to baseball, in which case I’d be harpin’ on the Oakland A’s, being the team based closest to where I was born. Had the sliding doors sent my life in that direction however, I’d be pretty annoyed now as the team are no longer based there so it’s probably just as well.
Then there’s football. When I did move to Ireland aged 8 and joined a new school I found myself under immediate pressure to pick a football team and for reasons that are too long for these pages, I chose Tottenham Hotspur. And their current plight isn’t a whole lot better than Oakland’s, and just a few hours before recording the already-difficult Champions Cup final wrap pod, they played a match which could have resulted in their relegation.
In the end the pod was a tough record anyway, but I can’t help but feel that had Spurs “gone down” my mood would have been much worse! And this of course is not to take anything away from my fellow podster Hugo Gordon, who despite enduring a difficult rewatch was able to deliver excellent, balanced analysis for the disappointing afternoon in Bilbao. Click here to check it out if you missed it.
DIVIDING BY 10
This year, he has not started at outhalf in any game.
In different circumstances you might think the headline was “clickbait”, but to be fair to Nathan the article does exactly what it says on the tin.
Apparently Tuesday was officially “World Redhead Day” so I’m not sure if this was a factor in the timing of this article but it’s true his leaving Leinster for Connacht has been much discussed since last Saturday when his introduction at first receiver seemed to make a difference to Leinster’s attack.
For my part I am torn on the Frawley debate. Of course I don’t want to see him go, but I also think it’s very naive to assume that Leinster could have easily kept him.
The formal announcement of his departure was just before Christmas, which means the decision was made prior to then. At this time, Sam Prendergast, rightly or wrongly, was the presumptive starter for both Leinster and Ireland, and Harry Byrne was pushing him strongly for the reserve role, in fact for many the argument was that it was he who should be starting, which he did in Bilbao.
Plus do we really think that we have full autonomy in such things? Was it purely that “Leinster let him go”? That is not how the Irish pro rugby model works. What annoys me about a lot of the opinion is that it seems to assume our provinces are clubs like they are in the 🔝🐱🐴. For me, this is the deepest issue. Unless we revert to an exact replica of what the French do and let sugar-daddies own and operate the teams, we will always have limitations and priority has to be given to the national team.
If Ciarán is guaranteed gametime at 10 in Galway, it should improve his Ireland chances. Working under Stu certainly won’t hurt either. It will be very interesting to see how they get on next season with Champions Cup rugby also on the menu.
Going back to Sam, I really hope we’re not writing him off altogether. I can totally see a redemption arc for him, but to my mind FWIW I believe it is crucial that, barring injuries, he does not start at 10 for Leinster again this season, nor does he start on the South African tour to kick off next season. For me that sends the message that he is to fight for the jersey, and with Joey Carbery seemingly on the way in, we should have options. There is of course also Caspar Gabriel on the conveyor belt, though I hear there may be plans for a short stint away from Leinster, nothing concrete just yet.
Sometimes I wonder if we are subconsciously holding our prospects up against the memory of Johnny Sexton, when he was clearly the definition of a once-in-a-generation talent. The superstar of your team does not have to be the 10. But it does help to know who is your preferred option so you can develop an overall attack strategy so hopefully now that all the moves are done Leinster can at least have a handle on this going into 2026/27.
THE BILBAO 23 (BONUS CHAT MEETS LEINSTER SQUAD UPDATE)
TROLL PATROL
COMPETITION UPDATES (incl 🔝🐱🐴)
NEXT HARPIN’
WRAP OF A WRAP
Ten Leinster tries in one match are always exciting to watch especially live, but when you add the context of our season, namely that only the win was of actual use to us plus we’ve a slightly bigger match the following weekend, you end up with a match that will be very quickly forgotten. As the saying goes, “the show must go on” so we did produce a wrap pod for Leinster v Ospreys, with Ciarán Duffy from Post To Post Sport joining me for a chat on Sunday evening, but we decided to cover the whole match in just the opening portion and use the rest of the time to go back over Leinster’s URC regular season. ICYMI click here to check it out.
HAIL TO THE KING
“…we’ve got new caps, we’ve got people adding into the on-pitch stuff. We’re growing our wave. I leave here with a sense that there’s only more to come.”
Like I said last week, Sunday’s Six Nations finale at the Aviva Stadium had to be about more than just the crowd, there was a match to be played and a solid third place finish to be earned. And what a performance it was. Although we did finish 3rd last year, that included a defeat to the Scots so there were scores to be settled and, well, I think you can safely say that was done and then some. This back row of Hogan, King and Wafer is a world class trio to build the team around and under Scott Bemand they have looking like a well coached group who enjoy working together and we have seen plenty to back up Erin’s claim in the quote.
And yes, the crowd was great too. But if they continue on this path as looks likely, there’s more big numbers to come there too.
Next up is the new incarnation of the WXV, known as “The Global Series” – it seems to be a women’s version of the Nations Championship although thankfully they have not just simply replicated the men’s version (they probably could do something similar with the Six Nations too).
“The top 12 teams (Australia, Canada, England, France, Italy, Ireland, Japan, New Zealand, Scotland, South Africa, USA, Wales) will compete in a home-and-away, cross-regional touring model within a newly aligned September – October international window. Significantly, unions will retain domestic commercial rights to their home fixtures, recognising the importance of growing the value of the women’s game in each country, and supporting reinvestment in player pathways and national programmes.”
BORDEAUX BEAT BATH, BILBAO BOUND, BUT BOTH BRILLIANT & BEATABLE
LEINSTER SQUAD UPDATE
TROLL PATROL
COMPETITION UPDATES (incl Super Rugby)
NEXT HARPIN’
WRAP OF A WRAP
My cough which has haunted me for the past few weeks seems to have mostly gone, at least when I’m recording podcasts which is the main thing. Both preview & wrap recordings went well, although when I met some friends in the pub after the match on Saturday it seemed to be back. “There’s a bug going round” as the saying goes so I won’t look for too much sympathy. Anyway Tom Coleman was on for the wrap pod offering his usual superb technical analysis from a coaches’ standpoint. On WhatsApp during the match he said we had the beating of him, even when we were in card trouble, and he was right. Just. But still right. Click here if you missed it.
RANDLE SCANDAL HANDLED
One step forward, two steps back. That’s the way this season has panned out for Munster.
Always the right option IMO. I know many are dwelling on how “accusations like this made against a young man can stay with you for your entire life”, and this is true, but I might push back by saying “sexual assault can stay with a young woman for the rest of her life too”. If we are to constantly bring up that the legal case was dropped and he denies it all, we must also bring up that the victim has not publicly withdrawn the allegations.
But from a purely rugby standpoint, this story is about Munster who most certainly did not need this matter at all and I don’t know what they were thinking trying to pursue it. Was the agreed approach “ah, sure, it’ll be grand”???
Anyway. The matter has been dealt with and they have to try and salvage something from their season. Results have improved it’s true but concern over a Tadhg Beirne injury looms large. As the URC table stands right now there would be a Leinster/Munster quarterfinal which maybe, just MAYBE, will cause a bit of hype…
It was an unusual weekend for content producing here at Harpin Manor – first, I was unavailable Friday to record the preview with Keego once the team was named so we did a “drop-in” version where he recorded his bit and I added mine but the video wasn’t ready until Saturday morning.
Then a family event on Saturday evening meant I had to miss both the Leinster and Ireland women’s matches. I did a reasonable job avoiding the Leinster score until the Sunday morning, I did catch a glimpse of a scoreline where the boys in blue were leading 14-5 but didn’t know what stage of the match that was. Turns out it was just before halftime and I let out an almighty roar of frustration when we shipped that needless penalty right at the death.
Anyway, whatever the outcome it was great to have Jay Long back on the pod to mull it over, click here if you missed it.
CLOSING THE GAP
There is still a gap between these two sides. Albeit it has shrunk to the point that this is now a proper rivalry.
Friend of the pod Nathan hits the bullseye with this account of Ireland’s defeat in Clérmont on Saturday evening. Continuously losing to both England and France does not necessarily mean the squad isn’t improving. You could argue that at this stage a lot of the difference between the sides was down to Irish lack of accuracy as opposed to actually not being good enough. Like I said earlier I didn’t get to watch this match live but I did switch over for a couple of minutes towards the end of the first half and Ireland had a penalty which Dannah O’Brien tried to put to touch in the corner but it ended up going dead. A couple of plays later the French were back down the other end of the pitch scoring. Fix that, improve the depth and we can definitely close the gap even further and I’d definitely have faith in the squad to do just that.
The cough I had last week is still hanging around which meant for more challenging editing but thankfully my latest guest Rich Mifsud wasn’t put off as he offered a great analysis of Leinster’s win over Ulster, a result particularly satisfying as a running joke in our WhatsApp group had been that Leinster tended to lose whenever he was on, and this particular week it felt like that trend would return. If you missed the latest pod you’ll find it here.
You may notice a theme of sorts among this week’s Front Five, namely that of women, and not just in terms of them playing rugby.
THE RANDLE SCANDAL
“I’ve known Roger for a long time. I think he’s an outstanding human, well-loved by family and people that have worked alongside him for a long period of time.”
We’ve been down this road before when it comes to rugby players accused of abuse, and each case has its own context that deserves to be considered separately. But in this instance, I genuinely cannot understand how this appointment could be seen as a good fit for Munster in any way, shape, or form.
The appointment has reignited scrutiny of a 1997 rape allegation made while Randle was with the Hurricanes in Durban. The charge was withdrawn when the complainant declined to proceed, but she maintained her allegation, and the incident has resurfaced repeatedly. Randle has always denied the accusation, yet its re‑emergence has prompted backlash from supporters and even resignations from members of Munster’s Professional Game Board.
Given that the incident dates back to 1997 and we are relying on archived reporting and second‑hand summaries, we should be careful about the conclusions we draw. But one thing is clear: the line that “there has been no conviction” does not end the discussion — not even close. It is entirely plausible that the case was withdrawn because the complainant felt her evidence wouldn’t secure a conviction, which is very different from proof of innocence.
This brings us to the core question for a platform like Harpin’ On Rugby: is this a worthwhile appointment from a PR standpoint for Munster Rugby? I would argue no — even without the difficulties they’ve faced on and off the pitch this season, and certainly not with them.
To my eye, the whole thing reeks of a kind of internal conspiracy: everyone involved must have known the appointment would be controversial, which means they needed a rhetorical strategy to present it to the public. And although this is a hot take, I suspect part of that strategy was timing the announcement after Munster’s visit to Durban — the location of the alleged incident — in March.
And honestly, if you find yourself needing to “close ranks” with public statements like McMillan’s above in order to justify hiring someone with a chequered past, then the answer should already be no.
This leads me to believe McMillan may have issued an ultimatum along the lines of “he joins us or I leave.” Even if that were true — and again, this is speculation — I would still argue that the net benefit to Munster would be for Randle not to come. And even if you dismiss that theory entirely, there are still multiple other plausible scenarios that raise the same red flags.
The fact that individuals within Munster Rugby were reportedly willing to resign over this suggests they may know more about the case than the public does. Overall, it’s a horrible situation that doesn’t belong in the Irish rugby story — especially given how similar cases have been handled in the past. Others have been forced to leave these shores (and I agreed with those decisions), so surely the only consistent resolution here is to reverse the appointment.
Anyone who knows me will tell you it gives me no pleasure to see this happening at Munster, or indeed anything that has happened there this season. We’ve said repeatedly on our podcasts that we want four strong provinces. And if the opinion of a Leinster fan isn’t enough, there’s an interesting thread among Munster supporters on BlueSky — mainly contrasting views from Three Red Kings and IWRSC. Below is a sample but click here for the whole thing.
It’s always a pleaseure to have Cian “RugbyKino” O’Muilleoir on the pod, since he was doing his own show MudderRucker that follows women’s rugby along with also-friend-of-the-pod Ailbhe O’Nolan his opportunities to appear have been limited to say the least. Obviously it was a shame that his appearance had to be for a bad Leinster loss, of course, but still there was a job to be done picking apart what went wrong and he did an excellent job as ever. If you missed it, click here to check it out.
THE IMPORT-ANCE OF BEING REIKO
“…he hasn’t added any clear and obvious lift in quality to ‘the big show’ the east coast province are so used to delivering.”
We touched on this for the wrap pod and clearly we’re not the only ones who noticed.
Two factors to consider before continuing…first, I’m wary of accusations of “import blaming”, something that has been known to happen at clubs not doing well throughout all team sports. We also have to acknowledge that it was highly unlikely that Reiko’s career cameo at Leinster was never going to come close to that of Jordie Barrett’s – although the similarities between them are plentiful, there are also plenty of differences so to expect the same output would have been crazy.
All that said, he has hardly set the world alight for us. It’s true, his intercept and pass on the run to JJ Kenny for our opening try in Scotstoun was quality, but when you wear that blue 13 jumper in particular you are expected to fulfil defensive duties as well and he was found wanting for more than one of the tries Glasgow made look all too easy.
To be perfectly honest, were I to pick an elite matchday squad for Leinster right now, even leaving out those injured, I can’t find a place for Reiko, which surely calls into question the value for money we’re getting for him.
Since we cut from two guests on the wrap pods to one, having the same guest two out of three weeks has been a rarity but that’s how things turned out for the Cardiff pod and since Conor Cronin also chipped in to the 500th episode it means he earned three caps in as many weeks which I doubt has ever happened.
Unfortunately that one dull fact is more interesting than anything that actually happened in the URC match at Cardiff Arms Park but still Conor did a great job analysing what went wrong; I reckon it’s worth a listen if you missed it, click here to do so.
RUGBY’S ASHES
An “identical exhibition trophy” is set to be used for the remainder of the championship
Not really a crazy story I suppose, fires happen, but I have to say I’m intrigued by the article simply saying “The fire, reported to have taken place in Ireland, led to no injuries…”.
Eh, maybe since you’re the Irish national broadcaster you might want to follow up on that? Where in Ireland? How did the fire start? To be fair if those details WERE in the article I probably wouldn’t pay them much mind, but they are still conspicuous by their absence and it leaves me an itch that needs scratching.
Plus all the talk of a new trophy being “forged” gave our WhatsApp group the perfect opportunity to run a host of Tolkien themed memes…
Our newest contributor is Hugo Gordon, and our schedule worked out in such a way that he had arguably the two “cushiest” assignments for an Irish podster in the opening three weeks of the 2026 Six Nations – first previewing the French game, when there was still even a smidge of hope for an upset away win, and finally wrapping the England game, when Ireland actually got one.
It goes without saying that this pod in particular was a pleasure to record, especially since we could spend the first portion reversing the mood from the previous week when we panned our attack plan, such as it was.
The whole point of this 80+ column is meant to be to turn the spotlight on anything BUT the Leinster & Ireland men’s rugby teams, but after that performance in Twickenham I think it would be rude not to bring it up a few times anyway. Besides, I do get away with it on a technicality in that the three Front 5 articles devoted to it involved reactions from non-Irish sources.
First up is Mike Tindall – look, while this stance may positively reek of sour grapes it is probably one that a lot of English fans will take when summarising the match. Plus it’s true, Borthwick’s men were below par and we did explore this on our wrap pod, it was definitely a factor.
But Ireland were pretty low on confidence too and there was no guarantee that we could take full advantage of England’s shortcomings, so to say we “did nothing to win” is disingenuous to say the very least.
And then of course there’s this – given his royal family connections….does Tindall really think he needs to be the poster-child for such a gaslighting opinion? REALLY? At THIS particular time? Baffling. I’ll leave it there.
HARPIN' ON RUGBY 