I like to think that our Harpin’ group of contributors is a good mix for the podcast.
For the past couple of years I have had two guests per “wrap pod” but this year I trimmed it down to one not only to allow the guest a higher percentage of the time to harp, but also to allow myself to join the conversation more.
We now have a panel of 9 to choose from, with Keego exclusively doing the preview shows (although Mark Jackson’s Premiership insights have seen him step in both last week and this) and the others taking part in a voluntary rotation of sorts.
And by a “mix” I mean a combination of those who currently coach rugby and thus can offer more tactical knowledge, and out and out fans who have followed Leinster & Ireland for years and love to share their thoughts.
On Sunday I was joined by one of the coaches mentioned above, Tom Coleman who looks after the Balbriggan Women’s team and has also helped out with Leinster. In our wrap of the Harlequins match he offered a great analysis of the style of attack the province is trying to bring this season under Tyler Bleyendaal.
Having studied opinions on Leinster Rugby for almost two decades I notice some interesting patterns. There is a realm with a narrative that tends to be negative no matter how well the team is doing, and when we do VERY well, they would go silent altogether, only to re-emerge again the next time the form takes a dip.
Last season was a classic example. Leinster won virtually every match apart from their South African trip before getting ambushed by the Northampton Saints, and when that happened all the “Cullen out” brigade came spilling out of the woodwork, before seeming to retreat “Homer into the bushes” style when the team recovered to win the URC title.
It seems that may not be just a Leinster thing. Munster got off to a flying start this season culminating in an ambush of their own on us at Croker. 5 wins out of 5 suggested Clayton McMillan’s arrival was paying dividends from the off, and when they scored 3 first half tries against the also-100% Stormers at Thomond Park, it really looked as though they’d be unblemished going into Europe.
But since that second half kicked off, things haven’t gone quite so well, and all it has taken is that 40 minutes plus a humbling against their old boss Johann van Graan in Bath to bring about an article like this one.
Don’t get me wrong – I have nothing against criticism of the province. Only this weekend I defended the commenters on our Facebook page who were mostly going negative about the display against Leinster after I got a comment which led to this exchange…
Things took a bit of a dark turn from there – I have redacted his name for this page but if you want to see the full exchange it’s here.
Anyway, my point is that while I wouldn’t go as far as to censor any opinions I considered overly negative, a bit like that commenter I wouldn’t fully understand it. And in the case of this article about Munster’s defeat in Bath, for the most part I can appreciate where the author is coming from, until the very end where it seems like he almost forgets to blame the whole thing on the “IRFU blazers” and their supposed pro-Leinster bias.
“Welcome to our latest bonus chat, if you missed our podcast looking back at Leinster v Harlequins be sure to check it out on Apple, Spotify and all the other usual places. I was joined on the pod by Tom Coleman who’s last appearance was way back on September 21st, right before Leinster’s season kicked off in Cape Town so I thought this was a perfect opportunity to give an overview of Leinster’s season so far – well Tom, after 6 rounds of the URC and 1 game into the latest quest for that 5th star, how have we been doing?”
6 December 2025; Jordan Larmour of Leinster scores his side’s third try during the Investec Champions Cup match between Leinster and Harlequins at the Aviva Stadium in Dublin. Photo by Brendan Moran/Sportsfile
Positives first, some great individual performances from Lamour, Frawley and O’Brien I thought their work both on and off the ball was brilliant, they showed a real hunger in their game. Tommy’s quick thinking to chip the ball through when he had no space and Prendergasts cross field kicks for Lamours try was great to watch.
Negatives (I’ll try keep it short) discipline again was very poor, Quinn’s 2nd 3rd and 4th try came from our poor discipline. Ringrose made some great ground and Paddy Mc gives a penalty away for a needless croc roll which leads to their try. The deliberate knock was brain dead as well, it was always going to be a yellow for it.
The rushed defence is not as great a tactic as it’s made out to be, we left gaps everywhere and could’ve been exposed more than we were. Over all another poor team performance, scoreline doesn’t tell the real story.
If Leinster played the Racing team that Ulster played last night, I can guarantee that we wouldn’t have put the same score on them that Ulster did. Ulster are playing like the old Leinster and Leinster look like a team that are unsure of what they want to do at times.
Greg Kelly
It was a weird sort of game. Everyone and his dog knew Leinster would win it. Even when Quins were within 3 you never felt that would actually win the game. That led to a looseness from Leinster. In the end the flood gates opened a bit.
I’d expect a lot more focus away from home next week.
Jackie McEachern
Glad for the BP win. But as other have said, too many errors. It feels like a team looking for their identity and not sure of themselves?
The defence is a definite problem and I think that’s going to be so costly against better teams.
There were some good performances for sure. Both McCarthy brothers were good. TOB, Larmour and Byrne were also bright spots for me.
Cormac Mannion
Do they not use a ball in training at all? So many poor passes, dropped passes, passes not going to hand, knock-ons in the tackle etc etc.
Just as well we can rely on our teak-tough defence to win matches… eh… oh…
Kevin Kelehan
Scrappy game, the absence of Keenan was really felt in organising the defence out wide, Quins did their homework and scored 5 tries by exploiting flaws. Thankfully the work at the breakdown was incessant and the penalty conveyer put Leinster in a position to score 7 tries. Larmour definitely back in serious form again and will push Lowe and Tommy O’Brien all the way for the starting shirts if he stays this sharp. You’d be expecting a sterner test from Tigers next week and a lot more cohesion from Ireland and visiting stars to ensure another win on the road. Frawley also seriously impressive taking the ball into contact and tackling.
Chris McDonnell
5 points are all you can get so fair play. Set piece was excellent. Of the 2 outhalves we have on the pitch neither were great thankfully frawley stepped up.
Gavin Hegarty
Last April we beat their firsts 62-0.
Today their reserves got a BP against us.
Nothing else to say.
Tom Clarke
Very sloppy performance. So many mistakes in attack and poor in defense. Early days but if that continues we won’t be winning a 5th star any time soon.
Andrew Tynan
Jaysus you lot are happy after us winning aren’t ye? 🤣🤣🤣🙄
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your own thoughts each week after the full time whistle
Every Tuesday we post a “bonus chat” from our Sunday evening wrap pod recording, here’s the latest one.
This is the lead-in : “Next weekend sees the opening round of the Champions Cup, and rather than engage in the annual complaints about the format which doesn’t seem to be moving the needle with the organisers, we thought instead we’d start our coverage by looking at the various contenders for winning the 2026 final in Bilbao, which Leinster fans won’t need reminding is where we won our fourth, and crucially our most recent, star. I suppose David before you list your contenders from around the continent I should probably ask, are Leinster one of them?“
28 November 2025; Joshua Kenny of Leinster scores his side’s second try during the United Rugby Championship match between Dragons and Leinster at Rodney Parade in Newport, Wales. Photo by Brendan Moran/Sportsfile
Glad for the bonus point win but am genuinely concerned about the discipline issues. I really worry about the European matches to come.
Christy O’Connor
That was a hard watch. The discipline was terrible, a lot of unforced errors and 3 yellow cards.
There was some scattered good passages of play but overall that was a terrible performance. We could’ve lost that game and not have had any complaints that Dragons didn’t deserve it.
I’ve said it many times now, I’m not a fan of Nienabar and it’s getting harder and harder to enjoy watching Leinster under his style of play
Kevin Kelehan
Better second half, Luke McGrath added an urgency and Snyman’s offloading came off perfectly. Against better sides the penalty count would have been fatal, they really need to stop giving away penalties at the breakdown.
Pádraig Turley
A curate’s egg of a performance, but bonus point very welcome.
Cormac Mannion
South African refs – a great bunch of lads
Eamon Saunders
Need to be better but getting loads of game time for the second choice players we will need them going forward
Gavin Delves
Ulster Munster and Connacht have ireland players playing this week and leinster had snyman in the second have why no one else becacause leo does what hes told by the IRFU things have to change
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your own thoughts each week after the full time whistle
Hi there, welcome to Broken Play, aka my Saturday morning Substack scribbling, and since you’re here, if you haven’t already, please hit the subscribe button if you don’t mind.
Last night there was something of a standoff here in Harpin’ Manor. On ‘normal’ weekends, my flagging the date and time of the latest Leinster & Ireland match (usually by way of a note on the fridge) informs/warns the rest of the family that his is the two-hour block where Dad is going to be screaming at the main TV for the duration and be sure to find something else to do.
But more often than not, and indeed on most weekends this season, said match has been on a Saturday, and given I’m the only real rugby fan in the house, I suppose you’d forgive the others for assuming it was the same this week.
So it turns out the four of us have been actively going about our lives all week with three of us under the assumption that Friday evening would be spent binge-watching the new episodes of Stranger Things, while my plans involved a different type of Dragons, with absolutely no dungeons.
Things came to a head when we sat down to dinner as I rocked up to the table wearing my Leinster jersey.
“Dad, why did you change into that????” asked one of the kids.
Given I’m unashamedly one of those nerdy dads who not only implements household systems like putting regular notes on the fridge, but also gets extremely smug when the opportunity arises to point out that people didn’t follow it, my reply was dripping with sarcasm.
“Because of the match”
“What match?”
“The match you’d know about if you looked at the fridge.”
My hubris came from the fact that I assumed this was a one v one conversation that I would easily win as the other two would remain neutral, if possibly rolling their eyes that dad is referring to another one of his nerdy systems again. But in actual fact, I had talked myself into a perilous 1 v 3 situation.
It was great to have Cian “RugbyKino” O’Muilleoir back on the wrap pod this weekend, he had been off working on his own podcast “Mudder Rucker” along with Ailbhe O’Nolan focusing on the recent World Cup. Unfortunately it had to be this crazy contest that he came back for, but he still managed to find some positivity in the pandemonium although as you’ll see later down the column, one of his analogies did not go down too well with fans of a certain literary work/motion picture series. ICYMI click here to check out the pod.
POTTS OF CASH
“I’m beginning to see some real green shoots of increasing revenues emerging from the Nations Championship.”
Every year the IRFU releases its financial report and according to Chief Executive Keith Potts, things look in decent shape. Deficits aren’t always a bad thing so it would seem he is justified in describing the union’s situation as “robust”. He also seems to be pointing to the new Nations Championship as a possible avenue for more revenue, I suppose we’ll have to wait and see what kind of broadcast deals come with it. To be honest I was kind of surprised there wasn’t one in place when they announced the format, especially given it is a competition that has been mooted for many years now.
From a fan’s point of view, here’s hoping the “robustness” together with the prospect of further growth from external sources means the ticket prices can at very least be held at current levels for a while going forward? We’ll see.
HARPIN' ON RUGBY 