Andrew Osborne during Leinster training in Pretoria. Photo: Frans Lombard / Sportsfile
Professional rugby players usually know what’s coming when the coach stands in front of them for a review session. But when Leo Cullen and Jacques Nienaber gathered the Leinster squad together in a Pretoria hotel on Sunday night, there was any number of angles they could have come at them from.
Even with the caveats of a truncated pre-season, the list of absentees and the fact that it was the opening game of the season, Friday night’s 35-0 defeat to the Stormers will go down as one of the worst Leinster performances of all time. If they go on to achieve their goals it will be a quirky footnote, but for those who were on the field it was an experience like no other.