It’s a knockout: Ulster play-off pain at Leinster hands

Ulster are more than capable of beating Leinster.

League victories over the eight-time URC champions have arrived with relative regularity over the last number of seasons and, in fact, Ulster have won four of the last seven clashes.

When John Cooney floated over his late winner three weeks ago to complete a 23-21 comeback, it was the second time in three seasons that Ulster had done the double.

No, Ulster’s issue has been getting the job done when it’s win or go home.

You have to go all the way back to the almost-forgotten Celtic Cup in 2003 to find the last time Ulster knocked Leinster out of a competition.

Even then, the sides finished level at Ravenhill, 23-23 aet (below), but Ulster scored three tries (penalty try, Neil Best and Tyrone Howe) to Leinster’s two and went through on the countback.

That was the only time in nine knockout meetings that Leinster came off second best, including three Champions Cup ties.

Ulster’s trail of play-off pain started with a limp 18-3 loss to Leinster in a Magners League semi-final in 2011.

The sides met in a Heineken Cup final the following year in Twickenham and a brilliant Leinster team ran out 42-14 winners but Ulster underperformed on the day.

In the 2012/13 season, Ulster under then-head coach Mark Anscombe won both league games but fell short in an RDS final, going down 24-18.

They picked up three just regular-season wins over the next 13 games in a period in which Leinster won the title three times, but lost successive Pro12 semi-finals in 2014 and 2016.

When the sides clashed in the quarter-final of the European Cup in 2019, Ulster fancied their chances and arrived to the Aviva Stadium wearing the same red that they wore when they beat Colomiers in the 1999 final at Lansdowne Road.

Defending champions Leinster had topped their pool but Ulster, then under Dan McFarland, had impressed in a group containing Racing 92 and Leicester.

The visitors took the lead and had Leinster rocking before Jacob Stockdale’s inexplicable knock-on as he looked to score a try in the corner.

A successful conversion would have given Ulster a nine-point second-half lead but Leinster, with Ross Byrne scoring 18 points including a try, reeled them in.

The shock of coming so close to knocking out the European champions on their home turf haunted Ulster for a long time.

While they did pick up a win in their next meeting, they again failed to put a dent in the Leinster juggernaut when they faced off in the 2020 Pro14 Grand Final, a game played behind closed doors at the Aviva Stadium due to pandemic restrictions.

James Hume opened the scoring for Ulster, but that third-minute try was their last of the day and they went down with a whimper, 27-5.

The following season they picked up home and away wins against Leinster in the league, which helped them to a third-place finish.

A narrow away semi-final defeat at eventual champions Stormers brought their season to an end.

But back at the business end of the Champions Cup they again travelled to Dublin 4 in 2023 for another Aviva Stadium shot at Leinster, this time in the quarter-finals.

Having qualified as last seed from the pool phase, with just one win to their name against Sale, they arrived at Lansdowne Road more in hope than expectation.

And so it played out, a relatively routine loss for Ulster, who were kept at arm’s length for most of the 30-15 defeat.

If the tale of the tape makes for depressive reading, Ulster can take some encouragement from where Leinster are at as they come to terms with a third stomach-punch Champions Cup final loss.

Being beaten after extra time in a European final obviously means that Leo Cullen’s men are operating at the top table but it’s where that loss, and the last two seasons’ URC semi-final defeats, leaves them mentally that gives Ulster a shot.

“We’ll prepare really well and try and put them under as much pressure as we can,” said Richie Murphy, whose Ulster side last won the title in 2006.

Leinster have gone full strength for this evening’s game but it’s worth remembering that on board when they lost 22-21 at the RDS on New Year’s Day were Champions Cup final players Cian Healy, Dan Sheehan, Joe McCarthy, Jason Jenkins, Ryan Baird, Will Connors, Caelan Doris, Jamison Gibson-Park, Robbie Henshaw, Ciarán Frawley, Michael Ala’alatoa, Jack Conan and Josh van der Flier.

Up at the Kingspan last month, a week before the Toulouse game, Cullen still deployed James Ryan, Hugo Keenan, Rónan Kelleher, Connors, Conan, Healy and Ala’alatoa and Jimmy O’Brien, who just missed out in London.

On paper, they had more than enough firepower to deal with an Ulster side operating without influential duo Iain Henderson and James Hume but Stockdale’s ability to punish a sloppy pass and Cooney’s game-management saw Ulster home.

Leinster players and management talk well about taking the lessons but walking the walk in the crunch games is the only thing that matters and Ulster will feel they have a shot if they can stay within range coming down the stretch.

The hosts daren’t allow that to happen.

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