Leinster ‘will build and we’ll go again,’ insists Leo Cullen

In the meantime, the inquest begins into a third season without picking up a trophy despite being in the semi-final or final of the Champions Cup and URC in each of those years.

But while the likes of World Cup winner RG Snyman and All Black Jordie Barrett will be arriving next season and former Munster out-half Tyler Bleyendaal will join the coaching team, it’s not as if Leinster have been inactive on either front over the past few seasons in their quest for glory with a playing roster that includes the bulk of the Irish international squad.

Today’s Sports News in 90 Seconds – 17th June

Bulls head coach Jake White, who guided the Springboks to the 2007 World Cup title, made a big deal before and after this URC semi-final at Loftus Versfeld in emphasising that it was a club side against an international one.

What then awaits Andy Farrell’s Irish side when they arrive at this venue in less than three weeks to take on South Africa?

One of the causes of Leinster’s downfall this season is the huge number of players in the Irish squad. They sent a callow squad to South Africa last month after beating the Bulls 47-14 at home and paid the price when they went down 44-12 away to the Lions and 42-12 to the Stormers.

Those losses, followed later by defeat in Belfast to Ulster, cost Leinster home advantage in this semi-final.

While Cullen sent his strongest squad – 15 full internationals and six more on the bench – they had no experience of playing for Leinster in South Africa.

Indeed, only Andrew Porter and Joe McCarthy had played there before for Leinster, while for Irish hooker Dan Sheehan, this was his first game in South Africa.

That absence of experience of playing at altitude contributed to a lacklustre Leinster performance and the Bulls, having made light of the loss of Springbok wingers Kurt-Lee Arendse and Canan Moodie, weren’t long turning the screw to book a home final against Glasgow Warriors as the URC final takes place in South Africa for the third year in a row.

Leinster’s Irish players won’t have long to dwell on this one – indeed, they will surely relish a chance to respond in three weeks’ time back in Pretoria – but Cullen and the Leinster hierarchy face a difficult inquest.

“The club is hugely ambitious,” said Cullen after his side’s 25-20 loss. “You see the club here that we’re currently sitting in is no different when you look at the honours wall that they have here. That’s what we’re up against. We’ve lost in a final to Toulouse and we’ve lost in a semi-final away here to the Bulls.

“So, two clubs that are steeped in history and have winning cultures as well, and we want to be up there with them.

“For us now, it’s been a long season, so it’s rest and recover. A load of guys will be away on tour and be back here.

“Hopefully they will be better for the experience of being here this week and will pick up more experience by being here in a few weeks’ time as well – so, when they do come back to us, they have a greater understanding of how you go and navigate your way to try and get a more positive outcome than we got today.

​“We’re in two unbelievably tough competitions and we need to keep working at getting better. We’ve got some young players who have picked up experience this year and we need them to push through and be better. With some of the people who are coming in, both in terms of the backroom coaching-wise and the players as well that we’ve signed.”

The Bulls enjoyed 62pc possession in the opening half on Saturday and would have felt they should have been more than 10-7 in front at the end of a gruelling opening half.

Leinster hit the front after 24 minutes after Bulls winger Sergeal Petersen was binned for a deliberate knock-on as Jimmy O’Brien tried to put James Lowe over in the left corner.

Leinster went to the corner and a couple of recycles later, Lowe scored in the unguarded left corner after Byrne managed to get the ball to him with an unorthodox pass. Byrne landed a superb conversion to make it 7-0.

But it was the Bulls, despite being temporarily down a man, who dominated after that and they got back on level terms 10 minutes from the break.

Full-back Willie le Roux executed a good 50:22 and from that lineout they mounted several surges infield before Goosen timed his run to perfection to score by the posts before tapping over the simple conversion.

He added a penalty before the break to lead 10-7 and 90 seconds after the restart Petersen got in for the first of his tries.

The Leinster response was good and they got back in contention. Left with no option but to tap a penalty inside the home ’22, they executed the move well, initially through hooker Sheehan before Caelan Doris finished and Byrne cut the gap to three with the conversion.

Byrne levelled with a penalty, but it was the Bulls who upped their game in the final quarter.

The decisive moment came when Petersen outfielded Ciarán Frawley on a high ball down the right before cantering home. Leinster, despite stringing a 23-phase move at one stage, were unable to respond and bowed out.

“We will build and we’ll go again,” said Cullen. “The group showed a lot of resolve to come back from where they had been over the last couple of years, so it’s disappointing to be left with the same outcome, isn’t it, which is a one-score loss in a URC semi-final. It doesn’t get any closer than that.

“We just need to learn and when they get across the line, they will be able to kick on from there. We just need to work hard at trying to get across the line in the first place.”