Jake White: 'There’s one thing Leinster taught me tonight'
Jake White, the Bulls’ Director of Rugby, said his side was not in pieces after their disappointing loss at the hands of Leinster in their United Rugby Championship clash at the RDS Arena in Dublin this past Friday.
Instead, he reminded all that his team was still second on the log with a host of big guns waiting for them in the next month.
“We are not in pieces,” White said emphatically.
“We are traveling back, we are second on the log, we played against a team that beats most teams nine out of ten times, I think nine and a half times out of ten times.
“We are not going to get down on ourselves. We didn’t win today and we’ve got to be humble about it.
“It’s not doom and gloom. This is a benchmark of where the clubs wants to be. It takes years and years of work.”
White said if one had to look at the history of Leinster, they are a club that built themselves up over time.
“What we do need is time. This hasn’t happened overnight for Leinster.
“Look at that bench, it reminds me of that Springbok bench when you just bring on more internationals, and not just any internationals, proper internationals.
“We are going to have to learn from that, I am not talking about rugby learning, also just learning as a club of how we can get to those heights.”
Asked what he thought the role of former Springbok coach Jacques Nienaber has been on quality of Leinster rugby, White said it was a very clever move of their head coach Leo Cullen to bring in someone with the inside knowledge of South African rugby.
“Leinster hasn’t gone from being average to now becoming the real deal overnight. I mean, they have been winning 95% of their games the last couple of years.
“All Jacques will do I’m sure is top up on that 95%. I just think it’s a very astute move by Leo [Cullen],to bring in a chap of the intricacies of what works for the Springboks,” White said.
“They haven’t won tournaments, but to be fair, there aren’t a lot of teams that can brag about beating Leinster over the last couple of seasons.”
White also refereed to the quality of Leinster’s replacements compared to the young guns of the Bulls.
“One of the things that do work is a bench of Malcolm Marx and those sort of guys, RG Snyman and you guys [Leinster] did it to us tonight.
“They were far more experienced than the group I could put on.
“It’s a very different team to the one we played last time, it’s two years older. And that’s why I say we need time.
“There’s one thing Leinster taught me tonight, and again reaffirmed, is the ability for them to go from defence into the attack, it was phenomenal.
“Every time we made a mistake they punished us.
“Every time they transitioned from a bad kick or a turn-over ball, they literally got away with points.”
White was adamant that his side will bounce back – they just had to learn from the mistakes and build on the experience of playing these big teams.
“We will be better.
“There’s a lot of learnings.
“It’s probably a good lesson for us to play Leinster before we play Lyon in a knock-out game because the next week, if we get through, we play the winner of Northampton and Munster.
“And that’s not going to be easy. And the following week we play Munster again in the URC.
“So literally the next month is not going to be any different to what we experienced today in terms of intensity, in terms of accuracy, in terms of pressure. So those are the lessons that we will have to put into our planning.”
Comments on RugbyPass
Geez plenty of time to come right before test season starts. Dont panic mr Mannering!!!!!
1 Go to commentsGreat read Nick. The Reds really have been great to watch this year, and the improvement of not only the players you mention, but the squad in general has been obvious. The Reds 10/12 play making axis is a nice counterpoint to the 10/15 partnership at the Brumbies and Rebels. If Schmidt was to pick say, Lolesio, Paisami and Wright / Kellaway, would this be too many play makers? I notice in a lot of those clips Tim Ryan playing across the field in support of Vunivalu. Is this a feature of Kiss’s structure?
2 Go to commentsSo sad, god rest him. Too young to be gone. RIP
2 Go to commentsRIP big man 🙏
2 Go to commentsThe GB coach. “Just because we don’t get together as much as other teams we don’t use that as an excuse for performances when we don’t hit the mark”. Why mention it at all then?
1 Go to commentsNo mention of the yellow card for Harlequins which really cost them.
3 Go to commentsThought you’d left us Nick. Good to have you back writing for us. So hunter ikitau works? I reckon wright kellaway as two of the back 3. Tim Ryan and Toole looking good for strike winger but I still want the power of korobeiti and figure our forwards still need him to help them out. Million dollar question is who plays 10? I’m thinking Noah for his kicking and combo with wright. Reckon the pair adds up to an attack and kellaway will help. Can you comment on Zac Lucas in Japan? How is he going?
2 Go to commentsMack Hansen, Ethan Roots, Taine Plumbtree, Louis Lynagh, Emmanuel Meafou? Which country do you want to pick your Barbarians from?
3 Go to commentsInstead of apologising, try to act like an adult, fcknut.
3 Go to commentsLooks like the Force twisted his leg…ahem arm
5 Go to commentsScotland should change their name to the Barbarians
3 Go to commentsThe game was already over leave the bloke alone ….from a Welsh fan 😀👍
3 Go to commentsShamefully the Toulouse players acted like footballers, falling down feigning injury at the slightest knock. About time refs penalised this play acting.
8 Go to commentsAnother non Scot for the anti Scot Townsend. Soon there will be no Scottish born and bred players in the National team.
3 Go to commentsGreat comeback to the playing field by Richie Mo’unga after the loss of his father. A great performance by Richie . I know him well and he is a great guy. On and off the field one of the greatest for the Crusaders. Scott Robertson would have loved him in his All Black’s side. A very missed player and person.
3 Go to commentsYeah nah he comes across as a funny bloke, but that stopped abruptly after the Nutcracker Prince debacle✋
3 Go to commentsAt this point I can’t watch him without thinking he’s a dirty slimebag. He should have been banned for the same amount of time that Quinn was out. It took Tupaea near on a fricking year to get fit enough to play again and his leg will never be the same. The other crap thing is that he was at ABs level and now he has to claw his way back there when he could have had several games under his belt.
5 Go to commentsThe Black Ferns 7’s have been without Captain Sarah Hirini now since Dec 23 in Dubai where she suffered a bad ACL injury - hopefully she is on the road to recovery for Madrid and Paris. Now also have Tyler King and Shiray kaka on the Injured List but the Team still found a way to win in Singapore and claim the overall Title.
1 Go to commentsUtter grub, hope he gets his leg broken. Shocking he is still playing after intentionally breaking quinn tupaeas knee
5 Go to commentsGreat to see NZ 7s teams finally coming into form and playing at the level that is expected of them.
2 Go to comments