The Irish provinces are once again the teams to beat in this season's Heineken Cup, according to Bath prop David Flatman Independent on Sunday.
This afternoon we at Bath take on mighty Leinster, the reigning Heineken Cup champions. The truth is that we have not quite hit our straps over the past few weeks so, despite being on our own patch, we go into the game as underdogs. Certainly I would expect the bookmakers to offer us relatively slim odds.
Such is the recent Irish dominance in European competition, these odds would be similar even if we were on top form. Leinster and Munster have become the new European rugby superpowers.
The reason the French teams did well was – and is – often put down to cash alone, and there is some mileage in this most basic theory. Their budgets are enormous and, consequently, their squads are flooded with high-end international players. One goes off, another comes on. This is tough to beat.
But the Irish provinces seem to thrive for different reasons and this, I think, is because they are set up to peak for the Heineken Cup. The Pro12 is a good competition littered with top-class players, but many of them don't play that often.
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