Leinster ease past Cardiff at home
Leading from start to finish, Leinster secured a good 23-6 victory over Cardiff at the RDS on Saturday night.
Irish flyhalf Jonny Sexton added 13 of his sides points from the kicking tee while wing Shane Horgan and replacement Simon Keogh dotted down in either half for the defending European Champions.
The Blues, struggling without a number of their first choice players, were never really in the match and could manage only two penalties to show for their efforts on the night.
Sexton started the scoring after seven minutes with a penalty before, 11 minutes in, Horgan got his name on the scoresheet with the province’s first try.
Blair responded with two penalties late in the half to take the score to 13-6 at the interval.
Sexton extended the lead back to ten points with his third penalty on 53 minutes but the killer blow came late in the game when Keogh crashed over for the hosts three minutes from time.
The Scorers
For Leinster
Tries: Horgan, Keogh
Pens: Sexton 3
Con: Sexton 2
For Cardiff
Pens: Blair
Yellow Cards: Jamie Heaslip (Leinster – 34 min), Gary Powell (Cardiff – 73 min)
The teams:
Leinster: 15 Isa Nacewa, 14 Shane Horgan, 13 Brian O’Driscoll, 12 Gordon D’Arcy, 11 Luke Fitzgerald, 10 Jonathan Sexton, 9 Eoin Reddan, 8 Jamie Heaslip, 7 Sean O’Brien, 6 Kevin McLaughlin, 5 Malcolm O’Kelly, 4 Leo Cullen (captain), 3 CJ van der Linde, 2 John Fogarty, 1 Cian Healy.
Replacements: 16 Bernard Jackman, 17 Mike Ross, 18 Nathan Hines, 19 Stephen Keogh, 20 Simon Keogh, 21 Shaun Berne, 22 Girvan Dempsey.
Cardiff Blues: 15 Ben Blair, 14 Richard Mustoe, 13 Gareth Thomas, 12 Gavin Evans, 11 Chris Czekaj, 10 Sam Norton Knight, 9 Richie Rees, 8 Xavier Rush, 7 Ben White, 6 Scott Morgan, 5 Paul Tito (captain), 4 Deiniol Jones, 3 Taufa’ao Filise, 2 Rhys Williams, 1 Darren Morris.
Replacements: 16 Rhys James, 17 Gary Powell, 18 James Down, 19 Josh Navidi, 20 Darren Allinson, 21 Ceri Sweeney, 22 Dafydd James.
Referee: James Jones (Wales)
Assistant referees: David Wilkinson (Ireland), Richard Kerr (Ireland)
TMO: Simon McDowell (Ireland)
