On Saturday at 3.40pm, Leinster face a make-or-break game against familiar foe Clermont-Auvergne. In the reverse of last Sunday’s fixture, a hard-fought 15-12 loss to the French side, Leinster know they must both win and stop Clermont getting a bonus point to stand any chance of getting through the group stages.

Heineken Cup Group 5 Standings

1. Clermont 14

2. Leinster 9

3. Exeter 5

4. Scarlets 2

With one try scored from Leinster’s three games thus far in the competition, talk of a four try bonus point win against Clermont is probably fanciful and should probably be reserved for the games against Scarlets and the Chiefs, at best. Instead the bottom line should be about getting the win in the first place.

Clermont have made two changes from last Sunday with Raphael Chaume and Julien Bardy, both of whom appeared as substitutes at the Stade Marcel-Michelin, coming in for Vincent Debaty and Alexandre Lapandry who drop to the bench. Brock James is included in the named team at fly half but is listed as uncertain; if he can’t start then David Skrela will be promoted with Australian-born All Black Benson Stanley taking his place among the replacements.

Some of the numbers from last week’s match in Clermont-Ferrand are very interesting. In the fortress that is Stade Marcel-Michelin, Leinster had 58% of the possession and 62% of territory. This is in marked contrast to Leinster’s first two games in the group, where they had less possession than both Exeter and Scarlets.

On Sunday Leinster’s handling was superb on what was a very poor pitch, keeping possession through phase after phase of rucking. They forced Clermont to make 131 tackles to Leinster’s 90, however, Leinster themselves missed over twice as many tackles as Clermont; 15 to 7.

At this level a tackle rate of 86% is poor; it is also almost identical to the rate at which tackles were missed against the somewhat inferior Zebre the week beforehand. That 86% also includes the staggering twelve tackles that Fergus McFadden put in from his position on the right wing, missing none in the process.

One thing in common between the teams picked for the Zebre and Clermont matches is the absence of Shane Jennings. The Mary’s man has at times this season has put in tackling numbers that have bordered on the obscene. While Kevin McLoughlin is no slouch himself in that department, the amount of time Jennings finds himself in the tackle zone, either as tackler or as third man in competing at the breakdown, is consistently enormous.

All of that time that Jennings spends making life a misery for his opponents has two effects: firstly it slows the opposition ball down and secondly it frees up his fellow forwards to concentrate on carrying ball rather than rummaging for it. All that goes to say that the reintroduction of Jennings to the team for tomorrow’s match certainly has potential to have a very positive impact.

Apart from Jennings, Joe Schmidt has made three other changes to the starting lineup. Eoin Reddan, predictably, is named at scrum half on what should be better conditions than the players “enjoyed” last weekend. Richardt Strauss will hope that his Clermont throwing blues will have been an unfortunate off day as he packs down beside Heinke van der Merwe in the front row while Kevin McLoughlin is the man to lose out for Jennings with Sean O’Brien moving across to take the number six jersey.

Boss, McLoughlin, Sean Cronin and Cian Healy are all named among the Leinster replacements, as is David Kearney who has recovered from a muscle strain.

One area of concern for Joe Schmidt must be the lack of raw yardage made with ball in hand and, on the other hand, the ground that Clermont were able to make in the same vein.

Yards carried is a useful stat, the basic principle being that if one advances with a ball far enough then, barring turnovers, one will eventually cross a tryline or two during a game. When they had possession, Clermont’s running on Sunday was extremely effective as, even though they had only 82 runs to Leinster’s 109, the French side turned that into 406 metres run with the ball as opposed to Leinster’s 274 metres.

Clermont beat 14 Leinster defenders last Sunday alone. In contrast, over their last two Heineken Cup matches Leinster players have beaten a total of 13 players with ball in hand. Take out the early break by Ian Madigan and Leinster spent the rest of Sunday’s match rucking, rucking, rucking but without any real penetration. They only managed three offloads in the entire 80 minutes. While that’s the sort of stuff that keeps you in a game against a feared opponent on their home turf; it’s not the sort of stuff that gets four tries a game.

On the positive side, Leinster only committed 9 turnovers to Clermont’s 15 and that sort of disparity must be looked for again if they are to get the result they need to keep their hopes alive of successfully defending the Heineken Cup for a second time.

Leinster: Ian Madigan; Fergus McFadden, Gordon D’Arcy, Andrew Goodman, Isa Nacewa; Jonathan Sexton, Eoin Reddan; Heinke van der Merwe, Richardt Strauss, Mike Ross; Leo Cullen (c), Damian Browne; Sean O’Brien, Shane Jennings, Jamie Heaslip.

Replacements: Sean Cronin, Cian Healy, Michael Bent, Devin Toner, Kevin McLaughlin, Isaac Boss, Andrew Conway, David Kearney.

Clermont: Byrne; Sivivatu, Rougerie (c), Fofana, Nalaga; James (or Skrela), Parra; Chaume, Kayser, Zirakashvili; Cudmore, Hines; Bonnaire, Bardy, Chouly.

Replacements: Paulo, Debaty, Kotze, Jacquet, Lapandry, Radosavljevic, Skrela (or Stanley), King.

This piece was published at Balls.ie: http://www.balls.ie/rugby/rugby-nerds-preview-another-epic-weekend-of-heineken-cup-rugby/#sthash.52XwmYRF.dpbs