Danny Care: Harlequins nine hails Leinster and Jamison Gibson-Park after Champions Cup showing

The Irish provincial side built an insurmountable lead before the interval in the Champions Cup quarter-final partially thanks to Gibson-Park‘s decisive play at the breakdown against the English league leaders.

As a result of this, the Ireland regular drew praise from fellow high-tempo scrum-half Care, who also beat Leicester with Quins, albeit by a much slimmer margin in the Premiership.

Alongside Leicester wing Chris Ashton on the BBC’s Rugby Union Weekly podcast, Harlequins’ top try scorer was full of compliments for Leinster, Gibson-Park and the first-class service he receives from his forwards.

“What I love about Gibson-Park is just the tempo that he brings,” offered Care, regarding the high-pace rugby that the scrum-half plays.

“Leinster for me are the best team in this competition.

“Technically they are the best team, their attacking breakdown – and I am a bit of a nause at the breakdown now in terms of attack because to get quick ball as a nine who wants to run your attacking breakdown has to be spot on.

“If you want to see how to carry a ball and clean a ruck out and promote the ball quickly to a nine, watch that Leinster performance against Leicester. This sounds like a simple thing but their ball carriers run so hard into the contact. You would say, ‘Well, everybody should run hard’ but there is a difference between running hard and running to bust. Leinster run to bust every single time and then their two support players are there with them in a millisecond, with a split second of the ball carrier being there and they just blitz that breakdown.

“So for a Leicester defender, the defence coach will say at times make the ruck slower but you can’t because they are so efficient. They are in there so quickly that