Leinster blow Connacht away at the Aviva Stadium to reach Champions Cup quarters

Leinster blew Connacht away with a 56-20 win at the Aviva Stadium – winning 82-41 on aggregate – to set up a likely Heineken Champions Cup quarter-final trip to Leicester Tigers.

James Lowe helped himself to four tries and Robbie Henshaw bagged a brace, leaving Leo Cullen’s men to await the winners of the Leicester-Clermont Auvergne tie.

Jamison Gibson-Park, who had his citing for a high tackle from the first leg dismissed, started the try-scoring as Leinster ruthlessly opened up a 28-3 half-time lead.

Connacht captain Jack Carty’s early penalty was cancelled out by converted scores from Gibson-Park, Henshaw, Tadhg Furlong and Lowe, the latter one coming after Bundee Aki’s sin-binning.

The blue hordes in a 32,604-strong crowd had a Good Friday to remember, with Henshaw and Lowe, the Heineken star-of-the-match, crisply adding to their tallies.

Despite a Jack Aungier yellow card, a gallant Connacht salvaged some pride with second-half tries from Tiernan O’Halloran, Sam Arnold and Abraham Papali’i.

The visitors immediately ate into their five-point deficit from last week’s game. Cian Prendergast was quickest to the breakdown and Carty knocked over the penalty.

The Connacht fly-half frustratingly pulled a penalty wide soon after, and Leinster duly thundered clear in the 10th minute.

Henshaw and Josh Murphy led a slick surge down the right wing, linking inside with Lowe who fed Gibson-Park to go over untouched. Captain Jonathan Sexton converted from the right.

Henshaw shrugged off his Ireland team-mate Aki to crash over in the 17th minute, and tighthead Furlong drove over 10 minutes later to make it three converted tries.

Aki’s subsequent yellow card for a high tackle on Sexton was also punished in clinical fashion. Sexton’s