Leinster hammer Ospreys to close gap on leaders Glasgow

Leinster are back up to second place in the BKT United Rugby Championship, as the race for the top seeds gets even tighter with two rounds to play.

After temporarily falling to fourth, following big wins for both the Bulls and Munster, Leo Cullen's side matched their five-pointers, with a 61-14 win over an Ospreys side that faded badly in the final quarter at the RDS.

The win wasn’t enough to climb back to the summit however, with the Glasgow Warriors’ two bonus-points, in spite of their defeat to the Bulls, keeping the Scottish side top, with just four points now separating the top four.

On a beautiful night for rugby at the RDS, Leinster won comfortably, but without ever really needing to hit top gear.

It looked like they were in for a stress-free night when tries for the returning Jimmy O’Brien and Ross Molony had them comfortably ahead inside 10 minutes, only for the Ospreys to hit them with two quick scores to level the game at 14-14.

The second of those was a penalty try, after Ciarán Frawley took out Luke Morgan in the air, which saw the Leinster full-back yellow-carded.

Indeed, the Ospreys looked threatening with Dan Edwards’ crossfield kicks, as they looked to beat the Jacques Nienaber blitz. Toulouse will have watched that tactic with interest.

While the Welsh side looked dangerous, Leinster got back in front when Jordan Larmour got over for the first of what would be three tries for the wing, while Jason Jenkins brought up the bonus-point just after the break.

Larmour’s second try of the night on 53 minutes broke the Ospreys, and the wing completed his hat-trick in the final 10 minutes, by which time the hosts had long sewn up their win, with Jamie Osborne, Charlie Ngatai and Tommy O’Brien also getting in the