O'Brien expecting keenly contested match against the Bulls

Eadestown's Jimmy O’Brien anticipates that neither team will be lacking in motivation when Leinster take on the Bulls at Loftus Versfeld Stadium in the United Rugby Championship this Saturday (kick-off 5.30pm Irish time).

Back on June 14 in Croke Park, O’Brien was selected at full-back as Leinster ended a four-year search for a major piece of silverware by overcoming the South African outfit on a score of 32-7 in the 2024-25 URC Grand Final. A little under three months earlier, the Kildare native also donned the number 15 jersey when the eastern province took on the Bulls in a regular season league game in Pretoria.

The visitors had looked set to emerge on top when a Ross Byrne penalty had them in front approaching the end of normal time, but their southern hemisphere counterparts had other ideas. Courtesy of an 85th minute place-kick from David Kriel, the Bulls secured a 21-20 victory over Leo Cullen’s men in dramatic style.

“They’ll be highly motivated from that final I’d say. They’ll want to try and get one over on us after last year, but that was a pretty devastating loss [for Leinster] last year. I remember after it I was, probably not as bad as I was feeling after Friday night, but pretty close,” O’Brien remarked in a Leinster media call earlier this week.

“Because we put so much into that league game last year down here and to get pipped right at the end was pretty gut wrenching. There’s a lot of lads who are down here now who were involved in that game. We’re also trying to right a few wrongs from that game.

“They’re a very good attacking team. They’ve a load of good players. I’m not sure who is going to get released to be honest or who’ll be playing, but there’ll probably be a few Springboks playing. It’s going to be a tough battle. Loftus is always tough.” As O’Brien references above, Leinster are coming into this weekend’s game on the back of a chastening 35-0 defeat at the hands of the Stormers at DHL Stadium in Cape Town last Friday.

While Leinster were missing their British & Irish Lions contingent for their first competitive fixture of the new season, O’Brien was one of nine players who featured in the aforementioned URC showpiece triumph over the Bulls to see game time in Cape Town.

There was frustration and disappointment within their camp at not just the margin of defeat last Friday – and the failure to register a single point in the game – but also at the lacklustre performance delivered by the Irish province over the course of the contest.

Yet whereas the Leinster players would ordinarily be back on home soil in between games at any other point in the season, they are currently living amongst each other during their mini tour of South Africa. From O’Brien’s perspective, this has left them well placed to work on the negative aspects of their display against the Stormers and ultimately build towards a much better showing in Pretoria this Saturday.

“After the game, I don’t think anyone wanted even to go back to their room because they didn’t want to be by themselves. Even on Saturday when we had the day in Cape Town, everyone kind of got around each other and spent time together.

“Obviously that leads into talking about the game and talking about how you can fix it, which obviously wouldn’t have happened at home. We would have maybe gone back home and you would have been sitting by yourself, thinking what you did wrong.

“Thinking about everything and rewatching the game. Whereas we’re all together [out here]. So it kind of accelerated the process of getting through it and thinking of ideas of how we can fix it for this weekend.” Following a 2023-24 campaign that saw him missing several months of action with a neck injury, last season saw O’Brien amassing a healthy tally of 20 appearances – 19 of which were as a starter.

This included all three knockout games that Leinster played in the URC, as well as their four pool stage encounters in the Investec Champions Cup.

The versatile 28-year-old had been part of the Six Nations squad in the spring without seeing any game time, but with a number of those he contends with for a spot away on Lions duty in Australia, O’Brien picked up his ninth and 10th Ireland senior caps in comprehensive summer test victories against Georgia and Portugal respectively.

This helped to put him in a good place for the start of the new season and even though last Friday’s game in Cape Town didn’t go according to plan, O’Brien is focused on remaining fit and delivering the kind of performances that can lead to further provincial and international opportunities.

“The end of last season went alright for me. I got to play in the big games towards the end and then went on the summer tour and got two more caps. Which I was delighted about. Coming into this season, I just wanted to get back fit,” O’Brien added.

“Stay fit for the whole season hopefully, touch wood. Because that’s half the battle of rugby and trying to play well. Obviously didn’t start too great on Friday night, but hopefully this weekend I can play a bit better.”