Leinster head coach Leo Cullen says the attitude of his players was the most pleasing aspect of this evening's 42-10 win against Benetton in the BKT United Rugby Championship.
The province ran in six tries in total, four of which came from Player of the Match Dan Sheehan, as they made it maximum points to start their URC campaign.
Just like last week's scrappy win against Benetton, they ran out to an early three try lead, but showed no signs of of complacency, closing out the bonus-point win with three more second half scores.
In large part thanks to a dominant pack, three of Sheehan's four tries came from the back of a maul, and Cullen says it was the foundation they built their win on.
"I'm not sure I scored four tries in my whole career! He did it and was taken off with 30 to go," the head coach joked afterwards.
"Dan is dynamic, the forwards laid a good platform for him. Ronan [Kelleher] was good when he came on too, but the two lads are driving each other on."
And Cullen was also full of praise for new signing Jason Jenkins, who followed up last week's try-scoring debut with an excellent first home outing.
"Particularly in the tight play, the game style is different to what he's used to," he said of Jenkins.
"Lots of good moments in the close exchanges, hopefully Jason will kick on and go from strength to strength.
Cullen had nothing further to add on reports that his senior coach Stuart Lancaster has agreed a four-year contract to joining Racing 92 next summer, although with the Englishman expected to be on media duties early next week, an update could come in the coming days.
The province will need to raise their game further next week when they travelk to Belfast to face Ulster in their first Interpro of the campaign, and Cullen says elements of their game still need to be ironed out.
"There was lots of good intent, there's parts of our game which still needs work and attention and when you're working on combinations – we knew it would be tough against Benetton.
"Guys have had a decent start, but they’ll be excited about the trip to Belfast. We lost there last year, it’ll be a ding-dong battle."
James Ryan was withdrawn from the team earlier today after complaining of a tight hamstring, which Cullen says isn't serious, while Caelan Doris departed the game in the early minutes for a HIA. The province say he came through a first head injury assessment, but was kept on the sidelines as a precaution.
And there doesn't appear to be any major fears for Ciarán Frawley, after the out-half picked up a shoulder knock.
The 24-year-old is set to depart for South Africa with Emerging Ireland on Sunday, which Cullen doesn't expect to be impacted.
"He seems ok. He took a bang on the shoulder, but we'll see. We'll get him assessed. It was just before half, time, he was still a bit uncomfortable at the start of the second half, and with Ross there we just made a call."
