Home comfort for Leinster

Leinster secured a home Heineken Cup quarter-final with an impressive 36-11 victory over Racing Metro in Paris.

The Irish side had already won Pool 2, but needed a fifth victory to guarantee a knockout tie in Dublin and they duly secured it thanks to five tries.

That took their tally in six pool games to 21 tries and on this form the 2009 champions look to have every chance of regaining their crown.

Leinster looked dangerous every time they had possession in the Metro half and five tries was probably the least they deserved.

Their lines of attack, support play and perhaps most crucially their patience all proved too much for a Racing side which had previously lost just once at home in the last 12 months.

Juan Martin Hernandez put Metro ahead with an early penalty but after the Argentinian failed to find touch with a penalty, Leinster pounced.

Pressure

After a spell of sustained pressure, Jonathan Sexton and Shane Horgan shipped the ball out wide and Isa Nacewa was in at the corner.

Hernandez missed a penalty on 13 minutes but from the re-start, Racing scored a try almost from nowhere, teenager Virimi Vakatawa collecting the drop-out and running through three tackles down the right touchline to score.

But that was the high point for the hosts. Moments later they tried to run out of their own 22, lost possession and Isaac Boss sent Sean O'Brien storming through by the posts.

O'Brien should have scored or set up a second try only to knock on five yards out, but it proved of no consequence as less than a minute later more brilliant handling put Sexton over.

An Hernandez penalty cut the deficit to 10 points at the break but a comeback never looked likely.

Sexton's penalty stretched the lead and just past the hour mark more clinical and patient build-up work saw Nacewa put Sexton in for his second try.

It only remained for birthday boy Brian O'Driscoll to get in on the act and he duly did 10 minutes from time, bursting through with a trademark darting run.