Munster, here they come. After hitting Cardiff with a magnificent three-try opening salvo that put the result beyond all reasonable doubt with only 10 minutes gone, Leicester travel to Limerick with their hopes of qualifying for the last eight of the Heineken Cup still intact. Only Thomond Park, then.
Leicester's equation was simple - not just to win, but to win with a try-scoring bonus point. After the 21-19 defeat here against Munster in the opening game of their Heineken Cup campaign this season - the only occasion that Leicester have lost at home in a competitive match since January 2005 - the Tigers have effectively been playing catch-up ever since. A five-point haul yesterday against a Cardiff side with no hope of qualifying for the last eight would put the two-time European champions on 19 points in their pool, with the small matter of a match in Munster to come.
As far as qualification for the last eight is concerned, a tally of 20 pool points could be sufficient booty for the two best runners-up, though of course Leicester could still progress as group winners if they could beat Cardiff and then see off Munster. Given the fact, however, that Munster have won 31 successive Heineken Cup contests at their Limerick stronghold, Leicester's best chance was to bag four touchdowns or more against a Welsh side missing the suspended Martyn Williams and try to secure a bonus point in Ireland on Saturday.
Not that Pat Howard, the Leicester head coach, saw it that way. 'With the three Italian sides in other groups, I have always thought that five victories would be the minimum requirement to get through from our pool,' the affable Aussie said. 'I think we will have to win at Thomond Park. Mind you, when I played there for the only time - for Australia - we beat Munster 55-9.'
The manner in which Leicester started yesterday suggested that they might plunder 55 points by half time. After allowing Chris Czejak a 40-metre dash up the left flank in the opening 30 seconds, the Tigers were simply irresistible as they battered Cardiff into virtual submission with three tries in the opening 10 minutes. With Martin Corry driving powerfully off the back of the scrum and Ian Humphreys putting in a brace of booming kicks - not to mention some devastatingly powerful thrusts by Alesana Tuilagi and Daryl Gibson - the visiting side were not so much on the ropes as careering through them
And it was Tuilagi who scored the first try in just the third minute when he crashed over by the posts with a pair of Cardiff players hanging off him as if they were irritating mini-beasts, such was the brute strength of the Samoan. And only another 88 seconds had elapsed when Dan Hipkiss picked up a loose ball on the Leicester 10-metre line and showed a clean pair of heels to sprint 60 metres for the second touchdown after Lewis Moody had scragged Mike Phillips at the base of a ruck. With Gibson barging over for a third score after Tuilagi's initial thrust had just about been arrested, Leicester were 17-0 to the good and it was just a question of when the bonus-point try would arrive.
Such was Cardiff's predicament that Nicky Robinson, their stand-off, was forced to kick for the corner after only 16 minutes when the visiting side were awarded a penalty 35 metres out and just about bang in front of the posts. When Cardiff's backs did get the ball, they looked more than half-decent, but their only problem was that quality possession was a scarce commodity as Moody and Shane Jennings distracted the visiting pack to distraction at the breakdown.
If anything, Leicester were guilty of over-complicating matters in midfield, and it was a beautifully simplistic move that brought the all-important fourth try when Seru Rabeni took Humphreys' delightfully weighted inside pass on the burst and crashed over from 30 metres out. Game, set and match to the Tigers before the interval.
The second period was, perhaps not surprisingly, somewhat of an anti-climax, though Cardiff never threw in the towel and even had a couple of half-chances to cross the Leicester line. A full complement of replacements by both sides made for little fluency, but Moody and Corry rewarded the efforts of the Leicester pack by crossing for tries in the final quarter. Six and out, as far as Cardiff were concerned.
Welford Road 16,815
Leicester G Murphy; Rabeni, Hipkiss, Gibson (Smith 55, F Murphy 75), A Tuilagi; Humphreys (Vesty 44), Ellis; Ayerza (White 49), Chuter (Buckland 68), Castrogiovanni (Ayerza 66), Cullen (Kay 56), L Deacon, Jennings (Crane 70), Moody, Corry (capt)
Tries Tuilagi, Gibson, Hipkiss, Rabeni, Moody, Corry Cons Humphreys 2
Cardiff Blair; James (Luveitasau 69), J Robinson, Stcherbina (MacLeod 64), Czekaj; N Robinson, Phillips (Fairhurst 63); Jenkins, Goodfield (Williams 48), G Powell (Filise 66), Jones (Down 74), Morgan, White (A Powell 74), Shellard, Rush (capt)
Referee A Rolland (Ire)
