Glasgow Warriors reaction: Dressing room tears shed as admission made over defeat to Leinster

Smith expressed pride in his side’s reign but they were ultimately outplayed by the hosts who won the semi-final 37-19 at the Aviva Stadium.

Leinster, who also knocked Glasgow out of the Champions Cup this season, thrashing them 52-0 in the quarter-finals, will now meet the Bulls in the final at Croke Park next weekend and there will be a new name added to the URC roll of honour. Neither side has won the trophy before.

Leinster, for all their brilliance, have lost in the semi-finals in each of the last three seasons but will be hot favourites to lift silverware for the first time since 2021 when they won the old Pro14 Championship.

Glasgow were overwhelmed in the first half, conceding four tries through Dan Sheehan (two), Jamie Osborne and Thomas Clarkson, with George Horne replying for the visitors. Osborne and Ciaran Frawley pressed home Leinster's superiority after the break before Jamie Dobie and Sione Tuipulotu scored late consolations for the Warriors.

“Tears were shed in the changing room, to be honest,” said Smith. “In the first 20 minutes, we just had no luck. We turned the ball over too many times and we made 70 tackles in the first quarter of the game, which is way too many and ended up going into the sheds at half-time 25-5 down. That means you’re chasing against a world-class team.

“You chase the scoreline and Leinster were very good. I was never in any doubt that they would be. I know the press asked a lot of questions around their mentality but I never had doubt. There are too many class A players. I sat here a month ago talking about the [Champions Cup] quarter-final and it's still a world-class team, nothing's changed. So, if we were going to lose the URC Championship title, I’d rather it was against them than anybody else.

“That said, we’re a proud team. I thought we gave it everything. I see this holistically, not just in terms of today's game. We defended our title bravely but today we fell short.”

Smith refused to use an extensive injury list as an excuse but there is no doubt Glasgow suffered in the absence of Zander and Matt Fagerson, Jack Dempsey, Huw Jones and Gregor Brown.

“I don't want to make excuses because I definitely felt the team that we named could have won the game,” said the Glasgow coach. “So, yes, it would have been good to have had some of those boys back, but I backed the team that we picked. I backed the depth and the growth of the club that we’ve seen, with more players becoming eligible for Scotland and putting their hands up to play at this level this whole season.”

“Leinster are ahead of everybody else,” he added. “They started this process way back when. I think I was still coaching Benetton and they were already on top of their game. With Joe Schmidt bringing in certain structures and certain expectations, they've got an unbelievable feeding source here from the schools and a huge academy.

“Their budget is different to ours. I'm not complaining here, that's not what I'm saying, but it is fact. So, yes, they are a way ahead of the rest of the URC teams [but] in the last three years we did well to start to close the gap.”