Saracens were beaten by the best side in Europe, according to director of rugby Mark McCall as his side crashed out at the quarter-final stage to Leinster.

The two-time winners were well beaten 30-19 by Leinster at the Aviva Stadium in Dublin, bringing to an end a glorious two years for the London-based club.

Leinster were top seeds at the conclusion of the pool stages and showed their class with a fine opening try in the first five minutes from Garry Ringrose.

The rest of the opening half was nip and tuck with Johnny Sexton and Owen Farrell exchanging penalties but two Leinster tries at the start of the second-half proving crucial.

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Man of the match Dan Leavy charged over first before James Lowe dotted down with Saracens’ only reply coming from loan signing Blair Cowan.

And McCall was quick to praise an incredible run in the European competition which has seen them lift the trophy twice in as many years.

“The team have been magnificent for two or three seasons now,” he said. “To have won it twice is such an achievement – it’s hard enough to get out of your pool these days.

“Credit to Leinster, they’ve been the best team in the competition this season so far and were deserved winners today.

“It’s hugely exciting for them, they have so many good young players coming through and real strength in depth, they played with ambition tonight but also defended so well

“They defended brilliantly and they hit us hard on the counter-attack. Their first try was a great try but I thought we responded to that pretty well.

“We spoke at half-time about how it was a really even game but we started the second half really poorly. They scored ten points, and we couldn’t catch them after that.

“It was a one-point game at half-time. In a game like this, to chase the game from 10-11 points behind, it’s very difficult against a defensive side as good as Leinster.”