Jacques Nienaber claims his future at Leinster has been put in doubt because media criticism has turned supporter sentiment against him.The South African has one year remaining on the contract he signed to join the province in November 2023.However, Nienaber has come under fire since Leinster suffered their third Champions Cup heartbreak in as many seasons with their defeat to Bordeaux Bègles last month, despite adopting the blitz defence system which helped the Springboks achieve back-to-back World Cup successes.Leinster are out to retain their URC title, hosting the Stormers in Saturday’s semi-final at the Aviva Stadium, but head coach Leo Cullen has already said everything is up for review at the end of the season.Speaking on Monday, Nienaber said he would have no issue ditching the blitz defence system if it benefited the team.“I will always serve the club,” he said, noting he coached a drift defence during his time with the Stormers. “The moment you are not serving the club, your ego is done.“You must make a decision, are you going to move away from something that is your strength and adapt to something that you’re not comfortable with, to be something or someone else?“You must believe in one (system), the team must believe in one. If the players don’t believe in that any more and we have to do a drift defence, it’s ‘can I coach them the best drift defence in the world to make them win?’ If the answer is no, then s**t, I’m not the right guy.“If the answer is ‘yes, I can do it’ ... that’s the thing, can you be the best value for the club? It’s always the club first. I’m not looking for supporters.”Asked whether he expects to remain with Leinster next season, the 53-year-old said: “Let me put it this way, do you know who fires you? The public, the media, they fire you.“Not the (Leinster Rugby) CEO, Shane (Nolan) – he doesn’t fire me. But you guys (the media) fire all coaches because the pressure builds up and builds up. The fan then builds the pressure on them and then they just say, ‘Listen lads, I think we must part ways’.“Your question is, am I going to be here? I hope so. Currently I’m not sure, to be honest, because people don’t value me here. They don’t.”Asked whether Cullen values his contribution, Nienaber suggested that was not the decisive factor.“The moment you lose the changingroom or the club’s fan-base, you’ve got to go,” he said. “You could just hang there and take your cheque, but no. They don’t want you there.”However, Nienaber said he does not believe he has lost the dressingroom. “I say I can only fight through results, can’t I? I’m asking, am I that s**t?”He also defended the province’s approach during the defeat to Bordeaux, rejecting arguments that the blitz defence system drains energy and has blunted Leinster’s attack.“If you have to defend for 40 phases, that takes a lot of energy,” he said. “But when we defended against Bordeaux, in the five tries they scored, how many rucks do you think they had to put up to score five tries in total? Fourteen. They didn’t have continuity.“Our defence complements our attack because we don’t have to defend for long passages, so we can actually utilise our energy in attack.“People see line speed as ‘you spend lots of energy’, but we normally don’t spend it for long periods of time. So, you put in intent, yes, when you have a set. But I don’t think the sets are long.”A senior coach by title, although he has described his role in various ways, Nienaber said he was responsible only for defence following last season’s Champions Cup semi-final defeat to Northampton. In an interview with SuperSport last November he said he ran Leinster’s rugby programme, but his explanation now is that he co-ordinates the overall programme, rather than dictating technical detail.“My baby is just on the allocated time that we have for meetings and what is happening on the pitch. I must make sure that aligns,” he said.“The meeting content must speak to the rugby content, and that must speak to the overall plan or strategy so that if we want to beat this team, this is what the time has to go into.“That is running a rugby programme. I don’t tell Tyler (Bleyendaal) how to attack, or Muckers (Robin McBryde) how to maul or win a lineout.“I don’t say, ‘listen, we’re not allowed to kick the ball, or we can’t put exit pressure on the opposition’. That’s not my job.”