Rugby:Jonathan Sexton and Devin Toner are in contention for Leinster's visit to Murrayfield to face Edinburgh on Friday. Both trained with the squad in UCD last night where Joe Schmidt was spared any fresh injury concerns and a decision on their fitness will be made before the coach names his team on Thursday.
The game comes too early for captain Leo Cullen, after shoulder surgery, but the Leinster management hope he will be fit for selection “over the coming weeks”.
Ireland fullback Rob Kearney is in line to make his 100th appearance but it won’t count for much if the result isn’t right after a second defeat of the season away to Benetton Treviso last weekend.
Outhalf Ian Madigan acknowledged today there are things that need to be put right. “At the forefront of that would be our ball retention and we need to be more clinical at the breakdown,” he said. “Then in attack maybe we need to offer with our lines of running.
"There was definite disappointment in the dressing-room afterwards because it was the third game in a row that we have gone ahead and fell behind in the second half. That’s something that we have to address.”
Edinburgh has been an unhappy hunting ground for Leinster in the past and Madigan described them as a “very dogged side” with “one of the best place-kickers in the competition in Chris Paterson”.
“We know that we’re going to have to be very disciplined going over there. They’re none from three, and we have won just the once in three games, so both teams are going to look to win the game. So we’re expecting a close one on Friday."
Despite the slow start to the season, Madigan is enjoying things under the new coach.
“This season with a new coach in Joe (Schmidt), I really like the brand of rugby that he’s playing. It’s about trying to have the skills-set to be able to play that brand of rugby that he’s trying to bring in.
“Growing up when I was maybe 11 or 12 I would have seen Brian O’Driscoll or Gordon D’Arcy playing and I would have dreamt of playing alongside them. Now I have the opportunity to do that and it’s a dream come true. I wake up every morning feeling lucky and looking forward to going to training.”
Edinburgh have made three changes, one positional, to the side that lost at Ravenhill.
Argentine lock Esteban Lozada is restored to the secondrow alongside Scott MacLeod after recovering from a blow to the head sustained against Munster. Ross Rennie returns at openside flanker with captain Roddy Grant switching to number eight as Netani Talei has a dead leg from last weekend's game against Ulster.
Coach Rob Moffat says his side have to “approach the Leinster game with both determination and confidence. It's our job this weekend to re-establish winning form on our own patch. We've done some good things in periods during all our games so far but we've also done a few basic things poorly”.
Meanwhile, Ulster will have to wait to see new signing Ruan Pienaar in action after the South African was left out of the squad to face Connacht on Saturday, but Dan Tuohy and Paddy Wallace are named after returning from injury.
The Connacht squad has been extended to 26 to allow a number of players time to recover from knocks sustained in training and against the Glasgow Warriors last weekend.
After a long session yesterday several Connacht players sat out some or all of the squad training. Gavin Duffy (back), captain Frank Murphy (ankle), top try scorer Fionn Carr (foot), winger Tiernan O’Halloran (knee) and Jamie Hagan (back) all took precautionary measures ahead of the game.
Some good news on the injury front is that flanker Johnny O’Connor is back in harness training but as yet cannot take contact after a back injury.
Edinburgh (v Leinster):C Paterson; M Robertson, B Cairns, A Grove, T Visser; P Godman, M Blair; A Jacobsen, R Ford, G Cross; E Lozada, S MacLeod; S Newlands, R Grant (capt), R Rennie. Replacements:A Kelly, K Traynor, J Gilding, C Hamilton, A MacDonald or David Denton, G Laidlaw, D Blair, J Houston
Ulster squad
Forwards:Tom Court, Paddy McAllister, Bryan Young, Chris Henry, Rory Best, BJ Botha, Andi Kyriacou, Tim Barker, Johann Muller, Ryan Caldwell, Willie Faloon, Nigel Brady, Robbie Diack, Stephen Ferris, Pedrie Wannenburg, Dan Tuohy
Backs:Adam D'Arcy, David McIlwaine, Andrew Trimble, Paul Marshall, Ian Porter, Paul Emerick, Jamie Smith, Darren Cave, Ian Witten, Paddy Wallace, Ian Humphreys, Niall O'Connor
Connacht squad
Forwards:R Loughney, B Wilkinson, S Cronin, A Flavin, R Sweeney, J Hagan, A Browne, D Nolan, M Swift, B Upton, M McCarthy, R Ofisa, M McComish, S Conneely.
Backs:C Willis, F Murphy, M Nikora, I Keatley, F Carr, K Matthews, N Taauso, T OHalloran, A Wynne, T Nathan, G Duffy, D Fanning.