Wallace gets the nod for Italian job

Rugby:Ireland internationals Paddy Wallace, Tom Court and Chris Henry will make their first starts of the season when Ulster face Aironi in Viadana tomorrow evening. Brian McLaughlin makes five changes in total from the side that saw off the Ospreys last Friday.

Nigel Brady and Robbie Diack also come into the pack, at hooker and number eight respectively, while Wallace’s inclusion at inside centre is the only change in the backs.

In Connacht, Mike McComish will start in the back row instead of the injured Ezra Taylor. Talyor is still waiting to learn how serious the knee injury he sustained last week is but the 27-year-old Australian is expected to be out for a number of weeks.

Apart from the addition of McComish, Elwood keeps faith with the side that doused the Dragons’ fire last week although up-and-coming academy star Shane Conneely is named on the bench.

Elsewhere, Cardiff coach Dai Young has named his side to take on Leinster at the RDS tomorrow.

Gethin Jenkins, Ben Blair and Leigh Halfpenny have been ruled out through injury but New Zealand’s Michael Paterson will make his competitive debut for the Welsh franchise while Tom Davies, Deiniol Jones and Sam Warburton are all named in the starting XV.

Cardiff arrive in Dublin on the back of a nine-match winning streak – including the scalps on Ulster and Munster – but have beaten Leinster since 2004.

“We want to win every game. But anyone who starts to write the likes of Leinster off are foolish. You only have to look at the quality of Leinster’s squad to see how dangerous they are,” Young said during the week.

“Yes, they lost to Glasgow last week, but there are a lot of sides who will go to Glasgow and lose anyway, so that’s nothing to be ashamed of.”

Ulster(v Aironi): A D'Arcy; T Seymour, D Cave, P Wallace, D McIlwaine; N O'Connor, P Marshall; T Court, N Brady, D Fitzpatrick; J Muller, T Barker; P Wannenburg, C Henry, R Diack. Replacements:A Kyriacou, B Young, P McAllister, R Caldwell, W Faloon, I Porter, I Whitten, J Smith.

Connacht(v Scarlets): G Duffy; T Nathan, N Ta'auso, K Matthews, F Carr; I Keatley, F Murphy; 1 B Wilkinson, S Cronin, J Hagan; M Swift, B Upton; M McCarthy, R Ofisa, M McComish. Replacements:A Flavin, R Loughney, R Sweeney, D Nolan, S Conneely, C Willis, M Nikora, T O'Halloran.

Cardiff(v Leinster): C Czekaj; R Mustoe, C Laulala, D Hewitt, T James; D Parks, R Rees; T Davies, T Thomas, S Andrews; B Davies, D Jones; M Paterson, S Warburton, X Rush. Replacements:R Williams, J Yapp, F Filise, J Down, B White, L Williams, C Sweeney, G Evans.