St Mary's there to be shot at

There is a downside to having so many internationals in your team. With their host of provincial players and internationals, St Mary's have rarely come together this season and, furthermore, are up there to be shot at when they come down to AIB League level. Not that Terenure need any excuse anyway.

Ever since the first division programme was mapped out, Terenure have been eyeing today's encounter at Lakelands Park and the high profile achievements of Conor McGuinness, Kevin Nowlan, Dennis Hickie, John McWeeney and Victor Costello will only have motivated them further.

It just so happens that many of those players' rivals for representative recognition come from their Dublin 6W neighbours. Today's derby is littered with individual contests of significance.

Ciaran Clarke was replaced as Leinster full-back by Nowlan and look what has happened since. David Coleman is another prolific try-scorer at this level who was understudy to McWeeney for much of Leinster's campaign. With one eye on Kurt McQuilkin's number 12 jersey next season, it will be intriguing to see how the emerging talents of Terenure's Mick Smyth and Gareth Gannon of St Mary's square up. To which can be added the contests of Derek Hegarty v McGuinness and Peter Bruce v Emmet Byrne.

Up front, Terenure look a stronger outfit than last season when, it should be remembered, they beat St Maary's en route to finishing above them in the final table. Indeed, St Mary's haven't beat their local rivals for seven years, although that won't count for much this afternoon. As befits a local rivalry - albeit a friendly enough one - this is a one-off and it should be quite a game.