Cooke set to replace Ravenhill

The Interprovincial Championship match on September 3rd between Ulster and Munster, the two sides who hauled in maximum points from last Saturday's opening games, is likely be moved to the grounds of junior club Cooke, who are providing a temporary home for Instonians.

This situation follows the application of an excessively strong solution of weed-killer which turned the Ravenhill pitch yellow, and obliged the contractors to re-seed the pitch.

"A decision will be made next Monday," according to the Ulster Branch chief executive Michael Reid, "after a second assessment by the ground consultants.

"We have two options, either to move the game to another ground in Ulster, or seek to have the match switched to Cork."

However, although no formal contact has yet been made between the Ulster Branch and the IRFU, it is believed that Munster would be very reluctant to have the game switched, and therefore concede home advantage for the return fixture on October 29th.

According to Reid, the alternative venues for the Munster game on September 3rd within Belfast would be Cooke or the Civil Service grounds, both of which have adequate parking and road access, with the former a more likely choice. "Cooke had 6,500 people there for the opening of their ground four and a half years ago," explained Reid, "with 3,500 accommodated in temporary stands."

To move the fixture there would entail the additional cost of acquiring the temporary seating for 3,000 spectators a fortnight earlier than planned and then transferring the seating to Ravenhill for the Ulster v Irish Selection game on September 17th. Reid remains confident that "barring something freakish and given normal August and September weather," this scheduled World Cup warm-up will go ahead at the venue.

The main concern, however, for the IRFU is that the World Cup fixture at Ravenhill between Australia and Romania is not endangered, given the potential loss of revenue entailed.

Prop Richard Harry was recalled as Wallaby coach Rod Macqueen yesterday made sweeping changes to his pack for Saturday's Tri-Nations Test against South Africa in Cape Town.

Macqueen axed the entire front row after they were hammered in the scrum by the All Blacks last month, with New South Wales team-mates Harry, Phil Kearns and Andrew Blades replacing Patricio Noriega, Jeremy Paul and Glenn Panoho. A veteran of 23 Tests, Harry has not played for the Wallabies since the World Cup qualifying match against Fiji last year.

Tom Bowman has been restored to the second row in place of John Welborn and Toutai Kefu regains the starting number eight spot from former Springbok Tiaan Strauss.

Australia: M Burke; B Tune, D Herbert, N Grey, J Roff; T Horan, G Gregan; A Blades, P Kearns, R Harry, D Giffin, T Bowman; T Kefu, D Wilson (capt), M Cockbain; Replacements: J Little, R Kafer, C Whitaker, T Strauss, M Connors, P Noriega, J Paul.