Leinster still fine-tuning

Although still missing up to 19 players for one reason or another, Leinster welcome back Adam Magro, John McWeeney and Peter Smyth for their second pre-season warm-up game prior to the defence of their Celtic League title when welcoming London Irish to Dr Hickey Park in Greystones this evening.

Both camps were content to name sizeable squads as of yesterday and, if not quite on the same scale as Leinster, the English Cup winners will still be missing some frontline players because of the ongoing Irish training camp, namely Bob Casey, Justin Bishop and Kieron Dawson. But Barry Everitt is included against his former province, as is their new signing from South Africa, Pieter Rossouw.

Despite being beaten by an injury time try by Bristol in Longford last Saturday, Leinster will have extracted far more good than bad from that effort. Revelling in the opportunity, and mindful that there will be more to come tonight and in the Celtic League, a host of good individual performances threw down markers.

Ben Gissing, voracious for work, made some searing gallops and along with the likes of Niall Treston and Aidan McCullan typfied Leinster's hunger. Kieran Lewis gave a polished performance while Gary Browne was eager and full of running.

A couple of the replacements stood out, too. Most notably the display of former Irish schools openside Shane Jennings - unlikely to win a starting place just yet - was one of the high points of the game - and strong-running, hard-tackling centre Dave Quinlan added some real penetration when he came on.

Leinster's Baby Blues, as Matt Williams refers to them, are going to have grow up quick but these games will be invaluable for them.

Ulster coach Alan Solomons has made four changes to the side which beat Bedford last week for Friday's visit of Glasgow in Ulster's final warm-up game before the Celtic League. Sheldon Coulter comes in for Jan Cunningham at left wing while up front Robbie Kempson replaces Clem Boyd, Tony McWhirter is converted into a second-rower at the expense of Mark Blair and Warren Brosnihan plays at openside instead of Neil McMillen.

LEINSTER (from): P McKenna, S Keogh, G Browne, A Magro, K Lewis, C Warner, J McWeeney, A Dunne, B Willis, M Leek, D Quinlan, S Whelan; N Treston, P Coyle, D Blaney, G Hickie, P Smyth, J Lyne, E Bohan, B Gissing, A Kearney, D Sheehan, A McCullan, D Dillon, L Toland (capt), S Jennings.