Team News: Leinster make one change

Leinster

Matt Williams has made one change to the Leinster side which beat Northampton last Saturday for tomorrow night's rematch at Donnybrook, with Eric Miller starting on the blindside of the back row in place of Trevor Brennan. But Williams stressed that this had nothing to do with the latter's second sinbinning of the campaign.

Indeed, Williams absolved Brennan of all blame for both incidents, maintaining that the flanker was harshly treated, and he claimed Brennan was being slightly victimised.

"The referees have a difficult job and there's been some inconsistency with the sin-binning. It's an area that the ERC need to work on in conjunction with the IRB, to give referees clearer guidelines," Williams said.

"Trevor is a guy who people automatically think has two horns and carries a rod. He's a great team man and he played his heart out last week, but certainly people judge him badly because of that (perception) and I felt very sorry for him, because he had a very positive game for us.

"Without doubt Trevor's reputation precedes him. He's uncompromising and he's tough, players love to play with him, he's inspirational, he's passionate and he's a great guy to coach. I'm not suggesting he's a saint by any stretch of the imagination, but his form as a rugby player is a lot higher than he's regarded."

Brennan's demotion to the replacements' bench is in part due to injury, as he has a badly bruised leg which has curtailed his involvement in training this week.

But Leinster's options with regard to back-five cover on the bench are limited by the non-availability through injury of Declan O'Brien, Ross Doyle and Rory Sheriff. With Kevin Putt still sidelined, it is the same 22 which did duty in Franklin's Gardens.

Ticket sales for the game have been unprecedented and stand tickets for the game have already been sold out, while remaining terrace tickets are available from the Leinster Branch.

"We're really proud of the support we've had away, and of the 3-4,000 faithful who come to Donnybrook, which is fantastic for the guys," said Williams.

"We're really proud of our jersey and we want a big crowd on Friday night to cheer us against an English side, and every Irish rugby supporter to be behind us, because they deserve it."

Leinster (v Northampton): G Dempsey; D Hickie, B O'Driscoll, S Horgan, G D'Arcy; E Hekenui, B O'Meara; R Corrigan, S Byrne, E Byrne, B Casey, M O'Kelly, E Miller, V Costello, L Toland (capt). Replacements - S Keogh, M McHugh, P McKenna, L Cullen, T Brennan, G Halpin, P Smyth.

Leinster Under-21 (v Ulster under-21s): F Baynes (Greystones); J Norton (UCD), K Lewis (Dublin Univ), G Brown (Blackrock College), A Cahill (Blackrock College); B Lynn (UCD), B O'Riordan (UCD); S Brophy (Dublin Univ), G Hickie (St Mary's College), N Treston (Blackrock College), P McCarthy (UCD), N Breslin (UCD), L Bourke (UCD), D Dillon (UCD), T Carter (UCD). Replacements - C McPhillips (St Mary's College), P Noble (Clontarf), P Drew (Blackrock College), G Cleary (Greystones), J Montgomery (UCD), E Gormley (St Mary's College), I Wallace (Old Wesley).

Munster

Predictably, Munster have announced an unchanged starting line-up, and indeed the same 22, for Saturday's return meeting with Bath at the Recreation Ground, which is an 8,200 sell-out and will be shown live by RTE and BBC.

Declan Kidney, who maintains that winning this game would exceed anything Munster have done to date, yesterday warned of a backlash from the English outfit. "This is a must-win situation for them, they know they must win."

The Munster captain, Mick Galwey, also effectively admitted that his team were a little flattered by last Saturday's 31-9 final scoreline.

"They're a good side, make no mistake about that. We got the breaks in the end but up to then there was nothing in it. When Jon Preston kicked the penalty (to make it 14-9) we knew we had to raise our game and the way the crowd got behind us was just fantastic. "Now we won't have that support on Saturday and we will probably have to deal with the sort of experience they (Bath) went through."

The Munster Under-21 side for the game against the Exiles in Sunbury on Sunday, where a win would set up a possible under-21 championship decider with Ulster two weeks later, is unchanged.

Munster (v Bath): D Crotty; J Kelly, M Mullins, J Holland, A Horgan; R O'Gara, P Stringer; P Clohessy, F Sheahan, J Hayes, M Galwey (capt), J Langford, A Quinlan, A Foley, D Wallace. Replacements - M Horan, J Blaney, M O'Driscoll, C McMahon, T Tierney, J Staunton, K Keane.

Munster Under-21 (v Exiles, at Sunbury, Sunday): D O'Riordan (Midleton); K Barry (Midleton), C O'Sullivan (UCC), M Lawlor (Shannon, capt), R Desmond (UL Bohemians); D Delaney (Shannon), P McCarthy (Dolphin); S O'Neill (UL Bohemians), C Tucker (Shannon), R Flanagan (Bruff), P Griffin (Garryowen), T hayes (Shannon), P Malone (Bruff), A Hickey (Dolphin), C Hartigan (Garryowen).

Ulster

Ulster have made just one change to the side which contrived last Sunday's remarkable 35-all draw away to Toulouse for tomorrow's return fixture with the inaugural winners. Clem Boyd, obliged to withdraw from several interprovincial outings at the start of the campaign due to a nagging back problem, will start with Simon Best moving to the replacements' bench.

The game, which has been moved forward to 7.15 and will be televised live by BBC Northern Ireland, is already a sell-out.

Ulster (v Toulouse): G Henderson; J Topping, R Constable, J Bell, T Howe; D Humphreys (capt), B Free; J Fitzpatrick, R Weir, C Boyd, M Blair, G Longwell, R Nelson, T McWhirter, A Ward. Replacements (from): S Bell, N Doak, N Malone, S Stewart, S Best, P Shields, P Johns, A Kearney, D Topping.

Ireland Under-21s

A 38-man panel has been chosen to represent the Irish Under-21s for two games against their French counterparts on Friday week, November 3rd, at Stade Pershing, Choisy-le-Roi, Paris. The first match will kick-off at 6.0 p.m., with the second game taking place at 7.30 p.m. The panel will be added to following this weekend's fixtures.

Irish Under-21 (Squad): Backs - C Atkinson (Armagh), K Barry (Midleton), G Brown (Blackrock College), G Duffy (Galwegians), M Lawlor (Shannon), K Lewis (Dublin Univ), B Lynn (Greystones), A Maxwell (Ballymena), P McCarthy (Dolphin), C McNaughton (Greystones), M McPhail (UL Bohemians), J Norton (UCD), B O'Riordan (UCD), B O'Driscoll (Imperial Medics London), D O'Riordan (Midleton), E Reddan (Old Crescent), F Baynes (Greystones). Forwards - H Bourke (Old Belvedere), N Breslin (UCD), D Browne (Galwegians), A Conboy (Corinthians), D Dillon (UCD), R Flanagan (Bruff), C Hartigan (Garryowen), T Hayes (Shannon), A Hickie (Dolphin), G Hickie (St Mary's College), A Maher (Dublin Univ), P Malone (Bruff), M McCullough (Dublin Univ), T Morton (Newcastle Falcons), J Murphy (UWIC), J O'Connor (Galwegians), G Power (Bridgend), C Prime (Banbridge), N Treston (Blackrock College), C Tucker (Shannon), B Young (Ballymena).

Northampton

True to his word, the Northampton coach, John Steele, has selected a near full-strength side for tomorrow night's game despite the European Cup champions effectively being knocked out of this year's competition after losing their first three games.

Thus while Pat Lam has been rested, hardly surprising given he has been running on empty after deferring the operation on his long-term shoulder problem which now threatens to curtail his farewell season, the fit-again and classy Welsh centre Allan Bateman has been recalled, with Italian Luca Martin switching to the wing and Simon Webster dropping to the bench.

Northampton (v Leinster): I Vass; L Martin, A Bateman, M Allen, B Cohen; A Hepher, M Dawson; G Pagel, S Thompson, M Stewart, J Phillips, O Brouzet, R Hunter, G Seely, B Poutney. Replacements (from): S Brotherstone, A Newman, D Richmond, D Malone, M Tucker, S Webster, T Kirk, J Bramhall.