Rugby Celtic League:Yesterday Leinster coach, Michael Cheika, was his usual explanatory self. His view was that if Leinster are to beat Cardiff in the Arms Park on Friday night to win the Magners Celtic League title, the team must buck the competition trend of sides generally losing games away from home.

The reality is that Leinster must probably buck two trends. Winning away is the first, but to do that they have to play without errors mounting in the very part of their game that is seen as one of their great strengths - handling.

Against Border Reivers, Leinster overwhelmingly won the match but could have done so with greater ease had passes not gone to ground or in front of supporting players.

While few doubt the team has the potential to beat Cardiff, whether they bring that full capacity into the game is open to question.

Leinster travel to Wales with the same body of players that defeated Border Reivers 31-0 last weekend.

While winger and centre, Shane Horgan, didn't train over the last few days, he is expected, as Cheika said, " to be back on the deck today."

Regardless of last night's win for the Ospreys against the Dragons (Leinster must beat Cardiff by a bonus point to be sure of the title) Cheika is aware of the fine-tuning that needs to be carried out.

"We have made mistakes. It's stopped our fluidity. We have shown some really good things and punctuated that with some mistakes, and mainly in handling," said the coach.

"That's not really a trademark of ours because we're usually good handlers of the ball.

"It means we're going through a bit of a patch where we have to be disciplined and find that form again.

"We're still being competitive but we could be finishing games and winning games better if we were not making handling mistakes. If you go back to the Ospreys game, early in the game we made a few good breaks but threw the ball away three times.

"As the matches become more important, not making mistakes and dealing with your opportunities is vital."

Winning away from home is probably the biggest issue and although Leinster won in the Arms Park when they last played there over two years ago, there is a shocking rate of defeat when teams leave their home ground.

But in this instance the match has more of a cup final feel than the end of a long road, which may just energise the Irish side.

"It's a hugely competitive league," said Cheika, explaining the poor away records in the league. "If you look at the 11 teams, seven of them have had either 11 or 12 wins. That's the bonus point system becoming extremely important.

"Now, we lost on a bonus point last year. It shows that home grounds are becoming fortresses. We're going to have to buck the trend there. If you look at the competition I think only about 20 per cent of the games away from home are won. We've got to really make sure we buck the system to get the result we want. We think we can."

Last year Leinster did a lot of preparation on Welsh international scrumhalf Mike Phillips and the type of work he does from the base of the scrum. Xavier Rush also gets his hands on a lot of go-forward ball.

Cardiff also have good finishers out wide, a strong front row and a good lineout through Welsh lock, Robert Sidoli, in a pretty rounded side.

Friday's game could also mark the final professional games of a couple of international warhorses, Ireland's Reggie Corrigan and England's Will Green as well as scrumhalf, Guy Easterby.

England's scrumhalf Harry Ellis is likely to miss this autumn's Rugby World Cup after scans confirmed he suffered serious knee damage last weekend. Surgery will be needed to repair the anterior cruciate ligament in his left knee.

Gloucester's Iain Balshaw has been named as Ben Cohen's replacement for England's two-Test tour of South Africa.

LEINSTER (v Cardiff): Backs -G Easterby, P O'Donoghue, C Whitaker, F Contepomi, C Warner, G D'Arcy, S Horgan, K Lewis, D Hickie, R Keraney, G Dempsey, L Fitzgerald. Forwards -R Corrigan, C Healy, W Green, S Wright, B Blaney, B Jackman, O Finnegan, T Hogan, M O'Kelly, C Jowitt, S Keogh, K Gleeson, J Heaslip, S O'Brien.