MAGNERS LEAGUE PREVIEW: CONNACHT v MUNSTER Sportsground, 7.30 On TV: Setanta Sports 1.
IT IS interesting that Declan Kidney has chosen to leave Marcus Horan, Paul O'Connell and Ronan O'Gara on the bench for this derby match. Clearly, the Heineken Cup game against Gloucester a week hence is not far from his mind, and with Rua Tipoki still struggling with a back injury, Kieron Lewis may yet be called in to start against Connacht.
Paul Warwick takes centre stage at outhalf, and Donncha O'Callaghan and Mick O'Driscoll form a proven partnership in the second row.
As for the front row, with the colossus that is Tony Buckley in at loosehead prop and the mighty John Hayes on the other side, how can the hooker Jerry Flannery possibly fit between them?
Buckley is on a rare excursion to the loosehead side but is probably deemed to need game time, having sat through most of the Six Nations as Hayes remained a constant at tighthead for Ireland as well as Munster.
Still, with Horan on the bench, there's plenty of cover if this experiment with two of the biggest props in the game fails.
There is no sign of Shaun Payne at all; Denis Hurley is in at fullback, All Black Doug Howlett is on the right flank and Ian Dowling is on the left.
Lifeimi Mafi is also in place at inside centre, providing at least half of the highly successful Kiwi centre pairing.
As Kidney has said, there is usually little between teams in these local battles, and regardless of what it says on paper, they invariably turn into dogfights.
Coach Michael Bradley has made three personnel changes to his Connacht side as well as three positional switches from last week's line-up. Andy Dunne starts at outhalf in a backline reshuffle that sees Keith Matthews move to inside centre, Mel Deane move to outside centre and Matt Mostyn move to the right wing.
In the forwards prop Brett Wilkinson starts once again at loosehead and David Gannon partners the captain, Andrew Farley, in the second row for the first time since January.
The match is a sellout, which is good news for Connacht. But the feeling is that Munster, who over the past four seasons have been ranked the top club side in Europe, have too much all around the pitch and too much experience in the art of winning to allow Connacht provide what would be the biggest upset of the week.
To make matters worse for Connacht, they have won only one of their 24 games against Irish provinces since 2004.
CONNACHT: G Duffy; M Mostyn, M Deane, K Matthews, D Riordan; A Dunne, C O'Loughlin; B Wilkinson, A Flavin, R Morris; D Gannon, A Farley (capt); J Muldoon, J O'Connor, C Rigney. Replacements: J Fogarty, B McGovern, A Browne, L Casserly, C McPhillips, T Nathan, D Yapp
MUNSTER: D Hurley; D Howlett, L Mafi, AN Other, I Dowling; P Warwick, P Stringer; T Buckley, J Flannery, J Hayes; D O'Callaghan, M O'Driscoll; A Quinlan, D Wallace, A Foley (capt). Replacements: F Sheehan, M Horan, P O'Connell, D Ryan/D Leamy, T O'Leary, R O'Gara, K Lewis/R Tipoki
Referee: S McDowell(Ireland)
Verdict: Munster win
