Leinster are already under pressure in their heavyweight European Champions Cup pool after losing 33-6 to a clinical Wasps team at the RDS.

Remind Leo Cullen he played in the last European final won by an English team, when the then London Wasps saw off Leicester Tigers in 2007, and he will be quick to point out he wasn’t part of the squad that won it.

Leo Cullen’s Leinster have brought the smiles back to the faces of their fans.

Keeping up with the blur of moves made by players this past year or so has been an impossible task, but the scale of the migrations and the quality of the players involved are evident just from those involving Leinster’s Champions Cup pool opponents this term.

Rugby World Cup Pool A

David Pocock believes Australian rugby looks past size when it comes to back-row forwards thanks to pioneers Phil Waugh and George Smith.

Here’s a briefing on some of the stories and issues highlighted on irishexaminer.com today.

Before looking forward to the inaugural Champions Cup final at Twickenham on Saturday, I feel compelled to examine the implications of an announcement last week that attracted minimal attention on this side of the world.

In one brief but ground-breaking announcement from the Australian Rugby Union, George Smith, Matt Giteau and Drew Mitchell were offered the hope of reviving their Wallabies careers in time for this year’s World Cup.

There has been a more than 40% increase in teenagers turning up at emergency departments with sports-related concussion in the last year, an Oireachtas committee has been told.

The International Rugby Board is ready to block exploitation of a loophole in qualifying regulations for Rio 2016 that enables players to switch national allegiance.

Ireland’s performance against Wales showed this team is able to produce technically and tactically under the pressure of a home Six Nations game.

Irish players are amongst those being left at increased risk of concussion-related injuries due to the failure of the PRO12, Heineken Cup and Six Nations to adopt IRB guidelines, according to a leading player advocate.

The chief executive of the Irish rugby players’ body, Omar Hassanein, has given his backing to the IRB’s concussion protocols in a week when the controversial issue has once again been thrust into the limelight by the injury to Peter O’Mahony.

It was just one of those nights for the Wallabies.

They have another jersey for the wall now. Right up there alongside the Irish one, a Sam Warburton jersey from the World Cup quarter-final in 2011 and the prized geansaí of Kiwi legend, Richie McCaw.

By Simon Lewis, Sydney

Three key areas

Will Genia has warned the British and Irish Lions that the best is yet to come from Australia with the rivals ready to decide their drawn series at ANZ Stadium tomorrow.

Graham Rowntree has ordered the British and Irish Lions to empty the tanks against Australia tomorrow in what he regards as the biggest match of the players’ lives.

Twelve years ago George Smith was gearing up for the Wallabies’ crunch third Test with Graham Henry’s Lions outfit in Sydney’s magnificent Olympic Stadium.

Australia coach Robbie Deans has promised his team will play its best rugby of the series tomorrow when the Wallabies face the British and Irish Lions in the decisive third Test at ANZ Stadium.

Flanker George Smith has been recalled to the Australia team to face the British and Irish Lions in the third and final Test in Sydney.

With Warburton out, if Deans chooses to recall George Smith to the fray, we could see a sizeable shift in that battle at the breakdown.

Australia coach Robbie Deans was disappointed by the presence of Kurtley Beale and James O'Connor in a fast-food restaurant in the early hours of the morning, but did not consider dropping them.

An eventful few hours in the Australia camp began with wing Digby Ioane being issued with an arrest warrant and ended with his injury-enforced withdrawal from the remainder of the Test series against the British and Irish Lions.

An eventful few hours in the Australia camp began with wing Digby Ioane being issued with an arrest warrant.

An arm injury sustained in the first-Test victory over Australia has placed Paul O’Connell’s Lions tour in jeopardy.

Australia have picked James O'Connor at fly-half for Saturday's opening Test against the British and Irish Lions at Suncorp Stadium with Kurtley Beale included on the bench.

“Hopefully going forward, if we’re going to take the Lions seriously, we need to make sure there is enough preparation to make a fist of it”.

Code-hopper Israel Folau is one of three new caps in Australia’s preliminary 25-man squad to face the British and Irish Lions, with in-form Reds playmaker Quade Cooper the most notable omission.

Want to pull off your own €35m worldwide ATM heist? It might not be that easy, experts say. Paul Wagenseil reports.

Australia flanker David Pocock will miss the upcoming Test series against the British and Irish Lions after rupturing an anterior cruciate ligament while playing for the Brumbies yesterday.

IT’S not what you see, it’s how you see it that matters.

Kilkenny football board vice-chairman Tom Duggan claimed a rampant Louth could have been more lenient in Wednesday night’s farcical Leinster U21 FC clash.

Ireland Under-19 manager Paul Doolin reckons Cork City’s Danny Morrissey can boost his international prospects in Turkey next week.

France captain Thierry Dusautoir has been named International Rugby Board player of the year at a ceremony in Auckland.

IRELAND’S U19s last night forgot about Tuesday’s hammering by Serbia as they won the second game of this week’s double-header friendly in Belgrade.

England 32 Barbarians 38

ROD KAFER and Doug Howlett are the only members of the elite north-south double winners club — but now Pedrie Wannenburg, Scott Hamilton, George Smith and Campbell Johnstone are in with the chance of adding their names to that shortest of short honours boards.