Christian Brothers College, Cork aiming to turn on the power in Junior Cup final

The real business of the Seat Munster Schools Junior Cup begins today at Musgrave Park with the first of four quarter-finals down for decision.

After the opening round when there could be no losers – all defeated teams survived to live another day – from now on it’s winners only.

Today, Christian Brothers College, Cork have been favoured with a home draw against Ard Scoil Rís, and it is an opportunity for the Cork college to exact something like revenge for the defeat of their senior team to the same opposition a couple of weeks ago.

Christians will start favourites too following their performance and big victory over Rockwell in the last round. Although it’s a decent team overall, the strength is clearly in the pack and particularly in the front row.

All five tries in the 33-15 win over Rockwell came from the forwards, one each from flanker Finn Burke and Robert Loftus and a hat-trick from fellow prop Luke Masters, the two front rowers being amongst the biggest and heaviest ever seen in this age group.

Ard Scoil will face a testing time at set piece and will have to be at their level best to emerge with a decent supply of possession.

They lost the first round tie to St Munchin’s (21-23) and will be disappointed with their second half display. However, they showed their potential when leading 14-0 and then 21-10 at the break, and clearly they have some try-scoring ability. They will be trying their best to avoid a slugfest.