Cheika in cautious mood ahead of Heineken Cup clash

Leinster will wait on the fitness of Brian O'Driscoll, Girvan Dempsey and Stephen Knoop for their Heineken Cup tie with Edinburgh on Friday.

“I'd say the three injury issues we have this week are Brian (O’Driscoll), Girvan (Dempsey) and Stephen (Knoop),” said Leinster coach Michael Cheika.

“Girv has been out doing some running and kicking, so he’s looking OK. But we don’t want to aggravate that, so we’ll wait and see how he comes up later in the week.

“We’ll assess Brian this afternoon and with a bit more intensity on Wednesday to see (if he has gotten over) the pressure in his foot and in his ankle. If a guy like Brian says that he can’t run out when you know that he’d run all day for you, you make the change and see how the assessment goes.

“When players leave grounds on crutches you tend to fear the worst because of the visual, but he has come up pretty well. He trained this morning in the gym so hopefully he’ll be a starter.

“The same with Stephen in that we’ll see how he gets on with more contact work. We’ll be in a position to make some decisions by Wednesday or Thursday.”

Friday's game looks set to be another sell-out in the RDS withmore than 17,000 tickets already sold. A limited number of tickets are still available from leinsterrugby.ie.

LEINSTER SQUAD (v Edinburgh):

Forwards (14): Juan Gomez, Cian Healy, Ollie le Roux, Brian Blaney, Bernard Jackman, Stephen Knoop, Stan Wright, Leo Cullen, Cameron Jowitt, Malcolm O'Kelly, Keith Gleeson, Shane Jennings, Stephen Keogh, Jamie Heaslip

Backs (12): Chris Keane, Cillian Willis, Felipe Contepomi, Jonathan Sexton, Christian Warner, Gordon D'Arcy, Brian O'Driscoll, Gary Brown, Luke Fitzgerald, Shane Horgan, Rob Kearney, Girvan Dempsey