Declan Kidney fashioning Gloucester gameplan

He may be regarded by some as the obvious choice to succeed Eddie O'Sullivan as Irish rugby coach but Declan Kidney has more important issues to contend with over the coming days.

First amongst them is putting the finishing touches to a winning gameplan for the Heineken Cup quarter-final clash with Gloucester on Saturday.

Ahead of the match, Gloucester coach Dean Ryan singled out Munster's "ability to travel with the knowledge of how they're going to turn up" as a potential stumbling block for the current Premiership leaders this weekend.

However, Gloucester will hope home advantage can swing the tie in their favour, which would be a remarkable achievement for a squad with an average age of 23.

The English side's form book shows they have lost four of their last 11 outings, but the records also indicate that Munster have lost to Gloucester on their last two visits to Kingsholm, a statistic that is uppermost in Declan Kidney's mind.