Confident Leinster have the upper hand against Munster

Munster and Leinster are back in interprovincial action at the Aviva stadium this weekend.

Munster are going into the game off the back of a tough encounter in challenging conditions against the Stormers, a team that they have some recent history with, including the URC final at the end of last year.

Leinster are in a different flow after the return of their important international players, adding to the growth that the rest of their squad has seen in their absence. With a dominant win over a weakened Scarlets side, Leinster will be full of confidence, but maybe could have done with a tougher test before an interprovincial rivalry.

Munster have struggled a bit at the set-piece lately. The scrum came under ferocious pressure again last week, some of them penalised, and other dominant Stormers scrums were allowed to play out. It won't get any easier next week with Leinster’s options in the front row.

Oli Jager is reportedly available for Munster selection, which will help in the scrum but could take some time to get into the rhythm of the rest of their systems. Props generally play a key role in lineout lifts, as well as in the middle of the field in attacking structures.

The Munster attack won’t be anything that Oli Jager can’t get up to speed on, a lot of the attacking structures look similar at the moment anyway, with some subtle differences.

However, if Munster can’t get their set-piece right, they’ll have a long day against Leinster. Leinster are a dominant set-piece team and launch very effective attacking plays from that.

Munster will be looking to replicate what they did in last season’s semi-final, keeping the ball in play and more importantly, avoiding Leinster’s structured attacking plays.

Joe McCarthy has been very