Leo Cullen: Garry Ringrose, James Ryan and Hugo Keenan could return v Ulster

Leinster's Garry Ringrose, James Ryan and Hugo Keenan appear to be winning their race to be fit for the Investec Champions Cup final against Toulouse in just over two weeks.

The trio all missed out on both the Champions Cup quarter-final win over La Rochelle and the semi-final victory over Northampton Saints at Croke Park last week, with Ringrose sidelined with a shoulder issue, Ryan rehabbing an arm injury, and Keenan out with a hip problem.

All three miss out again for tomorrow's BKT United Rugby Championship meeting with the Ospreys, but Cullen is confident that some of them could get a run out in next Saturday's trip to face Ulster in Belfast.

"They're going pretty good," Cullen said of his injured co-captains and Keenan.

"Again Garry [Ringrose], as I said to you last week, I thought he would have been involved last week, but again he just had a bit of a setback during the course of the week. We’ll see how that settles down really. I don’t think it is anything major. He got to the stage where he was very close to playing.

"Hugo [Keenan] hadn’t quite done enough, but he’s back running fully now. Hopefully he’s pretty close.

"Similar with James [Ryan], he’s pretty close now as well. It’s down to what is the exact right game to put them into.

"It’s not this week, but I think hopefully we’ll see a few of them in action next week. We’ll see, it’s day-by-day."

The Leinster coach has named a strong team for Saturday's return to URC action against the Ospreys at the RDS.

Will Connors comes into the side among five changes from their win over Northampton last week, with 14 of the starting 15, and 19 of the matchday 23 having featured at Croke Park a week ago.

Having fallen to second in the URC table with three rounds to play, the