"When you look at it, if you're starting for Leinster you've got a very good chance of starting for Ireland and that's the ambition you want from your players. Leinster's star players were instrumental to Ireland's autumn success "They will have the guys that have been on the periphery of Ireland or Leinster and will want to go 'here's a two game window leading into Europe where I can put my hand up and say I should be starting for Leinster'. "The worrying thing for Ulster is that yes Leinster won't have their internationals but they will have a lot of firepower to come on," Best said. Leinster, the only undefeated side in the URC, are likely to be without the vast majority of their large Irish international contingent who played such a big role in the recent autumn Tests.ĭespite the absences they will still expect to extend their unbeaten start against a side they have defeated in each of the last six meetings. "From an Ulster point of view if there's a trend that continues like that, and we saw it at time-to-time last year, when Ulster don't get at best parity up front they really struggle because they don't have enough big men to get them across the gainline." Leinster's firepower not restricted to internationals "I think the way Connacht played against them, they took them on at the breakdown and in the pack especially, but they also played some really good rugby. They were beaten up up front, they really were physically dominated.
"There were a lot of worrying signs from it. "When you take a season across all the months they play, one game isn't going to define you but it's how you recover from that," Best said. They remain in good shape sitting second in the table, but with four interpros and four European Champions Cup games between now and the end of January Ulster know they cannot afford to perform as poorly again if they are to take a step towards achieving their aim of ending this season with silverware.
Ulster have had a full month to consider what went wrong in their first interpro of the season against Connacht, where they were comprehensively outplayed in all departments as they shipped five tries. Leinster can sense improving Ulster trying to close gap - Toner.