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Ulster rocked by injuries to key players ahead of visit of Toulouse

Ulster captain Iain Henderson. (Photo by Tony Marshall/Getty Images)

Ulster will have to plan without a number of key players for Friday’s Heineken Champions Cup game against Toulouse at Kingspan Stadium after the province released a fresh injury update today. Andy Farrell’s Ireland squad are returning to their provinces this week ahead of the new European season, which kicks-off on Friday night, but there’s bad news for Ulster head coach Dan McFarland as some of his senior players have returned to Belfast nursing injuries.

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Ulster have confirmed that captain Iain Henderson is due to see a knee specialist after coming off injured during the first half of Ireland’s defeat of Scotland on Saturday, and will miss Friday’s game against Toulouse as a result.

Henderson’s absence represents a major blow for Ulster, who have reached the knock-out stages of the Champions Cup in the last two seasons, as they are also without fellow second-row Kieran Treadwell due to suspension.

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Out-half Billy Burns, who recently won his first international cap, will also be sidelined as he recovers from a groin injury.

Meanwhile Rob Lyttle suffered a back injury in Ulster’s game against Edinburgh last week and will also be unavailable for selection this week.

McFarland is also without Louis Ludik (concussion), Luke Marshall (knee), Rob Baloucoune (hamstring), Will Addison (back), Angus Curtis (knee) and Tom Stewart (hamstring).

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RedWarriors 6 hours ago
'Not a normal rugby team' - The Leinster flex that floored Jake White

I was actually at the match. Leinster were the outstanding team in the league stage. Leinster’s squad depth meant the Bulls could only nick a late win in Pretoria against an understrenght Leinster. Simple put, Leinster are significantly better this year compared to last. The Dublin match last year was a big win by Leinster. Yes they won by a point in the RDS three years ago but thats not relevant to yesterday.

As Leinster are such a dangerous team, it forces an opponent to focus on a strategy to undermine them and that way get their game on the pitch. Leinster allowed that against Northampton. But that was not going to happen again. The Bulls attack in last 10 minutes of the first half was as savage as anything in the URC this year. Yet Leinsters coaching plan repelled them allied to savage commitment from the players. The defense was outstanding, pressure at breakdown outstanding. Leinster did not win the European cup but arguably at their best this year no other European team could reach that height. They reached that yesterday. Leinster completely removed Bulls ability to hurt them.

And Croke Park….100 years ago the Brits fired machine guns into spectators injuring 100s and killing loads. No Irish team ever performs badly there. Same with Irish supporters. Opposition players might as well be Brit Tommies with machine guns.

I think a great Leinster team, played a great game plan, to the height of their power in a horrible stadium for opponents. If Bulls score before half time they were back in the match. They went down, but they went down fighting.

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