HEINEKEN CUP LAUNCH: IF LOOKS could talk. Tony McGahan and Michael Cheika, along with their Ulster counterpart Matt Williams and the captains of the three provinces in the cup, were in situ at Cruzzo's restaurant yesterday overlooking the Malahide marina for the launch of the Heineken Cup and while the Munster coach looked utterly content, the Leinster coach still had the look of thunder.

Yet, while Leinster are left with a few mental scars, thankfully that appears to be the extent of it. It's doubtful whether there was a more intensely, unremittingly physical game played at such a high tempo in any league across Europe over the weekend, and it seems remarkable to think that everyone could have emerged unscathed.

McGahan confirmed that yesterday's medical reports had agreed with the initially positive diagnosis of Sunday night, namely that John Hayes "had a bit of a stinger" and Jerry Flannery "had a knock on the elbow but the medical reports suggested no problem at all."

The assured new Munster coach, who has made such an impressive start since his promotion after a singularly influential two and a half years as defensive coach, thought that the Cardiff game a week before had been one of the most physically intense games he had ever been involved in, "and I thought last night was a step above that. There were two high-quality teams with a lot of internationals in either side, going at it for the full 80 minutes, and overall it was an excellent advertisement for Irish rugby."

McGahan also expects Leinster to be stronger once CJ van der Linde and Rocky Elsom settle in. "I think van der Linde has only been here two weeks and Rocky a week and a half. Once they get comfortable with the system going forward they'll be super players."

Munster are now into the teeth of their season, or at any rate the first phase of the season, with their first home game in Thomond Park next Saturday in the Magners League against Glasgow, followed by the Heineken Cup opener against the one new side in the competition, Montauban, on Friday week, and then the trek to Sale, the only unbeaten side in the English Premiership.

Both coaches have been true to their word in making full use of their squad - Leinster have started 23 players in four games, and Munster 25 - and before the opening round of the Heineken Cup a fortnight hence, each intends doing so to a more limited extent for another week.

"I think we need to be closing in on the top 22 going into the ERC," said McGahan, "but Glasgow and the A result (Munster beat Leinster on Sunday afternoon) have provided a few more selection issues, so we have to cover all bases."

Cheika reasserted his belief that Leinster weren't clinical enough in their basics, but took some solace in that: "I don't think we were stormed over physically; I just think we weren't clever enough."

Referring to the inability to cover some arrow-like touchfinders by Ronan O'Gara, he added: "We didn't position ourselves well, we left the back field open for O'Gara to pin us down, and if you leave him the space he'll do it."

He also agreed there was a relative narrowness to Leinster's game, and attributed this to their sluggishness in realigning their attack and thus losing their shape.

Looking ahead to Sunday's game away to Connacht, before the pivotal Euro opener against their Edinburgh bugbear, Cheika revealed that Cian Healy is the only injury concern.

He said that "a couple of players need to get an opportunity before the European match, because there's a couple of spots up for grabs, and secondly because of the six-day turnaround between two away games, we need to maybe shuffle our deck and thirdly we need to have a team that's capable of beating Connacht, and that's not going to be easy."

That the ERC organisers had relatively little to announce with regard to the actual format of the Heineken Cup - save for confirming that the referee's match clock will helpfully be in use at all match venues - was evidence of the competition's current stability.

As a means of underlining the Cup's enduring quality and strength (though hardly necessary) they provided a raft of statistics, such as a projected ninth million fan at some point in the later pool stages, with a further 39 tries needed to reach the 4,500 mark and Ronan O'Gara requiring only 46 more points to reach the 1,000 mark.

Toulouse, whose home matches to date have been watched by 686,600 spectators, will become the first team to play 100 matches, against Bath in round six, while Munster will follow suit if they can extend their record of reaching the quarter-finals for an 11th successive campaign.

The first year of a new seven-year accord affords the ERC huge breathing space with which to further the development of the two tournaments, all the more so bearing in mind the sustained growth which coincided with the previous seven-year deal.

And at times last year, when the brinkmanship of Serge Blanco and the French clubs especially was at its height, it looked like the Heineken Cup and Challenge Cups might not reach this point.

"I think what ultimately crystalised the focus was the strength of the property and the fact that it means so much to everybody," said ERC chief executive Derek McGrath yesterday.

"But what you have now - it's like the start of any new deal - is the opportunity over the next couple of years to see where we want to be in 10 years' time, and that's what we're doing now. We're taking the opportunities and there are a lot of talks, engaging everybody in it. We're actually going through quite a formal process in order to make sure we set out something that is going to deliver across all the countries."

"The quality is building all the time and the Challenge Cup is a critical one," he acknowledged. "I think, as you've seen, the tournament has become important to each country. What we'll be looking to maintain is the quality of the competition on the pitch, and making sure that the matches are going to get better and better."