All-Ireland League: Last weekend Lansdowne rolled out Gordon D'Arcy, Aidan McCullen, Felipe Contepomi and Niall Ronan to face Clontarf in a crucial All-Ireland League match. The ploy succeeded and Lansdowne left with the points.

The end of season has regularly been the stage for such cameo roles for provincial and international players. Clubs are perfectly entitled to use their full-time professionals, but the policy in some people's eyes is a dangerous one.

Carlow coach, Ray Ward believes there is a dangerous element to the practice and one that should be faced by the game before serious injury results.

"I think at AIL level there is no benefit or reason to have international players playing. There is a fairness issue and a safety issue. The safety issue is one of putting players who now train just twice a week against full-time professional players who might train twice a day on their strength and speed.

"Oddly, you might think, it is not the forward players I'd be more concerned about but the backs where the pace and strength of the professional players can be devastating. Their pace is completely different to what AIL players can play at and I believe that we could at some time be looking at a serious injury."

"You just have to put yourself in the position of being a young player at 10 and a professional bursts off the side of a scrum or maul. The difference is like playing a junior club against Shannon's senior side. These top players are so good that they appear to have so much time on the ball."