Time was when the onset of the Interprovincial Championship induced at best indifference, but there was a palpably upbeat mood for the coming together of the provincial coaches for a photo call at a pristine Lansdowne Road yesterday - not least because it coincided with an announcement that a minimum of five matches will be televised live for the first time by TG4.

The first of the five will feature the meeting of Leinster and Connacht in next Friday's opening round, as well as four subsequent matches - one of which has still to be confirmed.

Last year's belated introduction of a six-series home and away championship, and - lest we forget - the interprovincials' qualification status for the following season's European Cup gives the competition a keener edge than its ever had. Furthermore, this year sees the advent of more spectator friendly Friday evening kick-offs. All bar two of the dozen matches will be played on Friday evenings, with Connacht trying a double-header with a Bord na gCon greyhound meeting on September 8th for the visit of Ulster. The first five rounds will be played off on successive weekends through September, with the concluding round coming after the first four rounds of the European competitions on November 3rd.

"I think sometimes we can undersell our own competition," ventured Munster coach Declan Kidney yesterday, adding: "Last year I would have said it, and I'll say it again: playing in the interpros is as difficult as playing in your group matches in the ERC, and I think the sooner we all realise that the better. One thing that highlighted it for me was when Leicester played Wasps at the weekend. I think there were 2,054 people at it. Ulster had 5,000 at their friendly the other day."

So imagine the crowd at Ravenhill for the visit of Munster? As if to prove Kidney's point further, it says something about the interprovincials that one of the opening matches is a clash between the European Cup champions of the season before last and the beaten European finalists of last May.

Munster will be the prized scalp at the outset of this year's championship and probably all the way through it, while emulating last season's tally of 34 points, with six wins graced by bonus points in four of them, will be well nigh impossible to equal and probably never will be. "I'd be quite happy to be at the top of the table by one point this year," he admitted.

With Harry Williams kept at home with flu, the last to be asked for his thoughts was the new man on the block, Connacht's South African coach Steph Nel. "We realise we're the babies. You waited until now to ask me a question, so I know where my place is," quipped the 35-year-old. And Connacht's? "When I first arrived the big thing was the lack of confidence. I think every player who goes through a season like last season (when Connacht conceded four half centuries in six games) would lose confidence. I think Saturday (beating L'Aquila) did that a lot of good. The guys have worked very hard for the last seven weeks and they're very hungry, they want to put things right."

Much of yesterday's talk centred around the Irish Schools' superbly successful tour of Australia, with both Kidney and Leinster coach Matt Williams agreeing that the need to subsume some of these talented individuals into the professional system has to be countered by differing individual development rates. "Some players will be ready at 19, but others at 24," reasoned Williams.

Kidney ironically has probably had more reason than his provincial counterparts to dip into the young indigenous playing pool following a bigger player drain than the others in spite of last season's successes. All told, five internationals have been lost to the Munster set-up this season, including Keith Wood, Brian O'Meara and three back-rowers, Eddie Halvey, Ken O'Connell and David Corkery.

While having looked abroad for replacements, "the onus should be on us to look at home first because again we have a tendency to knock what is at home to what's abroad." Summing it all up neatly, Kidney concluded: "The primary function must be to bring players through to the national team, and then for us all to have as good a go as possible at the European Cup. In between times we just happen to have a go at one another."

Gloucester hooker Jawad Djoudi will appear before an English RFU disciplinary panel next Wednesday following his sending off against Saracens last weekend. Djoudi, who went on as a second-half substitute, was dismissed by referee Steve Lander for butting Saracens' wing Darragh O'Mahony. The Moroccan faces a minimum seven-week suspension.