It was against this opposition in Musgrave Park that O'Leary sustained the injury that was to see him miss out on the Heineken Cup semi final and robbed of a place on the Lions tour to South Africa. It was originally believed that O'Leary would not be back in action until late November early December and team manager Shaun Payne was quick to hand out praise for his extraordinary recovery.

"Tomas has shown tremendous professionalism and dedication in getting himself back playing and great credit is due to him and to the work done by our medical and fitness staff. It is of course great to see him back in the squad particularly after the injury he sustained."

O'Leary was not named in the extended squad but Peter Stringer had picked up a calf strain in the game against Cardiff Blues and that did not respond well enough to treatment during the week to allow him make the trip. Toby Morland will partner his old school mate Jeremy Manning in Parc Y Scarlets.

Coach Tony McGahan retains 21of the 22 that saw duty against the Blues, Marcus Horan missing out this time with French international prop Julien Brugnaut coming into the front row.

Elsewhere, McGahan changes things around ever so slightly with Damien Varley starting on this occasion ahead of Denis Fogarty whom he replaced in the Blues game.

Munster: F Jones; D Howlett, B Murphy, L Mafi, D Hurley; J Manning, T Morland; J Brugnaut, D Varley, J Hayes; D Ryan, M ODriscoll (capt); A Quinlan, N Ronan, D Leamy. D Fogarty, T Buckley, B Holland, T O'Donnell, T O'Leary, S Deasy, T Gleeson.