If you take a glance at Leinster's away fixtures in Pool 2, the trips to Agen and Gloucester look particularly challenging, which leaves Edinburgh as a fixture they pretty much have to win. Of course they're quite capable of losing this afternoon, and winning in both England and France, but that would constitute an extremely difficult route to the quarter-finals.

A win in Murrayfield would make their path an awful lot more negotiable.

Not that the points today are by anyway guaranteed, not by a long shot. If we're making this Edinburgh game sound easy, we apologise, but it's the least intimidating venue for Leinster's three away games, and thus the most winnable, even if Edinburgh represent a slightly better-than-average outfit.

Under new coach Lynn Howells, the side from the Scottish capital have added a bit more direct running to their side-to-side game, and the Leinster coach is expecting an extremely testing encounter.

"We are going to be under immense pressure up there, " says Cheika. "They play a very lateral game. We have to work out a strategy to get around that and then get around them. We want to go up there and get the advantage in the group. If we can do that it would be a big plus for us."

Leinster lost to Edinburgh in their opening Magners League game this season, but that was, of course, without their tranche of international backs. But they don't have a great record in the Scottish capital and a couple of high-scoring Edinburgh victories over Leinster at Murrayfield over the past couple of years (41-33 in 2005, 40-34 in 2004) hint at an open game.

"The games we have had with Leinster in the past have been brilliant, " says Edinburgh out-half Chris Paterson. "They have been impressive and high-scoring games because we both play a similar style but now, of course, it will come down to who double bluffs who. Do they tighten up? Do we tighten up?"

One certain thing is that Leinster won't be doing any tightening up, it just doesn't seem to be in their mental make-up. At any rate, they'd be mad to put the shackles on their exceptionally creative back line, especially if you take a close look at the Gloucester game. Leinster struggled for possession for most of that game but they still managed to amass 37 point.

This afternoon, in what's likely to be an extremely attractive game, they're likely to have a hell of a lot more ball and on that basis, they're capable of not only winning the game, but of also sneaking a bonus-point.

EDINBURGH H Southwell; C Paterson (c), M di Rollo, R Dewey, S Webster; P Godman, M Blair; A Jacobsen, D Hall, A Dickinson, M Mustchin, S Murray, A Strokosch, R Rennie, D Callam LEINSTER G Dempsey; S Horgan, B O'Driscoll (c), G D'Arcy, D Hickie; F Contepomi, C Whitaker; R McCormack, B Blaney, W Green, T Hogan, M O'Kelly, S Keogh, K Gleeson, J Heaslip HEINEKEN CUP POOL 2 EDINBURGH v LEINSTER Murray"eld, 1.00 Referee J Jutge (France) Live, Sky Sports 3, 12.30