Cullen waits on injured Leinster trio

Leinster head coach Leo Cullen says Rob Kearney, Sean O’Brien and Joey Carbery are all doubts for the European Rugby Champions Cup return tie against Northampton Saints next weekend.

Kearney, O’Brien and Carbery all suffered injuries in Friday's five-try 37-10 win over the Saints at Franklin's Gardens that puts Leinster in control at the top of Pool 4 with 11 points from their three matches.

Gary Ringrose, O'Brien, Rory O’Loughlin, Jamison Gibson-Park and Isa Nacewa all went over in the bonus-point victory over the three-time European champions, who had England captain Dylan Hartley sent off for a swinging arm on O'Brien.

O'Brien underwent a head injury assessment after the Hartley challenge, while Carbery and Kearney both suffered ankle injuries .

"It’s a swinging arm to the head," said Cullen of Hartley's red card.

"We’ve enough to worry about ourselves, we just need to worry about trying to play the game and let the officials worry about policing the game. We’ll see how Seanie is and maybe comment after that."

Out-half Carbery was forced off after only 16 minutes while full-back Kearney limped out early in the second half.

"They both tried to run it off, Joey for probably a bit longer," Cullen continued.

"Rob did his just before half-time and he felt probably a bit happier. I wasn’t sure about him running around but he felt pretty keen to continue, and we made the call anyway."

Ross Byrne came off the bench to replace Carbery, but the Ireland Under-20 captain also suffered a cut to the head against the Saints, giving Cullen a selection headache at out-half ahead of the return tie at Dublin's Aviva Stadium next Saturday.

"Cathal [Marsh] is still out, Johnny [Sexton] has been well documented, so we’ll see how he is. Obviously, Ross came in today and I thought he did well. He got a bit of a gash on the head as well," he continued.

"After that, Isa Nacewa has played a bit at 10 a long time ago and Noel Reid has played a bit at 10. He was injured going into this game as well, where he went off early last week.

"We’ll assess him and after that we’ll see. That’s who’s in the European squad at the moment. That’s the beauty of picking a 41-man squad and we’ll make some calls, see who’s fit and at least we’ve got an eight-day turnaround.

"But it’s going to be tight in getting guys back."

Photo (Getty Images/Pete Norton)

eir Sport channels are available across the eir Vision, Sky and Vodafone TV platforms as well as on the eir Sport app. All 6 channels in the eir Sport pack are available for free if you are a residential eir broadband customer.