As ever, international weekend wouldn't be the same without the customary appetisers, and the tastiest aperitif to tomorrow's main course is the A international at Donnybrook. In ways, intrigue about individual cases is even greater, the only problem being if individualism supersedes the team ethic.

That certainly contributed to the unnerving slaughter of the Irish As when they met the midweek Springboks at Ravenhill last time out. The home crowd saw 15 individuals play like, well, 15 individuals.

You feared for the careers of many of them that night, and it's almost a surprise, therefore, that as many as seven have gone back up to the Test squad and a further four survive from that night.

That A sides traditionally struggle to emulate the cohesion of a comparatively more settled Test squad goes without saying, but this one is ridiculous. Aside from the 11 changes, and having less time together, the original selection for this match has had more alterations than a wedding dress.

John Hayes' injury enforced withdrawal yesterday brought about the ninth such amendment, all of them amongst the forwards. Angus McKeen is thus promoted from the bench, with his place in turn being filled by Emmet Byrne.

McKeen thus becomes the third member of an under-achieving Lansdowne tight five in this line-up, backed up as they are by a Shannon back-row experiencing their worst ever run of club form.

Ominously, although the French As retain only one player (full-back Nicolas Brusque) from last season's meeting at this level, five of this pack were amongst the hungry young wanabees up front which laid the foundations for France's 49-24 win over Italy in Genoa last weekend.

Many a French pundit considers some of these understudies to be in better form and shape than the experienced incumbents who have been regrouped for tomorrow's test in Lansdowne Road. This disrupted Irish pack will clearly be doing well to contain them, never mind master them.

At the outset of a Five Nations campaign and all the more so in a World Cup year, the stakes are especially high on an individual level. Take the likes of Reggie Corrigan and Alan Quinlan - the former having lost his place in the senior squad after a delayed start to the season and the latter seeing a glimpse of the senior squad snatched away from by injury last autumn.

It's tougher for them too in that the senior Irish pack is a relatively closed shop. By comparison there appears more of an opening for some of the backs. There is no substitute for experience, explained Warren Gatland of the failed attempt to enroll Kevin Putt, and hence the performance of the London Scottish scrum-half Guy Easterby will be closely observed.

A couple of richly promising Lansdowne teenagers, Gordon D'Arcy and Shane Horgan, have been given their head here, and it will be fascinating to see how Niall Woods goes. Of all the players who were retained from the South African A game, he is the most surprising.

His international prospects looked bleak when being substituted that night after he had, by his own admission, made "a pillock" of himself. But at the time, he was playing badly with London Irish.

However, when it was put up to him by Dick Best, Woods responded and is now in a rich vein of form. He was gliding over the Franklin's Garden mudheap last week like a gazelle and what's more, his tackling held up very well. Woods is undoubtedly that rare breed of Irish rugby player; a world-class finisher. Given the Irish management are on the lookout for a game-breaker or two, if Woods can allay some of the doubts about his defence then perhaps tonight could kick-start his second coming.

Woods probably feels he's been hard done by at Irish selectorial level and knows he's on trial here.

To a degree, naturally, they are all under the microscope.