A summer of change at Leinster, but a familiarity in the new arrivals.
On the pitch, Leo Cullen's side have brought in two new bodies, Jason Jenkins making the move to Dublin after a disappointing, injury-ridden campaign at Munster, while veteran New Zealander Charlie Ngatai comes in following a spell at Lyon in the French Top 14.
It's behind the scenes that the real changes have been made though.
With Felipe Contepomi returning to Argentina following four years on Cullen's support staff, and Denis Leamy being recruited back to Munster, the Champions Cup finalists added two former Leinster players to the senior coaching ticket, albeit one more high-profile than the other.
Sean O'Brien needs no introduction, although we'll give him one. More than 100 Leinster appearances and over a half-century Irish caps, one of most powerful back row forwards the country has ever produced, and a winner of multiple Six Nations, Champions Cup and URC titles.
The other; Andrew Goodman, a New Zealander who spent a modest two seasons at the province between 2012 and 2014, and in recent years has cut his teeth in coaching with Tasman in New Zealand's NPC, as well as being an assistant at the Super Rugby-winning Crusaders.
Both O'Brien and Goodman (below, left) would have played with a significant portion of the current Leinster squad, although Leo Cullen says that familiarity is a bonus, rather than a necessity.
"I don't think it’s necessarily essential that there is a Leinster connection there, but it definitely does help," he said, as Leinster continued their pre-season preparations with an open training session at Longford RFC yesterday.
"He [Goodman] went to Japan after an unlucky period here with injury. I was actually injured with an Achilles injury at the time so we would have had a connection from that period, which was Matt O'Connor’s first year. Joe would have signed him, and he did two years, one with Joe, one with Matt.
"Andrew is someone I would have always followed closely, his progress with Tasman firstly initially and then more recently with the Crusaders.
"So again, you’re trying to get not just Andrew the man, the very, very good man that he is, but it’s also some of the IP he would have from his time in different places.
"It's funny, obviously [Contepomi] was brilliant, but I’m watching Argentina now and thinking 'Ooh, what’s Felipe doing? That looks familiar, that looks familiar.’ So I’m always looking at it the other way around.
"But yeah, when someone leaves, and we talked about Felipe at the time, it’s bringing in new ideas, fresh eyes and all the rest, but he still has an understanding of the Joe [Schmidt] times, Andrew would have been a part of those days as well, and he has a good grasp of all things Leinster."
O'Brien steps into a high-profile coaching role just a few months removed from the end of his playing days, replacing Leamy as the province's 'contact skills coach'.
And although he lacks experience of coaching at the top level, Cullen says the 'Tullow Tank' has long been a coach in the making.
"I don't know if you got to see any of the session but he’s in the thick of it the whole time.
"But Seanie is good, he did a lot of coaching all the way through when he was playing, even as a very young player, down in Tullow in particular, but even in London he was doing a bit of coaching there as well with different teams.
"He’s a brilliant character, he’s a larger than life personality as well so he’s a great addition on lots of fronts and we’re delighted he’s chosen to rejoin Leinster. It’s great, because I know he had some interest from elsewhere as well."
Leinster will play just one friendly ahead of the new season, when they travel to The Stoop to face Harlequins next Friday, before they kick off their URC campaign away to Zebre on 17 September.
For the first time in five years, they will start a campaign without a trophy to defend, following a painful end to last season, where they were beaten by La Rochelle in the Champions Cup final, before being caught cold against the Bulls in the URC semis.
And although an inability to deal with the physicality of the French and South African sides was cited as a theme of those defeats, Cullen says he believes the answer is around their mental strength.
"The last couple of seasons have been very strange for lots of different reasons. You think back to the Christmas period last year with Covid and games cancelled, then everything gets congested, games get rescheduled for during the Six Nations and there was just a bit of a grind element to it.
"So it was important that people had that bit of a refresh, and I think people have come back in in good shape now. It's more of a mental thing rather than a physical thing, I think, and this season is a cleaner season in many respects because we’re back to finishing at the end of May, rather than going into June and then a tour [international] at the end of that."
