Munster have received mixed injury news ahead of Saturday's BKT United Rugby Championship meeting with Ulster at Thomond Park, with Antoine Frisch a doubt for their final regular season game of the campaign.
The centre, whose upcoming move to Toulon was confirmed last week, has had a scan on a leg injury, with his availability for the Interpro to be determined later this week.
"As of now, we're unsure [about Frisch]," attack coach Mike Prendergast said.
"He did a bit of running over the last day or two but we’re going to give him an extra day or so see how he gets on. Going into Thursday we’ll see how he is."
The 27-year-old has been an influential presence in the Munster midfield this season, featuring in all but one of their games in the URC, and scoring six tries in all competitions.
If Frisch is unavailable, it would leave Munster stretched thin in the centre, with Alex Nankivell already ruled out due to an ankle injury. Prendergast (below) added that it's "too early" to assess whether or not the New Zealander would be available for their URC quarter-final next week.
However, the assistant coach is confident they have the required squad depth.
"We saw it with Rory Scannell, coming on against Edinburgh, he had a fine game I thought. And Sean O’Brien has played a lot of rugby this year and I know he’s been on the wing but any time he’s played in the midfield for us, which is his natural position, he’s come out on top there.
"So if the boys get through they get through it. If they don’t we have the next man up. We’ve been kind of used to that this year and the two lads that are due to come in if it happens that way are both in good form at the moment thankfully," Prendergast added.
In better news, Peter O'Mahony, Joey Carbery and John Hodnett have all returned to training this week, and appear to be on track for Saturday's game at Thomond Park.
O'Mahony and Carbery missed the recent win over Edinburgh due to minor knocks, while Hodnett has been unavailable for the last three games due to a leg issue.
Full-back Mike Haley is also on track to be available later in the week, with the full-back following the return to play protocols for a concussion against Edinburgh.
A win of any kind for Munster on Saturday would see the defending champions finish the URC regular season in first place, guaranteeing them home advantage for the quarter-final, as well as any potential semi-final or final.
Watch Munster v Ulster in the URC on Saturday from 5pm on RTÉ2 and RTÉ Player, follow a live blog on rte.ie/sport and the RTÉ News app and listen to commentary on Saturday Sport on RTÉ Radio 1
