Edinburgh need 'big start' against Leinster to reclaim URC top spot

Edinburgh hooker Adam McBurney has urged his team to get off to a flying start against Leinster on Friday night as they bid to return to the top of the URC.

The capital club need a draw or a win to get back to the head of the table after being knocked off their perch by Ulster last week, and former Ulster forward McBurney believes that to get the required result his team will need to be at the top of their game from first whistle to last.

“It’s definitely an all-round challenge and it will definitely take 80 minutes,” he said. “They’re not a team that’s going to roll over for you at any stage of the game.

“You don’t want to let them in early - that’s a big thing. If you let them in early they’ll get that momentum rolling and then they’re hard to stop. It will be a big start for us anyway and then we’ll just be trying to keep that going for the 80 minutes.

Adam McBurney is pictured during an Edinburgh training session at the DAM Health Stadium.

“It’s always a tough challenge, obviously. Thankfully I’ve got on the right end a couple of times, but I’ve also been on the wrong end, as a lot of other teams have been too. So yeah, tough team to play against, but I’m looking forward to another chance to go at them.”

Ulster, who went top with a win over Connacht last week, are inactive this weekend, hence Edinburgh have a chance to scale the summit again. But, while accepting it was a psychological blow to lose first place, McBurney insisted that he and his team-mates would retain their patience and remain focused on the longer term.

“Yeah, it’s disappointing not to be at the top of the league, as we were for a couple of weeks,” he added. “But it is a long season and you don’t really want to be winning the league this week. Hopefully we can pick up points in the next couple of weeks and get in and around the top couple of places, then we’ll be in a good place going into the business end of the season.”

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