A good weekend for Irish provincial sides just got a whole lot better this evening.
On Friday night Munster and Ulster recorded impressive wins over Glasgow and Treviso respectively and Saturday provided more joy for Irish teams with victories for Leinster and Connacht.
Leinster 37 Dragons 13
Isa Nacewa rolled back the years as his trys were the key scores in today's bonus point win over the Welsh side at the RDS, while Fergus McFadden showed balls of steel to land all of his kicks in the 24 point win.
Leinster had to fight back from trailing 10-6 early in the game after Sarel Pretorius crossed the tryline, but the home fans fans enjoyed a 20-10 half-time lead thanks to a try from the stand in captain and McFadden's accuracy.
Garry Ringrose and Cathal Marsh managed to grab their first ever Leinster trys also as the game ended with Leinster comfortablly holding onto the lead to mark a good start to the day for the Irish sides.
Connacht 36 Cardiff 31
It was thrill-a-minute in the Sportsgrounds on Saturday night as Pat Lam's side held on for a five point win.
Five trys were the obvious highlight for the home side, but tey will be unhappy at the concession of a late try that allowed the away side secure two losing bonus points.
Connacht led at the break by 19-17 with trys from Kieran Marmion, Nepia Fox-Matamua and Danie Poolman coming in a thrilling 16-minute burst.
But the Welsh side struck back to be just within two points at the break thanks to scores from Aled Summerhill and Josh Turnbull.
But Connacht came again in the second period and despite being down to 14 men for a period and conceding a try to the Cardiff full-back Fish, Tiernan O'Halloran grabbed a crucial try in the 57th minute to wrest momentum back from the visitors.
That score was all the hosts needed to kick-on and they scored another try through Aly Muldowney to go 33-24 ahead before the concession of the late five-pointer to Hobbs.