Magners League officials will be gathering in Edinburgh this evening to see if Leinster, the visiting team, can clinch the title, but just as many Scottish eyes will be turned west to see if Dan Parks can maintain the remarkable run of form that has followed his return from the Six Nations.

Since coming back to Glasgow, he has played twice, won two man of the match awards and the team have won both games, making him very much the man of the moment as Frank Hadden, the national coach, and his colleagues prepare for Scotland’s June tour of Argentina.

As far as Parks is concerned, all that has changed is that with encouragement from Sean Lineen, his club coach, he has reverted to playing his natural game. He admits that he might have gone overboard in recent times in relying on his kicking skills, but maintains that he has just as much to offer as a runner and distributer as any rival.

“I love playing for Glasgow so it was easy to come back and all the guys here made it really easy,” he said. “It was good to get back into the club scene. Like anything you can’t be fantastic every single week - if you could, great, but it is very difficult to be on top every week - though you try to be as good as you can.

“Sometimes things just don’t go your way. Other times you get the bounce of the ball or find a gap where somebody came out of the line. It cannot happen all the time. You have to capitalise when opportunities come.

“When I first came here, I liked to attack the line. It was not something that was taken away but it seemed more beneficial to use the guys outside me. I have always liked to take the line on and Sean [Lineen] has given me that role in the last couple of weeks. Once you get into the game, take a tackle, get hit, you feel you are in the game, part of it. For me that has been a big thing, I have taken a tackle early and felt part of it. Sometimes when you don’t get that early hit, you can let the game go.”

For all the criticism that flew his way after his last international performance, Parks still looks like the fly half most likely to do a job for Scotland in Argentina, especially if he rides on the wave of confidence that is bound to follow his most recent performance, with two tries, two conversions, two drop goals and a penalty bringing his personal haul to 23 points and making him the top scorer in the league going into the weekend.

Edinburgh and Glasgow seem to be heading in opposite directions, just as they have done for the last two seasons, the capital city side struggling to put together an end-of-season run, while their rivals have won both their last two games and are gunning for revenge against a Llanelli side who hammered them in the return fixture in Wales.

For Edinburgh, there is a double motivation. Should they lose and concede a four-try bonus then the fact that Leinster will not be handed the Magners League trophy until their next home game will hardly matter, the players and the fans will all know that the Irish province clinched the title at Murrayfield. Avoiding that humiliation should be motivation enough, but they are also now in a real battle to see which is to be the top Scottish side, with Glasgow’s late run closing the gap to two points.

The Edinburgh players are desperate to stop the Leinster party, which can become only more boisterous with the news that Brian O’Driscoll passed his fitness test yesterday and will take his place in the team to make his 100th appearance for the province.

“We will be doing our best to try and bring some silverware home,” O’Dris-coll said yesterday. “It will be a proud moment when I make my 100th appearance for Leinster. We know that when we’re playing well that we are a tough team to beat.”

How they line up

Edinburgh: H Southwell; S Webster, B Cairns, N De Luca, J Houston; P Godman, G Laidlaw; A Allori, R Ford, G Kerr, M Mustchin, B Gissing, A Hogg (captain), A MacDonald, D Callam. Replacements: A Kelly, G Cross, C Hamilton, S Newlands, B Meyer, D Blair, C MacRae.

Leinster: G Dempsey; L Fitzgerald, B O’Driscoll, F Contepomi, R Kearney; J Sexton, C Whitaker; O le Roux, B Jackman, S Wright, L Cullen (captain), T Hogan, S Keogh, S Jennings, J Heaslip. Replacements: B Blaney, S Knoop, M O’Kelly, C Jowitt, K Gleeson, C Keane, C Warner, M Berne, G Brown.

Glasgow: B Stortoni; M Evans, G Morrison, D Gibson, T Evans; D Parks (captain), C Gregor; J Va’a, F Thomson, M Low, O Palepoi, D Turner, K Brown, J Barclay, J Beattie. Replacements: D Hall, A Newman, K Tkachuk, J Eddie, S Pinder, A Henderson, L Fa’atau.

Llanelli Scarlets: M Stoddart; D Daniel, R King, M Watkins, N Brew; S Jones, G Cattle; I Thomas, M Schwalger, B Broster, S MacLeod, V Cooper, S Easterby (captain), J Bater, N Thomas. Replacements: B Douglas, M Rees, L Reed, D Jones, A Popham, L Davies, R Priestland.