THE waiting is over for Olly Barkley, who will finally make his Gloucester bow today after overcoming a broken wrist.

Kingsholm's highest profile summer signing has been handed the No 12 shirt for today's home clash with early Guinness Premiership pacesetters Harlequins, with Mike Tindall moving back to his preferred role of outside centre.

Barkley was injured during England's summer tour to New Zealand and had hoped to make his Gloucester debut in last weekend's victory over his former club, Bath.

But he was held back by head coach Dean Ryan – and is raring to get going today.

"This has been a long time coming and I am really excited about the opportunity," said Barkley.

"My rehabilitation has gone really well and now I just want to concentrate on contributing for my new club.

"Harlequins have made an excellent start to the season and we obviously appreciate their threat, but after last week's performance and result we are confident we can recreate that again and built on it this weekend.

"I am just delighted to be involved in the side – it has been a long time coming."

The midfield reshuffle sees Matthew Watkins move from outside centre to the wing, with James Simpson-Daniel, who took a knock to his arm last weekend, being rested.

Up front, Ryan keeps faith with the same tight five who blunted Bath's famously fiery pack, with the one change in the pack coming in the back row where Alasdair Strokosch replaces Peter Buxton at openside flanker.

Luke Narraway, a try-scorer and man of the match in the 21-17 win at Bath, deservedly keeps his place at No 8 – and is relishing the challenge of taking on a confident Harlequins side.

He is particularly looking forward to proving his good friend and England team-mate Danny Care's pre-match predictions wrong.

"I know Danny well – he is a good friend of mine through the sevens and the New Zealand tour," said Narraway.

"I spoke to him at the weekend and he was talking things up about how he was coming to Kingsholm and they were going to snatch a victory away.

"So I think they are confident and that shows in the way they have been playing. They have been playing at a high tempo, they haven't been kicking a lot but running and if we don't watch the players they have got, they could take advantage."

Gloucester put their opening-day defeat to Leicester well and truly behind them last weekend – but Narraway knows they need to keep building momentum, starting with this afternoon's match.

Narraway said: "We need to make sure our breakdown work is as good as last week, because we know that Quins are going to watch that and expect us to come after them at the breakdown.

"We also have to make sure that our shape in attack and defence are there again."

Quins field a third different fly-half in three Premiership games this season, with former Bath man Chris Malone stepping into the No 10 shirt.

Gloucester: O Morgan; M Watkins, M Tindall (capt), O Barkley, L Vainikolo; W Walker, G Cooper; N Wood, O Azam, C Nieto, W James, A Brown, A Strokosch, A Hazell, L Narraway. Reps: A Titterrell, A Dickinson, M Bortolami, P Buxton, R Lawson, R Lamb, M Foster.

Harlequins: M Brown; D Strettle, G Tiesi, J Turner-Hall, U Monye; C Malone, D Care; C Jones, T Fuga, M Ross, O Kohn, G Robson, C Robshaw, W Skinner (capt), N Easter. Reps: G Botha, M Lambert, J Evans, T Guest, A Gomarsall, T Williams, W Luveniyali.