Fun is over as Ireland crank up efforts

THE FUN is over and soon the games will commence. While it would be impossible not to enjoy the scenery, the adventures of Queenstown have been set aside as the Irish squad begin to crank up their preparations. Refreshed and rejuvenated, it would also appear as if Ireland’s injury profile is also becoming healthier by the day.

Gordon D’Arcy took only a limited part, “about 30 per cent”, in the week’s first training session prior to Sunday’s opener in New Plymouth – the squad take an early-morning charter to the north island coastal town tomorrow – against the USA. The other late arrival, Cian Healy, had an even lighter session on his own with the fitness staff, and of the two it would appear D’Arcy has a marginally better chance of being involved in the 22 against the USA.

D’Arcy sustained a slightly torn (grade one) calf but reckons he’s had one of those every season for about six years now and, mindful that like many others he needs game time, is keen to be involved come Sunday. Healy’s eye socket injury is more problematic and it seems highly unlikely he will feature in the opener.

Of the others on Declan Kidney’s casualty list, Rob Kearney (whose groin strain has sidelined him since the Bordeaux meeting with France), Brian O’Driscoll (whose shoulder injury has limited him to just one warm-up game at home to France) and Seán O’Brien (who sustained a medial ligament injury against England) all took a full part in training. Admittedly it was not a full-on contact session, though all reported a shift in focus yesterday for what Leo Cullen said was “Test-match mode”. The team will not be finalised until Friday.

Even allowing for whether the management again deem it prudent not to risk some of the above against the USA, Kidney and co assuredly face more selection posers than they may have imagined at this juncture in light of collective and individual form issues in the four August defeats.

Cullen, who became Ireland’s 100th captain against Scotland and France in Bordeaux, must be pushing Donncha O’Callaghan harder than ever given the latter’s relatively-muted performances at home to France and England, though Cullen revealed he had been training with the “opposition” yesterday. At the very least, he has clearly become a highly valued member of the squad, and if nothing else should be on the bench in the opening games as well as perhaps being earmarked for the captaincy in game three against Russia.

In any event, now 33, Cullen must find it somewhat ironic given he never made the cut for either of the previous two World Cups. Part of the vintage Blackrock College dream team which won a Leinster Schools’ Senior Cup medal in 1996 when beating a Newbridge College team including Geordan Murphy, he made his debut as far back as the summer tour here in 2002, when appearing as a sub against the All Blacks in Auckland.

That was the first of 14 caps which Cullen won in Ireland’s 17 Tests before the ’03 World Cup, only missing the 42-6 beating by England in the Grand Slam shoot-out at Lansdowne Road, the 45-16 thrashing by Australia in Perth and the final warm-up win in Murrayfield, only to be miss out to Malcolm O’Kelly, Paul O’Connell, O’Callaghan and Gary Longwell, whose constant battle with injury prevented him from appearing for one minute in that tournament. Missing out then was the low point.

“That was particularly bad. I remember when Eddie (O’Sullivan) rang me in 2007 I was expecting him to call me. I wished the team all the best. Still, in my head, I thought I could have done a job but at the same time I hadn’t been involved. But yeah, 2003 was a pretty tough one alright.

“Those four years in between (the ’03 and ’07 World Cups) were pretty lean internationally. I got two or three caps,” he recalls with a laugh, “when people were away doing other things.”

His two caps in that four-year cycle were at home to Romania in November ’05 and away to Argentina in the summer of ‘07, and in between he was one of the seven unused players on the tour to New Zealand and Australia in ’06.

Under Kidney, he has been involved in all of Ireland’s matches over the last two campaigns yet, in what he admits has been a slightly unfulfilling international career, he has added only another 30 caps in the intervening nine years, and 17 of his 31 Tests have been as a replacement.

“I still feel as if I’ve a lot to prove in terms of international rugby. I just feel that I’ve a lot to give. My international career hasn’t always gone the way I would have liked it but it is nice to be involved. I certainly wouldn’t have thought that four years ago. I would have thought my chance had gone.

“You always kind of have that doubt – you don’t think you’ll be able to play on or how long you’ll actually play for. To be honest I probably feel better now than I did four years ago physically, but I do feel as if I’ve a point to prove and I’m just looking forward, hopefully, to getting an opportunity to showcase myself.”

Cullen returned from a very rewarding stint at Leicester to Leinster after the ’07 tournament and in the intervening years has been a two-time Heineken Cup captain, and unlike four years ago is no longer struggling with shoulder injuries. “I had surgery last May, and I wasn’t really too sure how that would go. I had surgery before and it didn’t really go that well, and I was just struggling training and playing, and constantly dislocating my shoulder in games and coming off. You have to play tricks with your body to get through in many ways, but I don’t have those kind of issues now.”