Declan Kidney will have a full compliment to choose from ahead of the visit of Wales to Croke Park on Saturday. The Ireland coach will name his team for the fourth RBS Six Nations fixture at lunchtime tomorrow, having seen injury doubts regain fitness and Magners League fixtures pass off without major incident at the weekend.
Kidney took his squad through its paces at Greystones RFC today and the Ireland management reported afterwards that concerns over captain Brian O’Driscoll, fullback Rob Kearney and number eight Jamie Heaslip were no more.
All three took a full part in training today, while Kevin McLaughlin, Shane Jennings and Eoin Reddan – who played in Leinster’s win over Cardiff yesterday - were afforded a rest.
“Everything looks fine on the injury front. Rob Kearney did well, Jamie Heaslip did well and trained fully and Brian trained fully," team manager Paul McNaughton explained afterwards.
"We are reasonably fortunate that there were no real injuries brought back to the squad in relation to the Magners League matches that we played, so all of those guys came through fine."
O’Driscoll took a nasty blow to the head from Paul O’Connell’s knee in the game against England 10 days ago but has done some tests and seen a neurologist since in his bid to be given the all clear for the game against Wales.
Should he line out against Wales it will be his 100th appearance for Ireland.
Both he and Heaslip are sure to be named in the starting XV tomorrow, but Kearney, who missed the England game with a knee injury, could find himself playing back-up to Geordan Murphy, who impressed in his absence against Martin Johnson’s side.
“We’re fortunate that we’re in that position that we have two quality full backs to choose from," said McNaughton.
"They are both very experienced players now, Rob is experienced now and Geordan (Murphy) has been around a long time. The fact we have the two; we wouldn’t have had that two years ago.”