Despite a frustratingly slow recovery period from the torn calf he sustained in the build-up to the warm-up game against Italy, John Hayes is confident he is still on course to be fit in time for the World Cup.
Hayes has only played 50 minutes of rugby, in a pre-season friendly for Munster against Rotherham, since the Grand Slam decider against England in March due to a troublesome groin problem which forced him to miss the summer tour, whereupon he suffered a slight tear in his calf during scrummaging practice five days before the Italian game.
"I could have done without it," he said with deliberate understatement yesterday, when admitting it will be a "tight" squeeze in making it back in time for the World Cup.
"This is the third week of the recovery. I spent the first week on crutches and I'm only back to a slow jog now. I've been slowly but surely picking it up and I hope to be doing some exercises next week."
He admits he doesn't want to set a comeback date in stone, but will travel out with the Irish squad to Sydney on Monday week and maintains he is "very hopeful of being right for the start of the World Cup and even the week before it".
"I know I'll need games then but while there's no good time for these things to happen, if it had happened two or three weeks later it would have been a lot worse. I've missed out on the warm-up games but hopefully I'll be right for the World Cup."
Hayes is one of five Shannon players in the 30-man Irish World Cup squad, the others being Peter Stringer, Alan Quinlan, Anthony Foley and Marcus Horan, and the five-time winners of the All-Ireland League yesterday unveiled a new jersey as part of an announcement that 02 has become the senior team's sponsor in a three-year deal.
