RUGBY: The extent to which the Irish management were picking from a full-strength squad of 24 for Saturday's RBS Six Nations game against France last night was unclear prior to the team announcement today. Of their recuperating players, Shane Horgan seemingly remained more doubtful than Ronan O'Gara or Girvan Dempsey.
Dempsey and Horgan, both ruled out of the Italian match through injury, had been added to the 22-man squad which was on duty in Rome, while O'Gara had also been recalled in place of Paul Burke. O'Gara has proved his return to fitness and form after a four-week absence with an ankle injury by scoring 16 points in Cork Constitution's win over over UL Bohemians on Saturday.
By comparison, neither Dempsey nor Horgan played over the weekend, and their fitness was being assessed behind closed doors yesterday. In the absence of any official word from the Irish camp yesterday, Horgan would seem the more doubtful, given an initial prognosis of a four to six-week absence due to the torn quadricep muscle he sustained against the Scots over three weeks ago, while Dempsey has been inching his way back from the troublesome groin he aggravated against the Scots.
Akin to the initial announcement of the team to play Italy, one or two either/ors look possible when the team is announced today, though in any event Eddie O'Sullivan and his management team will have had some tricky selection posers, not least with that old chestnut, O'Gara or David Humphreys at outhalf.
O'Gara would have come into the championship as the form player and the incumbent were it not for Brett Sinkinson's stud marks in the Celtic League final. In his absence Humphreys has scored 43 points in two high-quality performances, garnished by two tries and 13 placekicks out of 16.
Debate, as ever, has been pretty polarised, and it could be that the management will be swayed by O'Gara's controlled and tactically calming presence for the initial heat of Saturday's battle with the defending Six Nations champions.
However, Humphreys's confidence must be high. He has done little to deserve to be omitted and displacing him now might arguably be more disruptive. It's a tough call to make and Ireland will hardly be weakened by either choice.
If Dempsey is passed fit there may be a stronger temptation to recall the Leinster full back after missing one game, though whether Dempsey regains his full back slot it seems unimaginable that the game-breaking abilities of Geordan Murphy will not be accommodated somewhere.
He too has scored in each of Ireland's wins over Scotland and Italy, thereby taking his strike rate at Test level to 10 tries from 13 games; the try at Murrayfield being an opportunistic effort from his own 22, the one in Italy being a run-in which his speed and reading of the game made look more routine than was actually the case.
Marcus Horan will replace the injured Reggie Corrigan, who underwent surgery on his fractured forearm last Thursday and will be in plaster for four weeks, with Justin Fitzpatrick recalled to the bench. Looking further down the track, Emmet Byrne is back in full training.
France, too, are to announce their side today. There is only one alteration to their 22-man squad which was on duty against Scotland, and similarly only one unforced change is expected to the starting line-up, with Dimitri Yachvili replacing the injured captain Fabien Galthie.
The Agen scrumhalf Mathieu Barrau will be on the bench and Fabien Pelous will regain the captaincy, temporarily at any rate, in what is expected to be an otherwise unchanged side from that which beat the Scots 38-3.
IRELAND (probable): Dempsey/Murphy; Murphy/Kelly, O'Driscoll, Maggs, Hickie; Humphreys, Stringer; Horan, Byrne, Hayes, Longwell, O'Kelly, Costello, Foley, Gleeson. Replacements: Henderson/Kelly, O'Gara, Easterby, Sheahan, Fitzpatrick, Cullen, Quinlan.
