WORLD CUP WARM-UP SCOTLAND v IRELAND, SATURDAY, MURRAYFIELD, 2.15:Kiwi-born Isaac Boss knows he faces stiff competition to make the Ireland squad for the World Cup – but he has a few additional strings to his bow

TIME WAS, not so long ago, when it appeared the three Ireland scrumhalves for the 30-man World Cup squad virtually picked themselves, but not any more. Now it’s one of the simpler equations in the Irish squad, with which the scrumhalves are most readily familiar. Five into three won’t go.

Entering last season and for much of it, the pecking order looked fairly clear-cut, with Tomás O’Leary first-choice, and Eoin Reddan and Peter Stringer backing up – in that order. Behind them came Isaac Boss, while Conor Murray, another Munster product, emerged from nowhere last season so strongly he supplanted two of his provincial team-mates, O’Leary and Reddan, for the successful Magners League run-in.

Muddying the waters further has been the sequence of injuries which bedevilled O’Leary’s campaign. Having missed the November internationals, he was confined to two undistinguished outings against Italy and France before a freakish training accident seriously impaired his vision and effectively ended his season.

And so like Jerry Flannery and Rob Kearney therefore, O’Leary needs game time, most probably starting this Saturday at Murrayfield. Deep down though, one suspects the uncapped Murray remains the outsider of the five, while O’Leary is still the strong-running and big-tackling number nine the Irish coaches want against Will Genia and the Australian backrow come September 17th in Auckland.

Meanwhile, having sacrificed a regular starting role with Ulster to join Leinster, the move not only saw the Kiwi-born Boss win a Heineken Cup winner’s medal but also become a viable foil to Reddan as well as patently improving his game. Boss has won 13 caps, but has only four Test starts, the most recent of which was in the corresponding World Cup warm-up at Murrayfield four years ago. His only cap since two replacement appearances in the ensuing tournament against Georgia and Argentina was a three-minute cameo last November against Samoa.

Innately upbeat, he never lost faith though and his familiarity with his native land won’t count against him either. “It would make it special. One of the matches is in Rotorua, 30 minutes from where I grew up. Every player’s goal is to make a World Cup, without a doubt I’d be broken if I didn’t make it. If I get there, it’s a nice thing that it’s in New Zealand.”

One senses Boss is aware of the pecking order too and talks of “working my way up the ladder” in training and now in the warm-up matches, though here again five won’t go into four matches, much less the three games before the squad cut-off point.

You mention to him that scrumhalf is more competitive than for a long time and he laughs: “Yeah unfortunately. That’s the way it goes. There’s some old ones and some good young boys coming through, so the depth there is strong and, I would say, it would probably have more depth than a lot of positions, which just makes you compete harder and you can sort of take your mind off the prize, I guess.”

What makes it unusual is that they often work together, or are constantly interchanging.

“Yeah, yeah, so when you’re in the gym, or when you’re passing, you’ve always got one eye on the other guy to see what he’s doing, so you’ve always got to better each other. Yeah, it is like that. It’s a funny sort of club.”

Although Reddan was picked ahead of him in most big games, Boss readily agrees the move to Leinster could hardly have worked out much better.

“You couldn’t have imagined in one season coming back with the Heineken Cup. It was disappointing to end the way we did losing to Munster but you’ve got so many good matches and memories and big occasions already, and although I was consistently fighting with Reddser, if one got to start the other generally got a good amount of time, so you always got an opportunity and you knew it was just around the corner to get your chance again.”

He admits Leinster also improved his game. “It’s not just through the competition, it’s due to the set-up the whole way through plus the squad they’ve got assembled there. I’d like to think it’s probably spin-offs off someone like Reddser as well, it brings in such competitiveness in a different environment.”

Specifically, his footwork to the breakdown and service seemed to quicken up to add to his strong defence and running game.

“It’s probably not a measurable thing. You don’t pick it up from week to week, you pick it up from the end of the season and it’s probably not something I’ve sat down and analysed myself but I think it’s probably just a natural progress in different aspects of my game as well.”

Aside from familiarity with his native land, Boss has another important string to his bow when it comes to World Cup selection, namely time at fullback and occasionally on the wing.

“You definitely don’t forget it, and there’s a number of other players who’ve got a lot of versatility in the backs. I’ll put my hand up as well if it means getting me on the pitch. If it’s going to be the difference between me getting on the plane or not I’ll play anywhere, I’ll play 10 if you want me to.”