Fly-halves Johnny Sexton and Joey Carbery are both set to be fit for Ireland’s Guinness Six Nations clash with France next weekend, while CJ Stander could also make his return.
Carbery has been battling a hamstring injury and Sexton has also been on a reduced training workload since the Round Three win over Italy.
But speaking at an open training session in Belfast, head coach Joe Schmidt was positive about both men’s prospects of being ready to go when Les Bleus head to Dublin in Round Four.
“They are both on track,” said Schmidt. “Johnny is certainly ahead of Joey. Johnny is going to be fine, he’ll train next week. We’re hoping Joey will be fit to train, potentially on Wednesday.
“If he can train Wednesday and do Friday then that’s sufficient lead-in that he can be in contention, so we’ll just have to wait and see, more so on Joey, but we’d be very confident about Johnny.”
No.8 Stander suffered a facial fracture in the 32-20 defeat to England in the opening round of this year’s Guinness Six Nations – causing him to miss the victories over Italy and Scotland.
But the Munster powerhouse has now recovered and Schmidt intimated he will be in contention for a place in the squad next weekend.
Schmidt said: “CJ Stander is fine, he’s running around refreshed; he’s very keen to be in the mix.”
There was further positive injury news for Ireland, as they look to keep their Championship title hopes on track against France, with Dan Leavy and Robbie Henshaw both back in training.
Back-rower Leavy hasn’t appeared in this year’s Guinness Six Nations due to a calf injury, and hasn’t played a competitive game of rugby since December 22, while centre Henshaw has missed the last two rounds with a hamstring issue.
And Schmidt was pleased to have them back with the squad for the training session at Queen’s University Belfast.
“Dan Leavy and Robbie Henshaw trained [Friday] morning, so we’ve got them on a slightly different programme,” said Schmidt.
“Dan is on track to train potentially on Tuesday and hopefully he’ll train Tuesday, Wednesday, Friday, and Robbie is on the same kind of path at the moment.
“It’s how they pull up after training; they worked pretty hard on Friday and we’ll get a better idea post that.”
