1 week Ago By Irishexaminer.com
Just like London buses, you wait for a fit tighthead prop and two come along at once. Tadhg Furlong and Tom O’Toole are both tracking well to be considered for Ireland selection to face Fiji in Dublin on Saturday, augmenting the options provided by Finaly Bealham and the newly capped Thomas Clarkson. Bealham has started both Autumn Nations Series Tests, a loss to New Zealand and narrow victory against Argentina, in the absence of first-choice number three and hamstring-injured Furlong while O’Toole sustained a head knock shortly after coming on as a replacement against the All Blacks and missed the 22-19 win over the Pumas last Friday night.
Clarkson was promoted to the Ireland bench in O’Toole’s place and made a confident start to his Test career at Aviva Stadium and now Ireland boss Andy Farrell could have four fit and available tightheads ahead of Thursday’s team announcement after scrum coach John Fogarty gave an optimistic assessment of Furlong’s chances. Lock/flanker Ryan Baird will miss the third of Ireland’s four Autumn Nations Series games having sustained a head injury shortly after entering the field against Argentina as a replacement. “Ryan is out, yeah”, Fogarty said on Tuesday.
“And the two boys are back in, they trained today. Hopefully they will get through the week.” If Furlong does come through it will almost certainly mean a 79th Ireland cap for the British & Irish Lion Test front rower and Fogarty said he was “full of energy”.
“So, yeah, he got through the session today and he will be assessed as we go along. “I’d say bullish, he’s eager to get back and excited to be in and around the team again. It’s lonely when you’re outside of that.
He’s excited to be in and around the team, and we are excited as well. “He’s back on time. He’s ready to go.
If he was back last week and ready to go, he would have been up for selection and then the coaches will decide. He is back in training and he has got through that session today.” Fogarty was also bullish about his options on the other side of the front row, despite concerns outside of the IRFU that the depth of talent in Irish loosehead props is thin beyond first-choice Andrew Porter and 37-year-old back-up Cian Healy, who is set to surpass Brian O’Driscoll as Ireland’s most capped player should he earn his 134th appearance this Saturday.
“It's very exciting,” the national scrum coach said. “We went on an EI (Emerging Ireland) tour. Alex Usanov is someone that I was almost going, 'Jesus, we're playing against the Cheetahs and Force and how is this kid going to get on?', and he did incredibly well.
"There's been consistently some nice looseheads coming out of our (Under) 20s each year. Getting them gametime is so important. The AIL is so important for them to learn on the move.
“We brought Jordan Duggan on that tour because we wanted to make sure he's getting a nudge. Sometimes players, maybe they don't believe they can make the step, maybe they don't believe they're on coaches' minds. "We're not a huge country, we're looking at every single loosehead that's playing competitive rugby in the provinces.
“We're watching very, very closely. Paddy (McCarthy) in Leinster, Leinster have quite a few, Jack Boyle has been in camp with us and has one a great job. He's been very competitive, I think he's learning on the run and he's someone that we're excited about, he's someone Leinster are excited about.
“Michael Milne is a guy we've had in camp before, and then there's Tom O'Toole who we've explored and consistently went down the line of loose and tight. “Mikey Milne competing hard, Jeremy Loughman, Jack Boyle, we'll see what we do with Tom O'Toole, I don't see looseheads and tightheads the same way anymore and why not?..
. There's a good stock of players there, we need them playing rugby. “We didn't mention Cian Healy or Andrew Porter because they're there.
All those players need to be pushing, need to be stressing their coaches to get gametime, to play rugby. I'm confident, I've seen them through the U20s, I've seen them develop. There's no reason why they can't step up.
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