DAN LEAVY HAD a fitness this morning but failed it, meaning Josh van der Flier starts at openside for Ireland against the All Blacks tomorrow.
Leavy wasn’t present at the Aviva Stadium this afternoon as Ireland went through their captain’s run and his absence meant the IRFU were unable to explain his injury beyond indicating that he was ruled out with “general tightness.”
Pressed for further clarity, Ireland’s media officer mentioned “a general movement amongst the players controlling their own information.”
Source: James Crombie/INPHO
Essentially, Ireland’s media officer had not had the opportunity to speak directly to Leavy about his injury and, therefore, said he was not in a position to go into further depth – the player himself having the right to decide whether his medical information is made public.
Leavy may be willing for the nature of his injury to be revealed in due course but for now, all we know for certain is that the openside will not be playing for Ireland tomorrow.
Instead, van der Flier is promoted to the starting team after being named on the bench yesterday, with Jordi Murphy taking his replacement spot.
With Sean O’Brien also having been ruled out of this game, Ireland are essentially down to their third-choice openside but van der Flier certainly doesn’t leave Joe Schmidt’s team weak in the seven shirt. Indeed, his quality underlines Ireland’s depth.
The 25-year-old has played against the All Blacks twice before, coming off the bench in both games against the Kiwis in 2016 and playing three-quarters of each fixture, replacing Jordi Murphy in the first and CJ Stander in the second.
Now, van der Flier gets his starting shot against the best team in the world.
Losing Leavy at this stage is obviously disruptive for Ireland, although Leavy didn’t train with the team yesterday so van der Flier is well-positioned to slot in comfortably.
Source: Billy Stickland/INPHO
Ireland lost Robbie Henshaw to a hamstring injury just before kick-off against Argentina last week, with Will Addison starting in his place, so they feel they can adapt too.
“It’s something we’ve had to deal with last week, we also dealt with it a couple of years ago with Jamie Heaslip [in the 2017 Six Nations],” said Ireland captain Rory Best.
“Dan came onto the bench that day and came into the game quite early.
“It’s something that Josh trained in quite a bit of yesterday, they all slot in the back rows.
And especially someone like Josh, you know he’s going to have been diligent regardless of where he’s been sat in the squad.