The squad for round three of the 2018 Six Nations is due to be announced on Monday morning.
Joe Schmidt will get his Ireland players back, at Carton House, this evening after most of them had a few days off.
Ireland broke up for three days, amid their championship campaign, after two days of training and tactical work in Athlone. Schmidt retained 21 players for the open training session at Dubarry Park, with Tadhg Furlong, Iain Henderson and James Ryan all present but not taking a full part in proceedings.
Munster hooker Niall Scannell was the only new face in the crowd but Schmidt may bring in two more backs after recent injury developments.
Ireland have, thus far, lost Josh van der Flier, Robbie Henshaw and Luke McGrath since the championship started, but we remain confident that we have their matchday 23 for the upcoming Wales game:
Confirmation from provinces means we can confidently predict Ireland's team to play Wales https://t.co/plou7nXevr
— SportsJOE (@SportsJOEdotie) February 16, 2018
Scannell is expected to be called up for the Wales game and Schmidt’s big call looks to be between getting Munster’s Rory Scannell back up to Carton House or bringing in Garry Ringrose for a look. The Leinster centre did not play against Scarlets and is likely to feature against Southern Kings, next weekend, but Schmidt may bring him in for a look.
Ringrose and Sean O’Brien, who is set to be left to focus on Leinster duties, are in line to return for the Scotland game, on February 10. Both men may visit Ireland’s training headquarters, albeit for a day, to be kept up to speed.
With Luke McGrath now out with a knee injury, Schmidt is likely to have Kieran Marmion backing up Conor Murray in the Wales game. John Cooney is in line for a call-up, though.
The Ulster scrum-half has had a fine season, despite his team’s struggles, and scored all of their points in Friday’s loss to Edinburgh, at Ravenhill. His selection in a wider training squad makes sense as he is the next man up should either Murray or Marmion pick up a knock.
With Guinness PRO14 games scheduled for next weekend, Schmidt will release five or six of his squad members for provincial duty later in the week.
This is how the Ireland squad should look:
FORWARDS
Cian Healy, Dave Kilcoyne, Rory Best, Sean Cronin, Tadhg Furlong, John Ryan, Niall Scannell, Jack McGrath, Andrew Porter, Devin Toner, Iain Henderson, James Ryan, Peter O’Mahony, Dan Leavy, CJ Stander, Jordi Murphy, Jack O’Donoghue, Jack Conan.
BACKS
Johnny Sexton, Conor Murray, Kieran Marmion, Joey Carbery, Ian Keatley, Fergus McFadden, Rob Kearney, Keith Earls, Chris Farrell, Bundee Aki, Jacob Stockdale, Jordan Larmour, Rory Scannell.
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