The Munster forward trained on Tuesday and Wednesday
Joe Schmidt says Ireland went into the 2019 Guinness Six Nations with ‘a different brief’. Tadhg Beirne has yet to force himself into that brief.
Schmidt rarely drops his players, in public anyway. To the press, he will talk about wanting to look at other players, of the excluded players being injured or carrying knocks. One of his go-to lines is telling the room a certain player could have started ‘at a push’.
It is rare for him to concede a player has been left out due to technical or tactical issues. Make no mistake about it, though, Sean O’Brien and Sean Cronin were both dropped for the France game [Cronin didn’t even make the 37-man squad] as they were not at it against Italy.
Ultan Dillane, two handling errors aside, had a fine game and that has been enough to stave off the challenge of Tadhg Beirne. The Munster lock was ruled out of the England and Scotland games with a knee injury but has not been required to gear up for Italy or France.
Schmidt went with a starting second row of James Ryan and the fit again Iain Henderson, with Dillane covering off the bench. What of Beirne?
“As tempted as we were with Tadhg Beirne, he’s been a little bit sore this week as he’s still coming back after injury.
“Ultan Dillane has played really well for us. His tackle count was very high against Italy, the number of positive involvements he was involved in were really good as well so we wanted to reward that performance.”
Schmidt returned to the Beirne question, Schmidt said he was ‘a bit sore’. He trained Tuesday and Wednesday but missed the Friday session [but the starting XV would have already been known within the squad by then]. The former Leinster and Scarlets lock was man-of-the-match in his comeback game for Munster, against Ospreys, but Schmidt and his coaching staff are not convinced.
As it currently stands, the best Beirne can hope for would be a bench role in the final Six Nations game against Wales. That is if Ireland beat France. Should they lose, Schmidt could re-jig his squad again but that could leave Ireland open for a doing against the in-form Welsh.
Barry Murphy – on Baz & Andrew’s House of Rugby – was one of the multitude calling for the Kildare native to be pitched in from the start against France. He declared:
“Beirne’s ball-carrying is excellent and that is the one thing we are missing at the moment – a guy that will get in there and slow the ball down. He is arguably the best in the northern hemisphere at doing it. Stick him in your team.”
Beirne, as it transpired, will be stuck watching the action unfold from afar.
He played Ospreys like a man frustrated and a man possessed. There is no Munster match this weekend so no opportunity to blow off some steam and build up match practice.
Beirne is having a third great season in a row and is, once again, leading the turnover stats in the Guinness PRO14 and in Europe. Schmidt claims he has seen enough of him to know what he can bring to the mix.
Right now, Schmidt is happy to go against the masses and leave one of the country’s best player out of his matchday 23.
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