Joe Schmidt has made one change to the team that defeated England 19-9 on March 1st. Remarkably, Leinster captain Jamie Heaslip has sufficiently recovered from three cracked vertebrae in his back, having been kneed by French lock Pascal Pape on February 14th.
Heaslip returns at number eight with Jordi Murphy dropping to the bench despite an impressive performance against England. Murphy also started against Italy when Heaslip was missing due to a shoulder injury.
Tommy O’Donnell drops out of the matchday squad entirely.
“It’s not the easiest of things as a player to stand on the sidelines, being held on a leash a little bit, probably for my own good,” said Heaslip this afternoon.
“I’m a stubborn git. Joe knows that better than anyone. I want to live life at hundred miles an hour. The medical team have been great to get me back on my feet.”
Johnny Sexton trained fully this morning, allaying fears about his hamstring strain. However, Schmidt indicated that Ian Keatley will travel to Cardiff as cover behind Ian Madigan.
“Ian (Keatley) did a great job in Italy for us,” said Schmidt. “He’s a guy we want to keep reasonably close to the squad as we want to develop depth in those pivotal positions. We’ve had an extra scrumhalf here (Isaac Boss) for the week.
“It’s the same with hooker, we’ve had Richardt Strauss here as well.
“Not all of them will travel but Ian might as it’s good for him to see the other guys operating with the team and mapping the team around the pitch.”
Schmidt also played down any concerns about Madigan’s lack of game time at outhalf.
“He’s probably in the top dozen for those who have game time. What he hasn’t had is time at 10 but we needed a 10 with us this week so he has trained a lot at 10 for us . . . he trained on Monday at 10 and then handed over to Johnny.”
Schmidt also referred to Jack McGrath’s performance, which included 17 tackles, in November’s defeat of South Africa as the reason he’s keeping Cian Healy benched.
“Jack has maintained that benchmark but Cian is getting closer to full fitness at each training run. He is going to give us great value off the bench this week.
“For us it was about rewarding the guy who is doing a really good job in the jersey.”
Ireland: R Kearney; T Bowe, J Payne, R Henshaw, S Zebo; J Sexton, C Murray; J McGrath, R Best, M Ross; D Toner, P O'Connell; P O'Mahony, S O'Brien, J Heaslip. Replacements: C Healy, M Moore, S Cronin, I Henderson, J Murphy, E Reddan, I Madigan, F Jones.
