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Rob Kearney has been ruled out of Ireland’s final RBS 6 Nations match against Scotland on Saturday
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The fullback missed last weekend’s overwhelming victory over Italy in Dublin
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Simon Zebo is now poised to continue in the No15 shirt
Rob Kearney has been ruled out of Ireland’s RBS Six Nations match against Scotland on Saturday, paving the way for Simon Zebo to continue at fullback.
The fullback missed the 58-15 victory against Italy last Saturday in Dublin with hamstring trouble and after further assessment on Monday Ireland have been forced to admit defeat in his bif to be fit for their tournament closer.
“The hamstring is still niggling him [Rob] and that means it would be a risk to push him on this week,” head coach Joe Schmidt told Irish Rugby’s official website on Monday.
“We’ve decided to leave that and let him rehab it fully. He’s probably only a week or two away, but that’s too tight to allow us to make a decision here and now.
“Apart from that, we actually came out of the weekend pretty unscathed. A few stitches and a bloody nose for Andrew Trimble but apart from that, everyone else came through okay.”
Uncapped Andrew Conway has been called up as cover, while Jack O’Donoghue — also uncapped — comes into the 35-man squad for training this week.
Munster forward David Kilcoyne has also been brought into the squad as cover for Cian Healy, who was ruled out of the win against the Azzurri with a hamstring injury.
Robbie Henshaw, Andrew Trimble and Keith Earls all received stitches to nasty-looking cuts during the Italy win, but all three will continue training unhindered this week.