Ireland captain Johnny Sexton ‘ahead of schedule’ in recovery from knee injury

The fly-half has not played since suffering a knee problem in early December.

Ireland captain Johnny Sexton gave his team a boost on Wednesday ahead of the Guinness Six Nations opener against Scotland in nine days by declaring himself ready to train fully.

Andy Farrell’s 35-man squad will on Thursday begin a training camp on Portugal’s Algarve coast as they ramp up preparations for their championship round one game at home to the Scots a week on Saturday and veteran fly-half Sexton will take a full part in the opening session at the Campus in Quinta do Lago, having recovered from the knee injury he sustained in Leinster’s Champions Cup trip to Northampton Saints on December 7.

His availability to face Scotland at the Aviva Stadium in Farrell’s first game since succeeding Joe Schmidt as head coach after the 2019 World Cup had been in question but Sexton gave an upbeat update during Wednesday’s Six Nations launch in London’s Docklands.

"Yeah, good, everything's been going to plan so hopefully I'll take a full part in training tomorrow,” Sexton said.

"Once I don't have any setbacks, everything's gone really well so far, everything's gone to plan and, if anything, I'm a little bit ahead of schedule. Once everything goes smoothly over the next few days, I should be fine and available for selection."

Farrell also gave positive updates on injured Leinster duo, full-back Jordan Larmour and uncapped hooker Ronan Kelleher.

Larmour suffered what his province described as a “low grade” foot injury at Benetton last weekend and the Ireland boss said: “He's still nursing an injury.

“We've had a few days off, so nothing too taxing. We met up yesterday and had a bit of a walkthrough, so he was able to partake in that but we will have to take it day-by-day. I don't think it's anything too serious but how that plays out in the next few days, we'll see."

As for Kelleher, a revelation for Leinster in his first full season and one of five uncapped players in the Ireland squad named last week, the hooker was declared ready to go by Farrell following the hand injury he sustained in the same game Sexton hurt his knee.

"He's fully fit, he's through all his protocols now. We're training in Portugal tomorrow and he's full steam ahead.

“Along with a few other names, there are some new guys in there who are going to freshen the squad up. They're in because they deserve to be in there, it's not just a matter of freshening things up, it's a matter of picking people that's in good form. Ronan has been injured for a few weeks but he's been in good form and Johnny, before he got injured, was on fire. So we feel we've got a 36-man squad that are really in a good place, really playing well, competition for places is at a premium for us, which is the way we want it."

Sexton, 34, also spoke of his honour at being asked to captain his country.

"I think everyone would want to be captain but it's about someone wanting you to do it and that's the biggest honour you can be asked to do. I

“It meant a lot that Andy asked me to do it, that he thought that I was the one to lead us forward into this campaign. It's obviously a campaign-by-campaign thing at the moment and we'll see how we go and see how everything goes over the next eight weeks.”