Problems mount for Kidney

AFTER having his Ireland squad torn apart by injuries and suspensions, Declan Kidney had to stand aside helplessly yesterday as Mother Nature stepped in to take another front-liner off his hands.

Ireland and Munster flanker David Wallace made a rapid exit from Ireland’s camp here in Brisbane yesterday to return home and be with his expectant wife Aileen.

While it was always a possibility that the veteran back rower would be summoned home before the tour’s end, yesterday’s call couldn’t have come at a worse time for the Ireland coach, who has been left to face the Wallabies with just four back rows to his name.

Of the quartet, Chris Henry and Rhys Ruddock are uncapped, the latter having never trained with an Ireland squad until this day last week. Niall Ronan has just two caps to his name, making Leinster’s Shane Jennings the most experienced man out here, with eight Test appearances in his locker, just three of them starts.

“David Wallace has gone home. His wife is expecting a baby imminently and David has gone back to be with her,” confirmed team manager Paul McNaughton yesterday.

“It was known (that he might have to go home), obviously it depended on when the baby was going to be born but he felt that he should be there for the birth and his wife is expected to have the baby in the next couple of days.”

It had been hoped that Wallace would anchor a vastly inexperienced back-row division that will be going up against Rocky Elsom and the ever-more impressive David Pocock. With a despairing chortle, Ireland assistant coach Alan Gaffney yesterday admitted he had never seen a shortage of bodies like it in all his years.

“Just writing them down – Sean O’Brien, Denis Leamy, John Muldoon, Jamie Heaslip, Kevin McLaughlin, Donnacha Ryan, David Wallace – seven,” Gaffney said, understandably managing to miss out another, Lions star and Grand Slammer Stephen Ferris.

“It’s unbelievable. I’ve never seen anything like it. Then you go to locks – Paulie, Leo, use Donnacha [Ryan] as a lock. It’s frightening, actually,” added Gaffney, while admitting that the back row almost picks itself now.

“Well, there’s only four left! Or the alternative is Dan Tuohy at six. There are four back rows left and c’est la vie. Just as long as we don’t have an injury at training.”

The one saving grace for Kidney has been that the personnel carnage hasn’t been mirrored in Gaffney’s own area of command.

“The backs are fine. We’re not missing too many – [Keith] Earlsy and Lukey [Fitzgerald] and that’s about it. The front row is alright. It’s just locks and back rows. But we keep learning,” said the Ireland backs coach, still relishing a tilt at his native country.

“We’ve just got to go into the game and give it a crack. That’s all we can do. The more we keep the ball in hand, the more we keep them under pressure. Because I still think we have the ability of attacking them in midfield, as we did in Croke Park. When you go back and look at the number of line breaks we made, which was significant, and we didn’t finish them off. But that’s been part of the problem.”

McNaughton also revealed yesterday that centre Gordon D’Arcy had been given permission to spend the day south in Melbourne, visiting an Australian expert on groin injuries. The Leinster man hasn’t suffered any relapse here in the southern hemisphere but took the opportunity to get the long-term issue looked at.

“Gordon D’Arcy didn’t train this morning, he’s actually down in Melbourne visiting a specialist for his groin, it was nothing to do with any injuries he’s got on this tour,” said McNaughton.

“We had planned this a few weeks back, he went down with the doctor, he’ll just be away for the day.”