O’Driscoll winning fitness race

IRELAND captain Brian O’Driscoll is making good progress in his effort to prove his fitness to face South Africa at the Aviva Stadium in eight days.

O’Driscoll has been out of action since straining a hamstring in Leinster’s Heineken Cup victory over Racing Metro at the RDS on October 9 and has played no part in training with Ireland during the national squad’s camp in Limerick this week.

The Ireland and Lions centre, though, has been responding well to rehabilitation during his time with Declan Kidney’s squad and Ireland defence coach Les Kiss said yesterday: “Brian is working very hard and over the last two or three days he has put in some good rehab work with the medical staff who are doing a fantastic job there.

“Talking to him today after the session he was very happy where he ended up, so he has another (rehabilitation) session tomorrow and a couple of days’ rest where he will obviously be doing a little bit of stuff and we will see how he goes after that.”

Kidney has further concerns at outside centre where Munster’s Keith Earls is battling an ankle injury and has not trained all week in Limerick. Earls will also sit out training today to continue his rehabilitation programme before the squad disperses for the weekend.

The Ireland players will reassemble in Dublin on Monday ahead of the opening game of the autumn international series against the Springboks on November 6 and defence coach Kiss said he was pleased with the progress made during the first week of training.

“It’s been fantastic so far,” he said.

“The guys, I have to compliment them. They’ve come here and embraced the new ideas that the coaching staff have put on the table, they’ve added their own bits to the mix and we’re grateful that they’ve put in such a good performance for the week.”