Elwood hopeful McCarthy and Browne will be fit for Connacht’s return trip to Biarritz

Connacht coach Eric Elwood is hoping to boost his squad with the return of a couple of heavyweights for Friday’s crucial Heineken Cup visit to Biarritz.

Though flanker Willie Faloon is ruled out with a fractured eye socket, Elwood is hopeful both Mike McCarthy and Andrew Browne, who missed yesterday’s training session having suffered knocks in Friday night’s win over the French, will be fit. While both Eoin Griffin and Mata Fifita are still a few weeks away from a return to action, the good news for Elwood is the possible return of prop Nathan White (calf), veteran lock Michael Swift (groin) and No.8 George Naoupu (foot) who all came through a run yesterday. “They went through a good rehab run today so we are hoping they can partake again. The signs are encouraging.”

Their return would be a timely boost for Connacht, whose youngsters prevailed 22-14 over a physical Biarritz in the Sportsground on Friday night, but Elwood is expecting a tougher challenge in the Basque region this week.

“It was a special night, a great result, and the manner in which we won was encouraging, but we are firmly keeping our feet on the ground because we are expecting a backlash. The key for us is we are going with a positive mentality to push on, and the challenge for us is to see if we can back it up in their garden.”

Elwood believes the French got their tactics wrong last week.

“We always said if we got the win last weekend, it keeps us in the pool and to be in the pool you have to win home games. We are looking forward to this return fixture. Biarritz may feel they got it wrong, but tactically we got it right. To be fair to our forward pack we nullified their strengths which was very important and we are not going to change our tactics now.”