Zebo recovery gathering pace

Munster star Simon Zebo will tomorrow take another step towards proving his fitness for Sunday’s Heineken Cup quarter-final against Harlequins at The Stoop.

The Ireland wing broke the fifth metatarsal in his right foot in the opening minutes of the Six Nations game with England on February 10 and was not initially pencilled in for a return to action until Munster’s RaboDirect Pro12 clash with Leinster at Thomond Park on April 13.

The Cork flyer returned to training last week, however, and after coming through yesterday’s session he will be asked to work flat out in Cork tomorrow ahead of Rob Penney’s team selection for the clash with the English Premiership champions and Heineken Cup top seeds in Twickenham.

The result may still hurt but Munster returned to the training ground for the first time since their 51-24 league defeat in Glasgow last Friday night with no fresh injury worries.

Fly-half Ronan O’Gara suffered a cut to the head in Scotstoun and was withdrawn as a precaution during the second half while No.8 James Coughlan took a bang to his shoulder but both trained as normal yesterday, as did Denis Hurley (hamstring). Sean Dougall (knee), Keith Earls (shoulder) and Luke O’Dea (hand) all missed last weekend’s worst defeat for Munster in nine years and are ruled out of this week’s game, leaving lock Donnacha Ryan as the only serious doubt, having played through the pain of a severely bruised AC joint in his shoulder for Ireland during the Six Nations.

Ryan’s Test cohorts Peter O’Mahony and Conor Murray look set to return for the European showdown while back row Dave O’Callaghan came through his comeback for Dolphin on Friday against Cork Con showing no-ill effects from a knee injury that has kept him out since the New Year.