O’Gara to Kidney: That’s sport

Theirs was never the warmest relationship in Irish sport, so when Ronan O’Gara was asked for his thoughts on the axing of fellow Corkman, ex-Irish coach Declan Kidney, nobody was anticipating powder and petals.

But if the Munster legend was short of sympathy for his old mentor, O’Gara clearly empathised with the feeling of being let wither on the vine.

“That’s sport,” he shrugged yesterday. “I thought for the Scottish game, I was the better option [at out-half], that for a crucial away game, I could have done the job. Then you can just walk off into the sunset happy. But that’s the way it goes.