Sean Cronin gives Joe Schmidt something to chew on

Sean Cronin has shipped a few blows lately.

A mistimed tackle against Exeter Chiefs earlier this month left his two front gnashers looking like a set of Alpine peaks but it was the omission from Joe Schmidt’s Ireland squad for the November internationals that was the real kick in the teeth.

“I haven’t spoken to him since November,” he says of the Ireland coach. “At the time it was just that he thought that I didn’t hit the ground running at the start of the season, which was probably fair enough, and other guys had played well.

“I felt that I was coming back after basically nine months injured. I’d my hamstring (injury) and then I had my neck. I probably wasn’t given much wiggle room, but I probably didn’t hit the ground running so...”

It’s clear that the decision to cut him didn’t sit well but Cronin sought to turn a negative into a positive by banking needed game time at provincial level, which he managed against Dragons and Treviso.

The first of those runs, a 54-10 thumping of Bernard Jackman’s Welsh region at the RDS, was banked less than 24 hours before Ireland wrapped up their month’s work against Argentina about a kilometre down the Ballsbridge road.

Rory Best, Rob Herring, and his Leinster colleague James Tracy had all availed of game time in green over the three weekends but Cronin wasn’t the type to chuck his TV at the wall — or switch the channel — in frustration.

“I wouldn’t be that bitter,” he said with a touch of bemusement. “I wouldn’t be watching the Coronation Street omnibus when the Ireland matches are going on. No, I enjoyed it and they did well and that is all they can do.

“Again, I use it more in a positive frame of mind. Deep down, at the end of the day, I think I am good enough to get back in. I know if I can play well, and I can put in the performances here, I think I can do enough to get back in. And hopefully that will happen.”

He isn’t privy to the thoughts in Schmidt’s head. Whether his omission was just the “bit of a kick I needed” or if the Ireland gaffer has already scratched him from his list as he looks ahead to the challenge of the 2019 World Cup in Japan.

The phone, he insists, is always on.

Whatever Schmidt’s reservations about a player who has earned a huge amount of his 141 Leinster caps and 56 Ireland appearances under the Kiwi’s watchful eye, they weren’t shared by Leo Cullen who started him for both European ties against the Chiefs.

Cronin has always been labelled an impact replacement. It’s a tag that has clearly irked him — and did again when raised this week — even if he has always acknowledged its usefulness in earning him squad spots at the expense of others.

It was annoying enough for him to contemplate the prospect of looking abroad a few seasons back but the Leinster coaching staff challenged him to prove otherwise at the start of this season and taking the odd hit for his team has been part of that.

He landed himself with a yellow card for a high but try-saving tackle against Exeter over in Sandy Park and he’s needed more than just the one visit to the dentist since his poorly-time rush into Don Armand’s shoulder at the Aviva Stadium.

“Eating turkey out of the side of your mouth is not ideal, like. I’m still trying to talk properly with them. It’s not ideal, like, but part and parcel of it. Some of the lads have actually been slagging me about it.

“They’re saying I look a bit better with the new ones now than I did. One of them is still loose so I still don’t know what’s going to happen there. That’s the sore one, it could be coming out. The other one isn’t too bad.”

He has already featured in seven Six Nations campaigns and knows that the chances of having a bite off an eighth will depend on a hectic run of big games with Leinster in the coming weeks, and one that starts with Connacht on New Year’s Day.

It was his switch from Munster to Connacht that earned him regular game time and a first cap with his country and he is likely to return to action on Monday against his former club having been rested for the St Stephen’s Day visit to his other former club in Limerick.

Aiming for international honours is all very well but maintaining the faith of Cullen and his staff at Leinster will be a job in itself as the competition for places continues to stiffen and the apex of the season moves ever closer.

“A lot of these guys coming in (against Munster), you saw what it meant to them to get that big opportunity,” he says.

It’s unlikely any of them have the edge on Cronin when it comes to motivation.