Kidney: Stringer will bounce back to form

Declan Kidney last night predicted that Peter Stringer will bounce back from his disappointments this season.

In recent months, Stringer has seen his place on the Irish team taken by Eoin Reddan and then suffered the double blow of losing his Munster place to Thomas O’Leary.

But Kidney, who admitted on Newstalk’s ‘Off the Ball’ programme last night, that he agonised over his selection for the final, fully believes the scrum-half will bounce back.

“I have no doubt that Peter will be back,” said Kidney.

“Some people talk about how great players are when they see then on the pitch but for me the real sign of a great player is how he reacts to adversity and the way Peter, Anthony (Foley) and Shaun (Payne) conducted them this week was phenomenal.

“It’s difficult to describe how difficult it is to go to players as good as they are and tell them, sorry I don’t have a game for you this week.

“The only was to describe it is that it is at the opposite end of the spectrum from the joy I felt at the final whistle on Saturday. But they are such good people that they know I have a job to do and they take the disappointment and get on with it.

“They could have crawled under a rock with their disappointment but instead they were the guys encouraging everyone.

“Their attitude was epitomised, for me, in the way the team performed on Saturday,” added Kidney.

Article courtesy of the Evening Echo newspaper.