'It's great to be back training': Joey Carbery ready to do his bit - wherever that may be

Joey Carbery's versatility is an obvious asset to Ireland at this World Cup but the Munster out-half's ankle injury has left him strapped for time and with little option but to concentrate on his primary duties at No.10 before Sunday's opener against Scotland.

The Athy man is Jonathan Sexton's understudy in the pivotal half-back role but he has featured numerous times for Ireland, as well as Leinster and Munster, at full-back. Joe Schmidt also views him as an emergency third-choice scrum-half here in Japan and some even see a role for him at inside-centre as a second play maker.

“Well, I've only trained this week so I've only been really in at around 'tenish'," he said on Wednesday evening Japanese time and on the day when Ireland switched hotels from Chiba to Yokohama on the far side of Tokyo.

"So, I haven't had too much time other than this week to do anything. Hopefully, over the next couple of weeks I'll get in at the other positions but at the moment it has just been at ten.”

Carbery's readiness or otherwise has obvious ramifications for the composition of the 15 and the matchday 23 this weekend. Throwing him in so raw at 15 would be a big call but then options are limited if Rob Kearney is unfit to feature and Andrew Conway or Jordan Larmour start in his stead.

Decisions, decisions.

Still, Carbery has impressed at full-back many times before and it would be far better to see him thrust in there than at, say, nine which would be the case if Conor Murray and Luke McGrath fell victim to injury given he hasn't played the position since he was an U18.

That Carbery is in a position to fill so many holes is a major plus in itself.

Plenty feared the worst when he was carted off after a hugely encouraging start at out-half against Italy in the first of Ireland's four warm-up games. He hasn't played since but the coaching staff always sounded positive and their faith has been rewarded.

“Yeah, it's great to be back training and stuff. The ankle is feeling pretty good. So yeah, I'm pretty happy. There was a couple of nervous days in between from when the injury happened. I'm pretty happy just to be here and, I suppose, it's great that the ankle is kind of healing.”

The task facing him and the others now is simple and, at the same time, difficult.

Ireland know they have to hit the ground running against their Six Nations neighbours in Yokohama but knowing that and doing it are two entirely different prospects. Both sides will, at least, be in the same boat in that regard.

“Having the four test matches in the pre-season was crucial for us,” said Carbery. “There was a lot of learnings we took from it. It's not every year that the first four games of your season are going to be proper test matches so that will set us up quite well.

“Then again, the buzz around the camp this week has been insane and lads have been bouncing off each other. If we can tap into that energy and to what we learned over the pre-season then we hopefully that will stand to us.”