Dan Leavy enters final straight in marathon rehab programme

Dan Leavy during a Leinster gym session last December. Photo by Ramsey Cardy/Sportsfile

Rugby's return, like so much else, remains up in the air but Dan Leavy will be fit and ready to play his part for club and country when it does.

The highly-rated flanker suffered a horrendous knee injury playing for Leinster during last season's Heineken Champions Cup quarter-final win over Ulster at the Aviva and has spent the past 12 months undergoing surgery and ploughing ahead with rehab.

The Dubliner damaged anterior and posterior ligaments in the joint and had to wait a month just to undergo the first operation. Another four-week window had to be endured before he could even begin the process of rehabbing.

Leinster operations manager Guy Easterby paid rich tribute to the player and physio Karl Denver on a conference call this afternoon, joking that the pair have been looking “into each other's eyes” on video calls having spent so much time getting the Ireland player back up to speed.

“Dan was very much at the end of that process [before the shutdown], he was very close to the end,” said Easterby. “Not at the end but very close to the end. Dan's bits now are the small percentages as opposed to the really big work. A lot of that he can do on his own.

“It's not like he hasn't gone through the processes in terms of a weekly schedule of what his rehabilitation looks like. Committing like he has throughout the whole process, he's been fantastic. It was obviously a very significant injury.

"He isn't a million miles away at all, Dan, and I think it's just the final pieces and making sure he's being kept in touch with, building up his strength a bit more. He's getting the running under his belt and he's not getting a bad reaction to that, so I'd say it's very positive from Dan's end.

“I would expect when we can get back up and playing, it's more than likely he's going to be available at that time."

Jack Conan, another long-term absentee after the foot injury he suffered at last year's World Cup, had returned to training a fortnight before the coronavirus brought society to a halt, as did the versatile back Rory O'Loughlin.

Prop Ed Byrne was another poised to put his hand up for some game time until everyone's plans were altered while Cian Healy (hip), Harry Ringrose (hand), Conor O'Brien (hamstring) and Vakh Abdeladze (back) are all continuing with their return-to-play programmes.