'Are you ready, kid?' - Kilcoyne on 'worst injury ever' and Ireland return

LATE INCLUSION: Ireland’s Conor Murray, Jack Conan and Dave Kilcoyne celebrate in Cardiff. Pic: ©INPHO/Dan Sheridan

It was only four words but Paul O’Connell couldn’t have made Dave Kilcoyne feel any better last Saturday had he poured sweet nothings into the prop’s ear for hours without end.

Cian Healy’s unavailability for the Six Nations opener was still to be confirmed publicly when O’Connell, the Ireland forwards coach, bumped into Kilcoyne at the elevator in the team hotel and told him nothing and everything.