Josh Van der Flier 'at peace' with Lions fate whether or not he makes touring squad

AT PEACE: Leinster's Josh van der Flier applauds the fans after the game. Pic: ©INPHO/Laszlo Geczo

Whatever about Leinster’s uncanny knack of hitting the bar when it comes to the biggest prize on offer, Josh van der Flier will be hoping it can be a case of third time lucky when the British and Irish Lions squad is revealed in London on Thursday.

The Leinster flanker was just 24 when the 2017 party was revealed. Injured and going through rehab at the time with Luke Fitzgerald, a tourist from eight years before, he remembers his then teammate all but ignoring the announcement.

Fitzgerald wasn’t going to be fit in time, he wasn’t in the head space to pay heed.

By 2021, van der Flier was Ireland’s starting openside. He had over 30 caps and was already starting to play the sort of rugby that would see him named World Player of the Year the following year. It didn’t matter. Warren Gatland overlooked him again.

The Wicklow man watched that announcement at home on a day off. Wales’ Justin Tipuric and Hamish Watson of Scotland got the nod in his position.

Then, when Tipuric got injured, Gatland turned to Josh Navidi instead as cover.

Now, here we are again.

This latest Lions ‘reveal’ will be either an extravagant or a bloated spectacle at the Indigo at the O2 venue, depending on your taste, with a two-hour live show, starting at lunchtime.

Van der Flier and his Leinster teammates will be deep into a training day by then.

He makes no bones about the import of it, though.

Playing for Ireland is special and unique in its own way, but it is hard to argue with his appraisal that being picked for a Lions is “the pinnacle in terms of individual selections”.

This is a squad for the best of the best in this part of the world.

“At the start of the season I put a bit of pressure on myself because obviously I’m 32 now. You never know [come 2029], but I decided early in the season I’m just going to play my best, try my hardest and try and just forget about it and take it out of my control.

“That’s where my head is at. I’m at peace with it, whether I’m involved or not. I’m trying to be anyway.”

It’s hard to say if he will make it this time or not.

Leinster’s shock loss to Northampton Saints last Saturday has seen their stock, collectively and individually, drop. The question is whether that causes any reappraisal on the part of Andy Farrell who is still expected to lean heavily on an Irish axis in Australia.

Van der Flier is one of those players who, at least in the public’s eye, is borderline to make that plane.

Of 13 predicted squads this writer has seen this week, most of them in English publications, he made six.

Others are in the same boat. Guys like Robbie Henshaw and Jack Conan.

Whatever the breakdown, Leinster will still be bulk suppliers to that squad but the boon that will come for those included won’t be enough to laser the scars left from that Saints semi-final defeat when another tilt at a fifth Champions Cup star came up short.

Van der Flier spent a good chunk of the next day playing golf and, while he was frustrated with his game by the end of the 18 holes, it had at least provided a different focus and outlet for any negative energy built up from the day before.

He looked back on it all this week and rued some of the “small margins” but it is worrying to hear players and coaches speak since about “effort errors”, as he termed them, being tired or, in Leo Cullen’s case, not being clued in to the Saints attacking threat.

These are basics, after all. At any level of rugby.

For all that, Leinster probably would, and should, have won it only for a controversial decision by referee Pierre Brousset not to award a penalty try when Alex Coles illegally stripped van der Flier when inches from the line in the dying seconds.

Would he have grounded it otherwise? Was he even thinking of grounding it? Truth is, he doesn’t know.

“You are playing with instincts or whatever. Sometimes you do things in a game and you don’t know how you did it, but it worked great.

"I definitely was thinking of trying to get to the line when I was carrying, but it’s hard to think back to the moment exactly.”