Fresh woe for Connacht as injury set to rule Thornbury out

A POOR week for Connacht has taken another bad turn with confirmation that promising lock Gavin Thornbury will be out for several weeks with a shoulder injury.

Thornbury suffered the injury in the early stages of the game against Scarlets last Saturday week.

“He’s going to be at least November, December potentially, before he is back. It is an AC joint,” said Connacht coach Andy Friend.

“It is (a big setback) but he has a bright future ahead of him. They all want to be playing, every day they want to be playing but that’s the sport we play. It’s a contact sport.

“He only had three minutes in the Scarlets game but in that three minutes he was pretty dynamic and did some good things for us. He has got a very bright future.”

Dave Heffernan, who captained the team in the 20-3 loss to Leinster at the weekend, underwent a scan to establish the extent of an ankle injury on Monday, but Friend is hopeful that squad captain Jarrad Butler may be available for Friday’s trip to Belfast, where Connacht have not won in the professional era and whose last success at Ravenhill was way back in 1960.

“Jarrad trained with us today and we will just check how he pulls out of that but he is integrated back into the programme and hopefully he will be available,” added Friend.

The loss of Thornbury adds to a difficult week with prop Dominic Robertson-McCoy facing a ban for a stamp on Josh van der Flier, while Fijian Sevu Reece is now unlikely to join Connacht after pleading guilty in a domestic assault case in New Zealand.

Reece was due to join Connacht on a two-year deal from Waikato next month but that looks like being withdrawn by the province and the IRFU.

“It’s actually a process I’m not involved in,” added Friend. “We have got a big game this weekend, a six-day turnaround, and that’s where my focus is at the moment.”