LEO’S OFF TO A FLIER
Leinster get early season boost as Josh and other top stars return
JOSH VAN DER FLIER and Devin Toner will be among the top Ireland internationals available to Leo Cullen ahead of Leinster’s trip to Scarlets this weekend.
Van der Flier, 25, has not played since injuring a cruciate ligament in Ireland’s Six Nations opener against France in Paris in February.
But the flanker has fully recovered and assistant coach John Fogarty said: “He’s in the rugby programme now which is great for
Ireland and for us.
“He’s up for selection, so it’s becoming difficult now to select teams and that’s what we want, a fella like Josh to come back in now and be competitive, train hard and improve the standard of training.
“There’s a number of guys that will come back into the programme now, they’ll be up for selection this week.” Jack Conan has also returned to training this week, as Leinster prepare for a second successive road trip and a familiar opponent in Scarlets. The two sides met four times last season, including two clashes at Aviva Stadium in the Champions Cup semi-final and the PRO14 grand final.
The Welsh region were beaten by Ulster last Saturday and lost two out-halves to injury during the game as well as Jon Davies in the warm-up.
Leinster won’t be taking them for granted though, with Fogarty insistent they’ll need to be better than they were in the 33-32 win over Cardiff on Friday night.
“There’s going to be an edge to that game, we played them four times last year, it’s going to be tough,” he said. “When we’re away from home discipline is going to be very important, that we’re not putting ourselves under pressure.”