BODY SETS TONE
Devin fighting fit & relishing step up
DEVIN TONER is at peace with whatever happens in his career now.
His 34- year- old body feels “surprisingly good” and he may well be calling t h e l i n e out i n yet anoth e r bi g European game tomorrow. w.
But Toner knows Ireland’s nd’s c a l l may n e v e r c o me e a g a i n . He w a s J o e
Schmidt’s shock omission from the World Cup squad but then brought back in by Andy Farrell
( circle) for the Six Nations.
H e p l a y e d a g a i n s t Scotland , Wales and England. Yet when the Six Na t i o n s f i n i s h e d i n October, he wasn’t there.
“I’m a little bit at peace with it,” Toner said. “Andy rang me and said, ‘ You’re not in the squad but you’re still on the periphery, you’ve got to keep working hard’.
“We’ve a little 12- week- old. I would’ve found it fairly hard to leave my wife and two children to go into camp for eight weeks and not be able to go home.
“It would have been fairly hard for her not having the help. So it was probably a blessing in disguise that I wasn’t involved. “
He added: “If I don’t get picked again, I ’ve got 70 caps for Ireland. I ’ve won a fair bit and I ’ve played well when I did. So I ’d probably be happy enough.
“But, on the f lip side, if I get picked and I get called upon to play, I’ ll absolutely put my heart and soul into it.”
And the future? Toner is one of the near 90 pros out of contract next summer and he’ ll have talks with the IRFU in the new year.
“Before this year, it was see how the body y holds up and, at the minute, I ’m feeling fee really good and I thin think I can play on,” said th the giant Meathman.
“I think I can offer something. Obviously the contract situation is a bit different now. I ’ve got to wait for this month and next month and see what’s happening.”
Would he move abroad if it came to it? “I’d never rule out going away, to be honest,” added Toner.
“It might be a bit of an adventure before the career ends. But I ’ ll see what happens here first, I don’t have too much to offer other than that.”
The immediate focus is on Leinster beginning t heir Champions Cup campaign in Montpellier.
“Really looking forward to it,” Toner said. “It’s going to be a huge step up for us.
“They’ve got a really good lineout defence which is unsettling, they’re very good at getting up in the air and disrupting, they’re very, very athletic – then the lads who stay down and don’t jump up are massive. So they’ve got a pretty big pack.
“It’s hugely important for us as a team to click. Europe i s only four games, we need every point we can get. It’s a pretty important weekend.”