Ireland to wait and see if Rory will be at his Best

IRELAND head coach Joe Schmidt will make a late call on whether to include Rory Best for today’s Six Nations match with Italy at the Stadio Olimpico. Best, who has won 101 caps for his country, missed yesterday’s captain’s run here with a stomach bug and was quarantined overnight. Schmidt is already without Johnny Sexton and the loss of Best would be a further blow to a squad looking to bounce back from their 27-22 defeat by Scotland last Saturday. If Best fails to recover, uncapped Munster hooker Niall Scannell is set to fill the void, with Leinster rookie James Tracy providing bench cover. Forwards coach Simon Easterby said: ‘He has been put into

his own bedroom, in isolation. He’s fortunate that as captain he does receive his own room. As far as we know it’s not contagious and the doctor is covering everything off and making sure we get to the bottom of it. ‘But, hopefully, everything clears up in the next few hours and he can get some much-needed rest.’ Ireland made a sluggish start at Murrayfield and were duly punished by a fired-up Scottish team who raced into an early 21-5 lead. Schmidt later revealed that the team coach arrived late to the stadium and was re-routed by their police escort. The Kiwi raised the issue during two media briefings this week but Easterby sought to draw a line under the affair yesterday. ‘I think too much was made of that last week,’ he said. ‘I think the players will not look for excuses in terms of the way that they prepare and I don’t think that this will have an effect on them.’