The game of musical chairs which is Test rugby selection before the World Cup continued on Thursday when Ireland gave another 14 players the chance to impress while retaining 10 of the squad who dismissed Scotland last time they met to wrap up consecutive Six Nations titles.
After last weekend’s cruise in Cardiff and the subsequent elevation of Ireland to second in the world rankings, things would appear to be going swimmingly for the head coach Joe Schmidt were it not for the continuing absence of Cian Healey, the Leinster loosehead prop and very much a cornerstone of the Irish pack.
Healey, part of the side which demolished Scotland 40-10 at Murrayfield in March, baulking up a points differential and putting the championship beyond England, is recovering from surgery on a prolapsed disc in his neck and while he is said to have trained on Thursday, time is running out.
On Saturday, Healey’s place will be taken by David Kilcoyne, with the ever-present Mike Ross at tighthead and Sean Cronin, back from shoulder surgery, returning as hooker in a side which includes at least one new debutant, the Leinster back-row Jack Conan, and a second should the Connacht Kiwi Nathan White leave a bench which also includes Ireland’s captain and last season’s player-of-the-year, Paul O’Connell. With Gordon D’Arcy, who has retired from club rugby, attempting to reach his fourth World Cup, there is plenty of experience in Ireland’s matchday 23.
Scotland have a new captain in the scrum-half Harry Pyrgos and none of the backline or half backs who started the final round of the Six Nations. The four survivors of that defeat to Ireland are the loosehead Ryan Grant, the lock Jim Hamilton, the No8 David Denton and Blair Cowan, the London Irish open side flanker who switches to No6 to allow another Kiwi convert Hugh Blake to make his debut. The Scotland coach, Vern Cotter, himself a New Zealander, took plenty of flak, particularly from the former Lions prop Peter Wright, when he added Blake to his Six Nations squad even before he had played for his adopted club side, Edinburgh.
Dublin is the first of four warm-up games for Scotland while Schmidt is much further ahead with his World Cup plans, the scrum-half Kieran Marmion joining Rob Herring and Noel Reid in leaving camp this week. Schmidt is adamant all three players have not been jettisoned entirely, but it is hard to see them coming into the reckoning when the Irish coaches get together next week ahead of the return against Wales in a fortnight, the final warm-up game before Ireland’s squad is announced.
“We haven’t really whittled the squad down. We’re just trying to get game-time for everyone at the moment,” said Schmidt. “And you’ll have a better idea when we probably pick the squad to play Wales the following week because the day after that we’ve got to make further decisions.”
Ireland team to face Scotland
S Zebo (Munster); L Fitzgerald (Leinster), J Payne (Ulster), G D’Arcy (Leinster), T Bowe (Ulster); I Madigan, I Boss (both Leinster); D Kilcoyne (Munster), S Cronin, M Ross (both Leinster), D Tuohy (Ulster), D Toner, J Conan (both Leinster), C Henry (Ulster), S O’Brien (capt, Leinster). Replacements R Strauss, M Bent (both Leinster), N White (Connacht), P O’Connell (Munster), J Murphy, E Reddan (both Leinster), P Jackson (Ulster), D Kearney (Leinster).
• This article was amended on 14 August 2015. The Scotland rugby captain is Henry Pyrgos, not Pygos.
