Ireland’s Six Nations title defence has suffered an early blow with confirmation that Munster lock Tadhg Beirne will miss the opening weekend encounter against England as well as the week two clash with Scotland due to a knee injury.
To compound matters, Ulster also announced that possible replacement Iain Henderson will also be sidelined "for several weeks" due to an injured finger, which he suffered in the European victory over Leicester Tigers on Saturday.
Beirne was forced off the field during a man-of-the-match display in Munster’s 9-7 Heineken Champions Cup victory over Exeter Chiefs on Sunday, and the 27-year-old has been withdrawn from the Ireland squad as a result of suffering damage to his medial ligament.
A scan revealed that the damage was not too serious, and Ireland head coach Joe Schmidt has not ruled him out of contention for their week three match against Italy in Rome on Sunday 24 February.
But with Beirne unavailable for the Aviva Stadium clash with the 2016 and 2017 Six Nations champions England in two weeks’ time, Schmidt has called up Connacht’s Quinn Roux to the squad that travelled to Portugal on Monday for a pre-championship training camp.
It leaves Schmidt short on experienced options in the second row, although he is still able to call on Leinster's 63-cap veteran Devin Toner as well as talented 22-year-old James Ryan, with Connacht's Ultan Dillane the other option in the squad.
Beirne’s club teammate Andrew Conway also picked up a knock against Exeter, with Leinster wing Adam Byrne called up as injury cover, but while Conway will be unable to train this week he has not yet been ruled out of the England game and will remain in camp in the hope of returning to training next week.
Leinster’s Jack Conan, who was forced to pull out of their victory over Wasps on Sunday, has been left at home to recover from the shoulder injury that he sustained at the Ricoh Arena, while both Rob Kearney and Jack McGrath have been released back to Leinster in order to play the Pro14 encounter against Scarlets this Friday in an effort to get match minutes under their belts.
Ireland will train at the Quinta do Lago resort on the Algarve, which is fewer than seven miles away from England’s training base in Vilamoura where they will arrive on Wednesday to begin their own preparations.
