JORDI MURPHY HASN’T travelled with the Ulster squad for their two-week Guinness Pro14 trip to South Africa, but the northern province say the injury he sustained against Edinburgh last week isn’t a ‘long-term’ issue.
The Ireland international suffered ankle ligament damage during his first appearance for Ulster last Friday, and wasn’t part of Dan McFarland’s 30-man travelling party which departed Belfast for Port Elizabeth yesterday.
Murphy will miss the games against Southern Kings this Sunday and the clash with the Cheetahs five days later, and though it remains unclear as to how long the 27-year-old might be sidelined, Dan McFarland isn’t planning without him long-term.
“It’s a loss not having Jordi but we’ve got some good back rowers,” the head coach said.
Ulster will arrive in Port Elizabeth today after their journey from Belfast included stops in London, Doha and Johannesburg.
The province face into the first of back-to-back games in South Africa with a clash against the Kings on Saturday [KO 1.15pm, eir Sport/Premier Sport] before a five-day turnaround to get ready for the Cheetahs in Bloemfontein on Friday 21 September.
McFarland has brought 30 players south of the equator including fit-again Springbok Jean Deysel, who could make his first appearance of the season at the Nelson Mandela Bay Stadium, but flanker Chris Henry has remained at home after suffering a calf strain last week.
New signing Marty Moore — who has yet to make his debut for the province — didn’t travel and will continue to work rehabbing the calf injury which he sustained during pre-season.
Ireland internationals Rory Best (hamstring) and Jacob Stockdale (hamstring) remain sidelined, while Louis Ludik (hamstring), Kyle McCall (elblow) and Luke Marshall (knee) are also on the casualty list and Iain Henderson sits out as per the IRFU’s player management policy.
“I’m comfortable with the fact we’re taking a squad that can cope with that [five-day turnaround],” McFarland said.
“I think the difficulty comes when you leave yourselves a little thin over there, when you train as a group for a certain length of time and then at the last minute you having to bring people out there.
“So I’m hoping we’ll have that we’ll have that covered but you can never say never, obviously there’s a limit on what you can do feasibly, yeah it certainly makes it difficult.
“In terms of the planning side of things, we’ll go with a team that we feel can beat the Kings and we’ll take a look at it going into the Cheetahs game, depending on how the guys rock up the following week.”
Ulster squad for South Africa:
Forwards (17)
John Andrew, Marcell Coetzee, Jean Deysel,Weihahn Herbst, Rob Herring, Ross Kane, Adam McBurney, Caleb Montgomery, Alan O’Connor, Eric O’Sullivan, Tom O’Toole, Matthew Rea, Sean Reidy, Nick Timoney, Kieran Treadwell, Andy Warwick, Greg Jones.
Backs (13)
Will Addison, Billy Burns, Darren Cave, John Cooney, Angus Curtis, Craig Gilroy, Angus Kernohan, Stuart McCloskey, Johnny McPhillips, Peter Nelson, David Shanahan, Henry Speight, Jonny Stewart.
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I could get over them having wanted to play for England if they were going in fully committed, but the way Bamford seems to be yanking McCarthy’s chain has me seriously questioning him. In or out ffs. We’ve always been technically weaker than other teams but team spirit and commitment has generally been what’s bridged that gap. It can’t be under-valued or taken for granted. If he’s this non-committal, odds are he’s not going to give 100% when he comes in. That’s not to say being born and raised in Ireland is any guarantee of this. Just compare Jon Walters and Stephen Ireland. Bamford really not endearing himself though by ignoring Mick’s calls and the like.
@ScewMadd: totally agree! Whether you like Bamford for not he does have links to Ireland but the “I’ll consider my options” stuff is getting really old.
@ScewMadd: he’s had serious injuries. If Leeds lost him now then it would be disastrous for their promotion bid. Bamford stalling for the moment makes perfect sense. Leeds fans would never forgive him if an injury for Ireland against Gibraltar cost them the promotion they crave
@Stanley Baggins: completely agree I don’t want him near that Ireland squad until the season is over for Leeds.
I agree with Kevin Kilbane that Patrick Bamford’s first choice was England, but Ireland aren’t in a position to be picky right now. He’d be a very good addition to the Ireland squad at the moment.
@James Clancy: Spot on,yesterday’s squad announcement showed the squad needs to be supplemented with quality.
@James Clancy: not buying it, your either Irish or English, not just Irish when your not good enough for England
@emmetnichol: reality is vast majority of players would pick England over Ireland if they’ve been born and raised there. Its a more natural choice and u have your agent in your ear telling you how many more zeros on your career earnings it’ll make. Kilbane is the exception. He was immersed in Irish culture since birth.
Clinton could have played for the mighty Jamacia but he decided on us..legend
Granny rule players used to declare for Ireland because it put them in the shop window. If they nutmegged Baggio in a game then that often resulted in a move to Liverpool or Everton a few weeks later.
Today players even in the championship are on such nice money that they don’t need International football anymore to retire wealthy…. So when a great player wants to play International football for us where we pay nothing to them in return, even if they only decided at 25 years old to join, then we should still welcome them with open arms.
Sweet god… do we ever learn. Laughing stock..
You can only laugh at the very small minority who knock granny rule players when we’ve just named a squad containing the likes of Glen Whelan and Padraig Amond. No disrespect to those two at all who are wonderful professionals but they’re hardly Aldridge, Townsend, Houghton etc
Another Clinton Morrison, albeit a lot more talented
@Seán Ó’Sionúir: The Clint did very well for us.
@Seán Ó’Sionúir: you should watch the sky YouTube interview of Clinton on playing for Ireland. He’s was 100% committed to the irish setup from the outset, unlike wasters Bamford, Rice, Grealish, Noble, Nolan etc
@Facundo: you should leave Noble out of that list, he was approached and did the honourable thing and said he felt English so he wouldn’t declare for us.
Absolutely nothing wrong with that.
@Panch Murphy: Yeah and he also went out of his way to have a whisper in rice’s ear about declaring for England, along with rats John Terry, gold and sullivan, swaying his decision. Beautiful human beings, all 4 of them
Quality will improve by picking Irish players over English players starting at under age level