Flood And Moloney Provide Fitness Boost For Ireland

The pair, with 52 international 15s caps between them, sustained injuries in the lead up to the Championship, but Ireland defence coach Hugh Hogan issued a positive update on both ahead of Saturday’s opening clash with France at Kingspan Stadium (kick-off 1pm).

“We’ve had four weeks of three-day training camps leading into our first Test this year, and overall we’ve a pretty healthy squad,” admitted Hogan, with an extended group of 40 players brought together by head coach Scott Bemand.

“We had two or three players coming back from injury who are now back in the reckoning for selection which is wonderful.

“Stacey Flood picked up an (ankle) injury in the Celtic Challenge a number of weeks ago. Unfortunately, she had to have a surgery but she’s just coming back to full fitness now.

“She has been out for six weeks now, and she’s fully fit at the moment. That’s a huge positive. She had an unfortunate injury playing with the Wolfhounds in the Celtic Challenge.

“But huge credit to our medical staff and to Stacey herself. They’ve worked incredibly hard to give her the opportunity now, which is awesome.

“Clíodhna Moloney picked up a calf injury playing in the PWR (Premiership Women’s Rugby) a number of weeks ago. She’s just coming back to full fitness now.”

Paris Olympian Flood started all three of Ireland’s WXV1 matches at full-back last autumn, and was in impressive form in Wolfhounds colours – as one of their leading carriers and kickers – before damaging her left ankle against Glasgow Warriors at the start of February.

The Dubliner last played in the Six Nations in 2022, while hooker Moloney made her international return during last year’s Championship and has scored tries against Scotland, Australia, and the USA in her last five Tests.

The second most-capped player in Bemand’s current squad with 38 appearances, Moloney’s Exeter Chiefs team narrowly missed out on a place in the PWR play-offs, finishing fifth in the table. She has scored 24 tries in 49 games for the Chiefs.

Sam Monaghan, whose Gloucester-Hartpury side won their third successive PWR crown last Saturday, is a longer-term absentee unfortunately as she works her way back from the ACL injury she suffered during last June’s PWR final against Bristol Bears.

The influential second row co-captained Ireland to a third place finish in last year’s Six Nations, earning Rugby World Cup qualification in the process, and has returned home to step up her rehab programme with the Ireland medical team.

“Sam is here at the HPC (High Performance Centre) at the moment. She’s here full-time, she came across a few weeks ago to really focus on her rehab,” explained Hogan.

“She’s not going to be fit for the tournament as I’m sure people saw – she wasn’t selected in the original squad and the target for her at the moment is to get her back to full fitness ahead of the World Cup camps.

“That will give her the best opportunity to have a great summer leading into the tournament next autumn.”

Béibhinn Parsons is much closer to a return to the pitch, having been included in the Six Nations squad. She said that her rehab was ‘going really well, it’s really positive’, and she could get back for ‘a game or two’ before the end of the Championship.

Her season was cruelly interrupted by a second leg break in the space of over four months, when she fell awkwardly in a tackle from France’s Marie Dupouy at December’s HSBC SVNS Series event in Cape Town.

Hogan confirmed: “Béibhinn’s probably not fit for selection just yet but we do expect her to be fully fit during the tournament.

“I couldn’t give you an exact date yet but she’s more and more involved in skills and walk-throughs, so she’s having a growing presence in the team at the moment.”

Parsons started last year’s Six Nations opener against France in Le Mans, a game which Ireland finished strongly with late tries from Aoife Wafer and Aoife Dalton but they could not avoid a 38-17 defeat.

Bemand’s charges have home advantage this time around, and Ireland have fond memories of playing in Belfast where they ended the 2022 and 2024 Six Nations with victories over Scotland, and ran out 36-10 winners over Australia in September’s 150th Anniversary Test.

The visit of les Bleues, the runners-up in each of the last five editions of the Six Nations, will be a good barometer of the girls in green’s progress just five months out from the start of the Rugby World Cup.

“Our expectation is that we’ll challenge France, and like any high quality Test match, for me it comes down to moments,” said Hogan.

“There’s big moments in games and when you can win some of those moments you put them in the bank. If you lose some of them they may cost you or they may hurt you points.

“What we expect on the weekend is a strong challenge from France but we’ll go out to put out a strong Irish performance as well.

“I’d love to tell you, ‘Yeah, we’re definitely going to win’, but the reality is it’s going to come down to moments. If we can put more in the win column then we’ll be in a great shout of winning the game.”

Commenting on the French strengths, he added: “They’re quite a ‘French’ team, and in that, I mean they’re very directed and ran through their number 9. (Pauline) Bourdon Sansus is an extremely good player, quite a typical French number 9, can kick, run – the ‘little general’ as you would say.

“While she is not necessarily what we would experience in our Celtic Challenge scenario, you have to be quite mindful of her.

“Overall, they’ve got some world class athletes, they’ve got some bigger players, a good offloading game. I think they’ve got threats across the pitch, probably more so than any of the other nations.

“They could hurt you through football, through a kicking game, playing through you and playing around you, their offloading game, their momentum, so I think there’s probably a few layers that we have to be wary of there.”