It’s not easy when forced to watch this Irish team from the outside. Having played every minute of the series win in New Zealand, Robbie Henshaw has barely played five minutes for Ireland this season, in the autumn win over Fiji, when a hamstring issue resurfaced.
That, combined with wrist surgery, meant he not only missed out on the November victories over South Africa and Australia, but the three Guinness Six Nations wins in the opening three rounds as well.
“It’s tough, but it makes it more exciting when you come back,” said Henshaw. “You bounce on to the pitch and pinch yourself when you come back in and are enjoying it.”
He resumed his old Connacht, Pro12-winning midfield partnership with Bundee Aki on Thursday in an open session and training game against the Ireland under-20s, who are also on three wins from three, and was clearly buoyed just to be back training.
Called in to train with Leinster on Monday, Henshaw sees it as a positive to have had three sessions this week, but save for those few minutes against Fiji, he has effectively not played since last October. Although Stuart McCloskey and Garry Ringrose sat out the open session in the Aviva, that pair are also expected to be in the mix next week for the game against Scotland.
“All I can do is come into camp next week and put my head down, train well please God, and see what happens. Looking at history and past experiences, if I am called upon I’ll be ready. I’ve done it in the past where I’ve come back from a long-term injury and had to step up. If it happens, it happens, and if not, it doesn’t.”
It’s hard to credit that Henshaw won the first of his 61 Ireland caps as far ago as the 2013 tour to the Americas against the USA. Asked if this is the strongest Irish squad he’s known, the 29-year-old said: “It has to be up there”.
“I think the way we’ve used a lot of numbers within the group, the competition is very high and there are new guys returning as well. The standard has been set over the last few weeks with three massive performances and it makes it really exciting to be coming in and seeing the lads doing so well.”
The same, of course, could be said of this Scottish team. Henshaw was part of the Irish team that won in Murrayfield in 2015 and two years ago, as well as the defeat in 2017.
“We’re not going to lie, it’s been a tough place; we’ve always had really tough battles up there. The Scotland team will bring emotion and at Murrayfield with their home crowd, it’s a cauldron-like atmosphere. We’re going to have to be ready for that emotion, physicality and we’re going to have to play our game.”
With England to come six days later in Dublin, Henshaw describes Ireland’s next game as “massive”.
“A big result sets up a big finish on Paddy’s weekend, with England coming to the Aviva. Everyone in the country knows what it means when we have England at home, it’s a huge fixture. One step at a time, and we’ll see how we go.”
