HEINEKEN CUP SEMI-FINAL:ALREADY CONSIGNED to being without their influential French centre Damien Traille for next Sunday's Heineken Cup semi-final against Munster in San Sebastian, Biarritz are also fretting over the fitness of the equally talismanic number eight Imanol Harinordoquy.
The brilliant Basque player, one of France’s start men in their Grand Slam campaign, underwent an operation last Saturday on the broken nose he sustained in the defeat away to Racing Metro a week previously
His nose is still encased and he is unlikely to train this week, and while he hopes he might be able to play at the Estadio Anoeta with a protective face mask, he is not sure whether the club or the rules will allow it.
After losing Traille, who landed three drop goals and helped create both their tries in the 29-28 quarter-final win over the Ospreys, were Harinordoquy ruled out it would be a significant blow for les biarrots.
Leinster received a boost yesterday when Shane Horgan trained, although the Irish winger has remained troubled by the foot injury he sustained against the Scarlets in February that has limited him to just two matches since, the quarter-final win over Clermont and the ensuing league win at home to the Ospreys.
He looks likely to start against Toulouse in Saturday's first semi-final and most probably so too will Rob Kearney, who has been hors de combatsince sustaining an ankle ligament injury late on against Clermont. However, Fergus McFadden (calf) and Girvan Dempsey (neck) may have limited involvement in training this week.
The most pressing concern remains Jonathan Sexton, who underwent an operation to have a plate inserted in a fractured jaw the day after the quarter-final win – last Saturday fortnight – and no less than Paul O’Connell, he looks to be in a race against the clock to be fit for the the semi-finals.
As for their opponents Toulouse, Census Johnston and Louis Picamoles joined their injury list in Saturday’s win over Castres. Johnson, their 130kg Samoan prop, is expected to be fit for Saturday, like Picamoles and another prop Dan Human.
Irish bete noire Vincent Clerc, rested on Saturday, the brilliant Maxime Medard and South African number eight Shaun Sowerby are all expected to come back into the equation. French flanker Yannick Nyanga also resumed training yesterday but, given he hasn’t played since October, he’s unlikely to feature too strongly again this season.
Jean-Baptiste Elissalde continued to be troubled by the calf injury he initially picked up training with the French national team in the run-up to the Six Nations last February, only making his return the previous week at scrumhalf against Bourgoin. Outhalf against Castres, he clearly had difficulty kicking and limped off in the 52nd minute, but he is expected to play against Leinster.
The game also marked a return to form for the ultra-physical Byron Kelleher.
The 34-year-old 57-times capped former All Blacks scrum half has spoken of his desire to win a first Heineken Cup.
“My goal is to win the Heineken Cup – and it is not just an individual dream, it’s a dream of the team,” he said.
“The Heineken Cup is growing as a competition and continually puts pressure on you because you have to win away from home and the tournament has got stronger every year since I have been here.”
“There used to be a mentality of focusing everything on winning at home and not worrying so much about winning away – that would be a bonus – but that has changed and French sides have adapted to professional rugby.
“It’s great to be at home in the semi-finals and Leinster are a difficult team to play against but these games are 50-50 and whether you are home or not it doesn’t matter.”
“Leinster are a very good team. They showed that in the quarter-finals, and Brian O’Driscoll is a world-class player and his performance against Clermont was exceptional. We have Yannick Jauzion and if you look across Europe you won’t see two better centres. There are big match-ups all over the field but that’s what semi-final rugby is all about and why we play,” he added.
