Paul Wallace knew immediately something was seriously wrong - the pain was excruciating. He looked down and saw his ankle at 90 degrees to his leg. A seemingly innocuous tackle had dashed his hopes of playing for Ireland in the Six Nations Championship and possibly earning a Lions squad berth for the summer tour to Australia.

The Saracens prop left Ravenhill after the match against Ulster last Friday night in an ambulance. He was discharged from a Belfast hospital yesterday, and planned to journey to his parents home in Cork for a week. The fact that he is not allowed to fly because of the operation just adds to his physical discomfiture.

Initially "gutted", Wallace is slowly coming to terms with the setback. He recalled the incident: "I was just taking a ball on and got tackled. It was a kind of judo-style tackle with Tony McWhirter dragging me over his leg. The ground was a bit frozen so I think that my boot got stuck. My boot didn't move but my leg did and got twisted, which dislocated the ankle and broke the leg.

"It was fairly excruciating. I looked down and the ankle was at 90 degrees to the leg. I had recently been talking to Conor O'Shea about his injury so I knew it was fairly similar. I knew exactly what the procedure was in terms of having to put it back in straight away.

"They had a go on the pitch but couldn't manage it so, fortunately, when I was brought to the ambulance they gave me something for the pain and put it back. I went to hospital, had it X-rayed to confirm the initial diagnosis but they couldn't operate on the Friday night. The following morning I was whisked down to the operating theatre.

"It's strange that the first thing you think of at the time is how long you're going to be out of action."

An unwelcome familial coincidence serves as a warning. "Richie (Wallace) broke his leg, ironically on a frozen pitch as well and he never quite fully recovered. So I am conscious of not rushing back too quickly. I'll be six weeks in plaster and then they'll take one of the screws out."

Sod's law decreed that Paul Wallace was playing extremely well before the injury. Despite battling two England internationals in David Flatman and Julian White for the propping positions at Saracens, he had forced his way past White and was showing signs of the quality of rugby that had made him such pivotal figure in the Lions 2-1 test series victory in South Africa in 1997.

"I've been playing some of the best rugby this season that I have managed in a few years. My ambition was to get into the Irish side, something that I knew would be difficult, but I was headed in the right direction. I've been reasonably fortunate with injury in my career in comparison to some, like Jeremy Davidson, so I can't complain too much.

"I'll be in plaster for six weeks and I'll probably be out for four months in total. Maybe I can get back a little sooner."

Wallace will be glued to the television as his brother David lines out for Munster in the European Cup quarter-final against Biarritz on Sunday. Next week he returns to London and begins the rehabilitation process.