A 30-STRONG squad will take off for another Irish tour down under when the Maxol-sponsored Irish Universities leave Dublin on Friday evening for Australia.
The seven-match schedule will begin against Northern Territory on July 11th and will finish with the top game of the tour against the Australian University side on August 6th.
The squad, which has been picked from the five universities which field Saturday sides - UCC, UCG, DU, UCD and QUB - is hopeful of following on from their Triple Crown win earlier in the season.
The University side has constantly produced international players, from the first tour to New Zealand in 1976 when Mike Gibson was on the rise, to the Japanese tour of 1983, which included Irish fullback Hugo McNeil, and recently to South Africa, where the side won four of seven matches.
Seven members of the current Irish senior squad have come through the Universities side, including the successful Lions Test prop, Paul Wallace, and winger Denis Hickie.
Robin Morrow, from Queen's University, will captain the squad which has eight players from the Belfast college, 11 from UCC, five from Trinity, four from UCD and only two from the recently relegated UCG side. Queen's coach Ray Pattison will travel as coach to the squad, with John West as manager.
:quality(70)/s3.amazonaws.com/arc-authors/irishtimes/f6af4aa9-3e11-4b2d-ad9f-be0f224302ab.png)
:quality(70)/cloudfront-eu-central-1.images.arcpublishing.com/irishtimes/YVIRIOZQ35EWRPZXR27KGMO6YU.png)