'I'm just glad I got invited to Joey's press conference' - Ireland's Sean Cronin

Ireland offered up Munster fly-half Joey Carbery and Leinster hooker Sean Cronin to the media on Wednesday but when the first dozen questions were directed at Carbery, Limerickman Cronin must have wondered if he was wasting his time.

At long last, a question went to Cronin: “Sean, what about you?”

“I'm just glad I got invited to Joey's press conference,” he quipped, to much laughter. “Thanks, Joey, for having me!”

If the early focus was all on Carbery, it was mostly because of concern over whether he will be fully fit to face Scotland in Sunday’s Pool A match against Scotland in Yokahama. (8.45am Irish time on EirSport/RTE and ITV)

Johnny Sexton’s main rival for the No 10 jersey was injured in Ireland’s first warm-up match for the tournament, against Italy last month. His recovery, it seems, is now fully complete.

“It’s great to be back training,” he said. “The ankle is feeling pretty good. There were a couple of nervous days when the injury happened. 

“I was kind of like, ‘Will I be ready, will I be OK to go?’ But I had great help from the physios and the doctors. They got me through it all. It wasn't as if there was a problem going into the Italy game - it was just the way I fell on it [the ankle].”

With the countdown to Sunday well and truly on, Carbery said the buzz around the camp has been “insane”, adding: “Lads have been bouncing off each other. If we can tap into that energy and to what we learned over pre-season then hopefully that will stand us in good stead.

“Having the four test matches in the pre-season was crucial. There were a lot of learnings. It’s not every year the first four games of your season are proper test matches, so that will set us 

Cronin finds himself in arguably the most competitive position of all – a three-way fight for the hooker position with incumbent and captain Rory Best and Munster’s Niall Scannell. 

“We all got opportunities in pre-season, and we’re here now. Rory is the skipper but we’ll all be competing against each other,” he said.

“I got dropped in the Six Nations, but it shows I have good mental strength because I fought to get back in. All you can do when things like that happen is try to do better and just be positive. 

“It’s a good thing about professional sport that you go out the next week and have the opportunity to do it again. That's all you can do. This is my third World Cup so I'm happy I've been sniffing around for a while.”