O'Brien eyes the prize and Irish squad spot on return to field

Sean O’Brien has expressed relief at being able to return to play for Leinster before the end of the season.

O'Brien eyes the prize and Irish squad spot on return to field

Sean O’Brien has expressed relief at being able to return to play for Leinster before the end of the season.

The “Tullow Tank” returned after a five month lay-off with a shoulder injury to take his place in the Leinster starting 15 which beat Edinburgh at the RDS last weekend.

Since injuring his shoulder against Ulster during the Christmas break, Leinster head coach Matt O’Connor has been adamant that O’Brien would play no rugby for the rest of the season, ear-marking the start of next season’s league campaign for a return date.

The Irish international played 50 minutes for the province last weekend, which sets Leinster up for the Pro 12 semi-final against Ulster at the RDS.

O’Brien admits that he surprised himself with his fast recovery.

“It was good yeah, I was obviously pleased to be back,” O’Brien said.

“I hadn’t thought about it much that when the shoulder went that I would be back this year, so it was good to get back early and get through a bit of work.”

“Saying that, I wasn’t happy with my performance at all, but I have been looking after myself for the last four or five months and protecting myself.”

“I suppose it’s a different story when you are involved in a game, no matter what training you do it doesn’t prepare you for getting back involved.”

“It’s just getting a bit of work through the shoulder and body and just getting a bit more confidence in it so I was just happy to get back and do bits and pieces here and there,” said Sean.

There would have been no better time to return to his side than now for O'Brien, who now looks set to start against the team he picked up his injury from.

It is the last chance on Saturday for Matt O’Connor’s men to stay in the race to pick up some silverware, and retain what they won last year under Joe Schmidt.

O’Brien warned Leinster cannot take their eyes off the prize they set out to win at the beginning of the season.

“It’s the business end of the season now and we have spoken about wanting to finish on a high.”

“Every competition you are in you’re in it to win it and this is no different now so it’s last chance saloon for us to win a trophy this year and it starts this weekend,” O’Brien said.

O’Brien has also eyed up a return to the international set-up this summer.

Joe Schmidt will take a squad down to Argentina and despite the Irish coach already knowing what O’Brien can do, he feels he will have to play his way into the squad like everyone else.

“I think there are going to be injuries over the next few weeks and different people are going to get knocks and bumps, so hopefully if I go well this weekend and get a bit of momentum into the final, hopefully things will go my way for Ireland.”

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