Ireland flanker Tommy O’Donnell ruled out of Rugby World Cup

Gatland must submit his final 31-man squad on August 31, and on the evidence of Saturday’s defeat the likes of fly-half James Hook could now be skating close to missing the cut.

Their roles were reversed on Saturday and Cave was generous in his praise of his colleague’s efforts as Earls made his return to the Test arena for the first time in two and a half years after injury and illness.

Apart from the centres the remainder of the backline is set to be present at the World Cup, although wing Anthony Watson is the only guaranteed starter when the tournament opens against Fiji on September 18.

“It is something I have been waiting for for a long time”, he said.

“I’d love to get another chance”.

Investigations at University Hospital Wales yesterday afternoon confirmed that Tommy suffered a hip dislocation in the game against Wales.

Another, Toby Faletau, came off the bench – “I thought he was outstanding when he came on” said Gatland – but only two others can truly say that they confirmed or enhanced their credentials. “He’s such a dynamic player for us that we’re just going to cross our fingers [that he is OK and available for the World Cup]”.

“It’s about the person now more than the player so it’s about looking after him and making sure he’s getting proper care and all that”. And it was in both of our interests to work together so that we went as well as possible.

“It’s upwards and onwards now and you don’t know what selections are going to be”.

Ireland enjoyed a satisfying first warmup for the Rugby World Cup by drubbing a flattered Wales 35-21 under the Millennium Stadium roof on Saturday.

“But it’s nice to go back on Monday into a more structured, Test-match week and having a game at the end of it, against Ireland who are Six Nations champions”. It was always the plan to give everyone a good run-out – you want to give players an opportunity.

Understandably his counterpart Joe Schmidt was much happier with his side’s efforts in scoring five tries and smashing Wales’ scrummage, as well as winning most of the contact battles.

“We won’t be falling in love with ourselves after last week; I think the scoreline flattered us a bit, after Wales had a gruelling pre-season with altitude training”.

Meanwhile Andrew Trimble will have a precautionary scan on the foot injury he sustained against Wales. “Some of them need to take a pretty good look at their game”.