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MacGinty's season all but over after brutal injury

(Photo by Jan Kruger/Getty Images)

Sale out-half AJ MacGinty has been ruled out for up to four months after dislocating his shoulder in Friday night’s 30-23 Heineken European Cup pool defeat by La Rochelle.

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Steve Diamond, the Sale director of rugby, insists the club have the resources to cover for the loss of the US Eagles No10 who has been sharing the starting role with Springbok Rob du Preez.

MacGinty has been struggling to stay fit in recent seasons with his very physical style of out-half play putting him in danger – he is a No10 who doesn’t shirk defensive duties which puts him harm’s way.

MacGinty was sidelined for twelve weeks in October 2018 by surgery on his shoulder and he now faces another lengthy period of rehabilitation. He will see a specialist on his return from France to assess the extent of the damage suffered at La Rochelle.

Diamond said: “It’s a dislocated shoulder for AJ and he will probably be out for three or four months which is disappointing, but we have other players in the squad who can play there.

(Continue reading below…)

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“He was controlling play very well in the first half and is a very good defender. We didn’t play Faf de Klerk and left 10 players in England and they will play next weekend at home to Glasgow.

“We played well in the first half and then made two errors which La Rochelle scored tries from and they didn’t have to work very hard, but in the second half they overpowered us for 20 minutes. 

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“Seven of our matchday 23 were 18-years-old and I have to run the club that way with my kids coming through and to get experience in such an environment was fantastic. On the night we were beaten by a better team.”

Diamond rested key players for the trip to France which left him with one serious injury and prop Valery Morozov facing a ban after he was sent off. He was shown a red card for driving his shoulder with force into the head of Lopeti Timani. Timani was shown a yellow card after a neck roll on Morozov.

England wing Chris Ashton was shown a yellow card having replaced MacGinty after 32 minutes to increase Sale’s problems, but they still managed to nab a losing bonus from their trip.

WATCH: RugbyPass travelled to Brecon to see how life after rugby is treating Andy Powell

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H
Hellhound 20 minutes ago
France put World Cup pain behind them with unbeaten run in November

France is starting to look like they are finally over their WC headache, although they were lucky that NZ had a very bad game. The Argies as usual is one game good, the next bad. If they can sort that out and be more consistent, they could become contenders for the WC.


NZ, Argentina (if they are more consistent), and now the Wallabies too is in an upward curve (can they be consistent?), as well as Fiji(as inconsistent as Argentina) looks like possible contenders. The Boks will be as usual a huge threat to defend their title. Things are looking up for the South, so the North should rightfully beware of the Southern Hemisphere threat.


With the French looking dangerous, the English with their close runs (mostly a mindset problem) and the Scottish seems to be the NH main contenders. The Irish is good, but not excellent anymore. They are more overbearing and with their glory days mostly gone with old players hanging on by a thread, by 2027 if they don't start adding in the younger players, they won't make it past yet another WC Quarter final. The problem is that their youngsters, while good is nothing special.


That is just 8 teams without the Irish that can become real WC contenders. Lots of hickups to be sorted still for these teams, excluding the Boks to become a threat. Make no mistake, the top Tier is much closer than people realise and the 2027 WC will be a really great WC, possibly the best contended WC ever.

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