Tiger Niall Morris aiming to be an Irish Wolfhound
Leicester winger Morris was called up by the Irish selectors to play in the inaugural IRB Tbilisi Cup after an excellent campaign for Leicester, which culminated in a Premiership-winning appearance at Twickenham.
The soon-to-be 25-year-old played every minute of all three games in the round-robin tournament which also featured hosts Georgia, a South Africa President’s XV and Uruguay.
He signed off the tournament on a personal high with a brace of tries in a 42-33 win over Uruguay that lifted Emerging Ireland into second place.
“It was a really good tour, we managed to win two out of the three and I played three lots of 80 minutes,” he said.
“I was lucky enough to get two tries in the last game against Uruguay which was played in 36-degree heat, we were dying at the end which probably explains why we went from being 42-14 to only winning by nine points”
Morris added: “I think it was the first time any of us had been to Georgia and it was a massive eye-opener to be honest.
“We were fortunate to be staying in a really nice hotel in a good area, but once you drove out of the main square it was quite a stereotypical eastern bloc country with some rough areas where the rules of the road seemed to be totally disregarded.”
Dubliner Morris made 27 appearances in all competitions for Tigers last season, scoring eight tries.
And the wing/full-back knows that it will take another impressive campaign with his club if he is to take the next step on the international ladder and work his way into the Ireland Wolfhounds (Ireland A) set-up. He said: “My overall goal is to get recognition from the national team but the main thing is for me is to get into the Leicester team and play as well as I can when I get the opportunity.
“I was delighted with the way last season went, I played a lot of rugby and to win a trophy at the end was a massive bonus.
“There’s going to be plenty of competition for places on the wing this season.
“Gonzalo Camacho has come in and he is a really good player, there’s Niki Goneva, Miles Benjamin is coming back from injury, and a good few academy guys are coming through such as Henry Purdy and George Catchpole.”
JON NEWCOMBE
