Dropped.

Ulster scrumhalf John Cooney has admitted that we was surprised when Ireland decided to drop him from the World Cup training squad a fortnight ago.

Cooney has been in excellent form over the last 12 months or so for Ulster, with many believing he had a strong chance of travelling to the World Cup in Japan with Ireland.

The 29-year-old wasn’t even given a chance to impress during Ireland’s warm-up series, having been dropped from the squad after the opener against Italy – a game he wasn’t involved in.

“I didn’t see it coming,” Cooney told The Rugby Pod.

“I was actually watching the Gaelic football, the semi-final Tyrone were playing and my phone was on silent. I went to look at my phone about 10 minutes after the game and saw I had a missed call from Joe. Straight away my first reaction was to scream – and I knew well that I was going to be cut.

“It was a bit of a surprise because I’d done fitness and gym all week because I wasn’t playing against Italy. The week before, I thought I could be dropped but I wasn’t. Then I thought I might play against England, I kept the head down and got to work that week. In that way, it was pretty upsetting that I didn’t get to play a game.

“I knew well once I saw the phone call off him that was it. I rang him back and he must have been on the phone to someone else, I had to wait about 15 or 20 minutes to call him back. It was a bit of a limbo at that stage. Once you get a phone call out of the blue, you know something is up.”

Since making the move to Ulster, Cooney has been an absolute revelation, but still only has eight caps for Ireland, with just one of them being a start (USA last November).

“Personally, I would have liked to have played a lot more,” Cooney added.

“There are now two Italy games I’ve been involved in that I would liked at least to get a start, even off the bench the last day. That’s what hurt me the most, that I didn’t get a chance. I don’t see why I didn’t get a few minutes, even against Italy. I’m not sure why that is.

“Even against USA, I got the start, played average enough. You know that type of year where you are carrying a few niggles, I remember my AC was at me. Little hindrances that sometimes if you get one-off games, you don’t get to make up for it.

“I thought I did quite well in the Six Nations, played four out of the five games. The year before, my goal was to play in one of the games and I didn’t. To get four out of five the year after was huge for me. I thought I did quite well when I came on and obviously would have liked a bit longer but I actually haven’t had a chance since then.

“In one way, I’m pretty happy with how I went when I got my opportunity but it doesn’t really do much for you when you don’t get another go.”