Ireland without Cian Healy and Rob Kearney for England clash

Ireland will be almost at full strength when they meet England at Twickenham in their final World Cup warm-up match on Saturday.

Coach Joe Schmidt will wheel out the majority of his first-choice XV, with only prop Cian Healy and full-back Rob Kearney not risked.

Loosehead Healy has only returned to full training this week, following neck surgery in May, and was at one point touch and go even to make Ireland's final World Cup 31.

Simon Zebo slots in at full-back in the absence of regular starter Kearney (knee bruise), whose brother Dave takes the left-wing berth.

"We just felt it was important to get Simon a little bit more time at full-back once we decided he was going to cover full back for us," said Schmidt.

"Rob Kearney has a bruise on his knee but he trained fully and we could have picked him."

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Jack McGrath starts in Healy's place at loosehead, with centre Keith Earls not pressed into action - he has passed concussion protocols after a heavy blow against Wales last weekend but Schmidt says he did not need another game.

Schmidt will be seeking a statement result ahead of their World Cup opener against Canada in Cardiff on September 19.

The first-choice back-row of Peter O'Mahony, Sean O'Brien and Jamie Heaslip are reunited for the first time since the Six Nations, with standout half-backs Conor Murray and Johnny Sexton also in tandem.

Fresh from his Test debut in the 16-10 defeat to Wales in Dublin, Tadhg Furlong takes a seat on the bench to cover loosehead prop.

Munster's Donnacha Ryan offers bulk from the bench to impact the second row in the closing stages, with Darren Cave covering midfield among the replacements.

"Keith (Earls) has completed his return to play protocols thus far, so we'd expect that he would probably have been fit to be selected," added Schmidt.

"But the thing with Keith and what we're trying to do with balance at the moment, there are some guys that play really well fresh and others that need to get a bit more a game rhythm, and Keith's had a couple of outings.

"In the first game in the Millennium I thought he looked super-sharp, so to have him fresh where there's a small degree of doubt then it just made sense. Luke (Fitzgerald) trained fully through the week, did a little bit of contact today, no problem. He would be fully-fit, but he's had two starts already.

"We wanted to give Simon another run at full-back, and Dave Kearney and Tommy Bowe again on the wings. We thought about putting maybe Luke or Rob Kearney on the bench, but Darren Cave is the other guy who has had the least amount of game-time so it was good to get Darren into the group as well.

"Because with Jared (Payne) and Robbie (Henshaw) we can always drop someone else back to full-back, they've slotted in pretty seamlessly in amongst it at training this week."

Ireland: 15 Simon Zebo, 14 Tommy Bowe, 13 Jared Payne, 12 Robbie Henshaw, 11 Dave Kearney, 10 Jonathan Sexton, 9 Conor Murray; 1 Jack McGrath, 2 Rory Best, 3 Mike Ross, 4 Devin Toner, 5 Paul O'Connell (c), 6 Peter O'Mahony, 7 Sean O'Brien, 8 Jamie Heaslip.

Replacements: 16 Richardt Strauss, 17 Tadhg Furlong, 18 Nathan White, 19 Donnacha Ryan, 20 Chris Henry, 21 Eoin Reddan, 22 Ian Madigan, 23 Darren Cave.

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