No malicious intent – Andrew Porter denies wrongdoing in Antoine Dupont incident

Ireland prop Andrew Porter insisted “I haven’t done anything wrong” as he hit back at France head coach Fabien Galthie amid the fallout over Antoine Dupont’s season-ending knee injury.

Les Bleus captain Dupont – widely regarded as the world’s best player – faces a lengthy spell on the sidelines after rupturing an anterior cruciate ligament during his country’s 42-27 Guinness Six Nations win in Dublin.

France were furious with the incident which caused the injury, with Galthie branding it “reprehensible” as he announced his intention to refer Ireland pair Porter and Tadhg Beirne to the citing commissioner for possible retrospective punishment.

Leinster loosehead Porter, who – in addition to team-mate Beirne – is free to feature in Saturday’s round-five fixture away to Italy, said he had “no malicious intent”.

“He can say what he wants, see how far it gets him,” Porter said of Galthie.

“No, I wasn’t disappointed (with being cited). I knew what I did; I didn’t go out to try and injure anyone. That’s not the type of player I am. If he (Galthie) wants to think that, that’s up to him.

“I even sent Antoine a message on Instagram just to see how he was and obviously you never want to see anyone going off the pitch like that.

“If you have the head coach calling for your head, it’s a bit much to be fair.

“But he’s such a pivotal player for them that they nearly don’t want him to be touched at all. Look, he’s entitled to his opinion but I know I haven’t done anything wrong there. I sleep well at night.”

Dupont was visibly upset when he limped from the field in the 29th minute of Saturday’s match after Beirne, who appeared to be pushed by Porter, fell on his right leg, causing it to buckle.

France’s anger fuelled a breathtaking second-half display as they turned a slender 8-6 advantage into a emphatic demolition job to move into pole position for championship glory and halt Ireland’s Grand Slam bid.

“His leg got trapped in between a ruck when he was trying to counter it and he obviously just got trapped and went over, ” Porter continued.

“It happens so much in this sport. There was no malicious intent surrounding it at all. It’s obviously unfortunate and unlucky.”

Ireland had hoped to travel to Rome on the cusp of an historic third consecutive Six Nations title.

But Simon Easterby’s side are now in danger of finishing third on the back of a first home loss in the competition in four years.

Ireland must win at Stadio Olimpico and then hope second-placed England and table-topping France slip up against Wales and Scotland respectively.

“It’s obviously not easy moving on from a game like that,” Porter said of the sobering loss to Les Bleus.

“You can’t dwell on the past too much. But you’d be lying to yourself if you said you weren’t still thinking of that game.

“It was just a few small mistakes on the day really. We’re not going to let something like that shake us.

“We know exactly who we are as players and as a team. We know exactly what we can do, it just didn’t click for us on Saturday.

“If anything, it’s emboldened us to go out and produce the rugby we can play.

“We’re not out of the competition completely yet. It’s everything to play for. We get to go out and play this weekend and right a few wrongs.”