LUKEY'S back...just don't call him lucky.

Joe Schmidt yesterday plucked Luke Fitzgerald from the Test wildlands, throwing a man who has not started an international for a full four years into the BT Murrayfield fray. In the process, he has rewarded the one-time wunderkind who refused to let rugby forget him.

Fitzgerald has been the victim of many misfortunes, injuries piling on top of one another, in the dark days that have passed since his last Ireland starting berth in August 2011. But there were plenty before then too. The game has been at times kind but more often wickedly unkind to the Leinster winger.

This is a man who, still a boy, in the autumn of 2006 was Ireland's youngest debutant for three decades, yet he missed out on selection for the Rugby World Cup the following year. He rebounded to play a key part in Ireland's famine-ending 2009 Grand Slam and became a Test Lion that summer, yet there was again no room for him in the group who went to the 2011 World Cup. Tomorrow he will return to the Test arena a 27-year-old with 27 caps to his name. It's fair to assume that No.28 will be pretty special.

"It's any guy's dream to be involved in that starting XV and I'm lucky enough to be pulling on the green jersey this weekend - well I say lucky but I probably don't believe that," said Fitzgerald. "I've worked really, really hard to get back into this position, and I feel like it's all that hard work vindicated. It's hard when you feel like you're a million miles away and you're close to retiring because you just can't figure out injuries, but I find it really hard to say I'm lucky to be in.

"I was pretty close with some pretty major injuries; I just couldn't see a way back and figure out what the problem was," added Fitzgerald who could probably hold a decent level of conversation on anatomy with champion jockey Tony McCoy given the variety of bodily complaints he has endured. Hamstring, neck, knee, hip, abdominal and groin problems have, to varying degrees filled his days. "I just couldn't figure it out: it was so frustrating coming in three times a day, working hard and getting no results. So I feel it's an awful lot of hard work rewarded today. I've been reminded constantly today that it's four years since my last start in a Six Nations match.

"I'm absolutely delighted to be involved in this for the big one."

If Fitzgerald refuses to feel lucky, then the man he has replaced in the starting XV should probably not feel too unlucky either. Simon Zebo endured an exceedingly difficult afternoon in Cardiff last Saturday and some memorable flashes of skill against England aside, hasn't grasped the opportunity to make the most of the absence of Andrew Trimble, one of Schmidt's most reliable performers in last year's championship run.

Yet it is notable that on a day when Ireland need points and, one would imagine, tries should they wish to put pressure on England in the championship race, Schmidt has opted for a man who has been a scorer in just one of his 27 Tests (Fitzgerald) over a finisher who has crossed the white lines in five of his 15 internationals (Zebo).

The return of the considerable bulk of Cian Healy to the front row marked the only other change as Schmidt shied away from any temptation for more wholesale changes in the wake of the error-strewn defeat to the Welsh.