{"id":778062,"date":"2026-09-21T18:34:13","date_gmt":"2026-09-21T18:34:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/778062\/"},"modified":"2026-09-21T18:34:13","modified_gmt":"2026-09-21T18:34:13","slug":"raffi-quirkes-newcastle-career-gets-off-to-false-start-after-injury-setback","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/778062\/","title":{"rendered":"Raffi Quirke’s Newcastle career gets off to false start after injury setback"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Published: 3 hours ago | 21 September 2026 10:47 EDT <\/p>\n

mens<\/p>\n

gallagher-premiership<\/p>\n

BAGSHOT, ENGLAND – JUNE 16: Raffi Quirke of England looks on during the England training session at Pennyhill Park on June 16, 2026 in Bagshot, England. (Photo by Patrick Khachfe – RFU\/The RFU Collection via Getty Images) \"Google <\/a> <\/p>\n

Newcastle<\/a> Red Bulls<\/a> boss Dan McFarland has confirmed that England<\/a> scrum-half Raffi Quirke has been ruled out of the season opener against reigning Gallagher PREM champions Northampton<\/a> Saints at Franklin\u2019s Gardens on Friday night.<\/p>\n

RugbyPass understands that\u00a0Quirke, who moved from Sale Sharks<\/a> this summer, has damaged knee ligaments and that the club have started to search for a potential replacement.<\/p>\n

The news will be a blow to Quirke, who suffered a string of hamstring and wrist injuries during his time with the Sharks and hoped a move to the North East would kick-start his stalled international career.<\/p>\n

Quirke, 25, was called into the England squad for a Nations Championship<\/a> clash with Argentina<\/a> in the summer after Alex Mitchell suffered a hamstring injury and won the last of his two caps, scoring a try in a win over the Springboks in November 2021.<\/p>\n

McFarland confirmed to RugbyPass on Monday afternoon that Quirke, who played in a pre-season game against Glasgow<\/a> Warriors 10 days ago, won\u2019t be available to face the Saints but stopped short of saying how bad the injury was.<\/p>\n

\u201cRaffi is currently not available yet. That\u2019s absolutely true. We haven\u2019t released an injury update, but Rafi won\u2019t be considered for selection this week.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m not going to say at the moment (the extent of the injury). If that\u2019s all right, but he won\u2019t be available this week,\u201d said the new Red Bulls boss on his weekly media call.<\/p>\n

McFarland did confirm, however, that his three new Argentinean signings, tight-head Francisco Moreno, lock Franco Molina and full-back Benjam\u00edn Elizalde, plus scrum-half Sim\u00f3n Benitez-Cruz, have all arrived in the North East after international duty.<\/p>\n

And they will be available to face Saints, and the news that Benitez-Cruz is fit will be a boost given Quirke isn\u2019t available and it appear that he won\u2019t be for the immediate future.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Published: 3 hours ago | 21 September 2026 10:47 EDT mens gallagher-premiership BAGSHOT, ENGLAND – JUNE 16: Raffi…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":778063,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[35],"tags":[5903,101,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-778062","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-rugby","tag-rugby","tag-sports","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/778062","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=778062"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/778062\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/778063"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=778062"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=778062"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=778062"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}