Donal Lenihan: Getting up close and personal with a Springbok bomb squad

Munster have a distance to travel when it comes to seriously competing at the knockout phase of the big tournaments and must invest further in their front row resources.

IMPRESSIVE: Leinster's Sam Prendergast works on his kicking at St Peter's College in Johannesburg on Tuesday. Pic: Harry Murphy/Sportsfile

JUST imagine for a moment what it must have felt like for 19-year-old Danny Sheahan as he boarded a plane for Cape Town last week.

This time last year the young UCC hooker was preparing for the Leaving Certificate, having just completed his schools rugby career with PBC. Last Saturday, as he warmed up to my right hand side, in a luminous green bib as one of the back up reserves, an all-Springbok front row of (Ulster-bound) Stormers captain Stephen Kitshoff, Joseph Dweba and Frans Malherbe did likewise on the other end of the field.