I got three minutes in a room with Jacky. I was honoured to get that

No I haven’t walked the 200 feet of tunnel that reputedly leads from renowned London wine merchants Berry Brothers and Rudd to Buckingham Palace, but I am assured such a route exists, writes Ronan O’Gara.

The first time I met Racing 92’s president and owner, Jacky Lorenzetti, was at one of these sumptuous business lunches at the venerable cellars on St James Street, near The Mall in London. My hands were sweaty, my head all at sea.

I had barely stripped off the Munster jersey for the final time in Clermont when a French intermediary asked of my interest in moving to and coaching in Paris. If the price of a bottle of red seemed an indelicate subject to raise on the day with the owner of Racing 92, the terms and conditions on offer from my next employer was something I needed to pin down.