Pick your moments, pick your battles

It doesn’t seem long ago but it’s more than a decade all the same. Paul O’Connell, raw and big-boned, was 21 when I first set eyes on him. It wasn’t long before I wanted to throttle him.

May 19, 2001. Cork Con are hosting Young Munster in the semi-final of the All-Ireland League just days before setting off I headed off to manage the 2001 Lions tour to Australia. Ronan O’Gara is also travelling and, regardless of the result, is about to play his last game before the tour. Late on, the Con out-half is lying prostrate on the deck in an awkward position when this raging red head shoes him within an inch of his life. Forgetting my position and in the highly-charged atmosphere that attended club rugby fixtures in those days, I let rip, much to the amusement of the Munsters supporters on the open terracing at Temple Hill.

Eleven years on and that dynamic duo are still the heart and soul of rugby in the province. Indeed, together they’ve almost single-handedly dragged Munster into yet another Heineken Cup quarter-final.