Keith Earls is Darren Sweetnam’s advice centre

The sight of Keith Earls hunting down Italy full-back Matteo Minozzi in the final minutes of a game already done and dusted has had everyone purring, and Darren Sweetnam has thrown in his praise, calling his Munster team-mate’s skills, pace and commitment “outrageous”.

Earls capped a fine try-scoring performance for Ireland last Saturday in the 56-19 Six Nations victory with a whole-hearted chase of Italy’s rising full-back star Minozzi to prevent the Azzurri from gaining a try bonus point.

It was in the dying moments of a game which had seen Earls, 30, bring up Ireland’s bonus point five minutes before half-time.

Yet the Ireland wing showed that his worth to the national side was as much without the ball as with as he brought a halt to Minozzi’s 60-metre straight-line dash down the right wing by running crossfield from the opposite side of the pitch to snare his man on the Irish 22.

It earned admiration from punters and pundits to Ireland head coach Joe Schmidt, but for Sweetnam it was the measure of a man whom he regards as something of a mentor.

“The man is outrageous. He is electric, isn’t he?” Sweetnam said of Earls as he began preparations for Munster’s PRO14 trip to Cardiff Blues tomorrow.

“He seems to be getting faster with age. Earlsy is ridiculously good and he just seems to be getting better and better, so I think I could learn a few things off him, his running lines and whatnot.”

It was Earls whose hamstring injury during the first week of Ireland’s November campaign paved the way for Sweetnam, 24, to get his first taste of Test rugby.

The West Corkman earned his Ireland debut off the bench against South Africa before a try-scoring first start against Fiji the following week and he is grateful for the time Earls spent with him, offering his wealth of experience despite his own disappointment.

“Definitely, Earlsy is very good for that. Even when I was up in camp and I was struggling with the moves and stuff, you could just go up to him. Even the week before the South Africa game - and he got injured - he was straight over to me helping with the moves and stuff.

"It makes such a difference. He doesn’t need to do it, but he is just such a nice guy that he will. He is very selfless. It makes a big difference.”

Earls’ absence from Munster as the 2018 Six Nations continues is now another opportunity for Sweetnam to raise his hand for selection with last Saturday’s start in the 33-5 win over Zebre marking his 50th senior start for the province.

“Last week it was so exciting, there are new guys coming in, everyone is looking forward to the opportunities because when the internationals are away there are so many opportunities out there.

“You kind of want to put pressure on them when they’re coming back and that obviously helps massively because if they are under pressure it builds the whole squad and if you have good depth in the squad, that is where you want to be and that helps push on to win trophies.”

Munster need to push on as a collective to put themselves in the frame for the big games to come in both the league and Europe and that continues this weekend with the trip to the Arms Park in the Welsh capital as Johann van Graan’s side looks to build on its home victory over Zebre and nail down at least runner-up spot in Conference A of the Guinness PRO14.