Building a career beyond Munster: Ballincollig’s Eoghan Barrett celebrating first Top 14 try

Then 18, Barrett left Cork for Pau shortly after completing his Leaving Cert

AN IRISHMAN ABROAD: Eoghan Barrett admits there were times when he questioned if he could make his Pau adventure work. ‘When I moved over at 18 years of age and saw the quality of players that were playing at the time — and look at the quality of players that are here still, now, it’s hard to believe I’m playing alongside them,’ he says. Picture: Alex Caparros/Getty Images

Eoghan Barrett’s well-taken try for Pau on Sunday — his first score in his second Top 14 start — is the latest chapter in an overnight success story that has been three years in the making.

The 20-year-old winger, in the last six months of a three-year academy contract at the French club, latched on to a perfectly weighted kick to race under the posts.