Keith Earls reflects on his hardest ever Munster game

OVERCOME: Jack Crowley and Keith Earls of Munster embrace after their side's victory in the United Rugby Championship semi-final at the Aviva Stadium. Pic: Harry Murphy/Sportsfile

A little more than a week ago Keith Earls had thought his season was over and he had possibly played his 200th and final game for his beloved Munster.

Yet the tears he cried at the full-time whistle of his team’s victory over Leinster were of joy, not regret. The 35-year-old Ireland wing had got through 80 minutes for the first time in a stop-start, injury-hit season of frustration and contributed wholeheartedly to an epic win, having overcome the belief the groin injury sustained on tour in South Africa last month had left his campaign in tatters.

Defence coach Denis Leamy had delivered the gloomy diagnosis of a grade three groin injury ahead of the quarter-final at Glasgow Warriors as thoughts turned to Earls’ contract set to expire at the end of this autumn’s World Cup and the possibility of his former team-mate renewing with Munster to play for a 17th season in red.

“It’s not great,” Leamy had said of Earls’s injury on May 2. “He’s got a Grade 3… which would probably mean he’d be out for a number of weeks.”

On Saturday, Earls picked up the story as he sat alongside head coach Graham Rowntree after just his ninth appearance of the season.

“It was genuinely over, but after a couple of days I started feeling a lot better,” he said. “Good physios, good doctors, good treatment, Graham and the lads looking after me in training and giving me every chance. I was delighted. It was risky but well worth the risk.”

Earls added: “It was overwhelming at the end. I did genuinely shed a tear. You know, it’s been a rough season for me personally. It’s tough sitting out watching the lads and thankfully I got a shot this week. It means everything. I haven’t won a trophy in 12 years with Munster, and that’s something I want to do because there’s only, I don’t know how long left.”

Earls has enough miles on the clock to know what is required in the coming days ahead of Munster’s departure for Cape Town and a URC grand final against the Stormers on Saturday, May 27.

“We genuinely left a couple of scores out there today and we’ve got to take them in finals if we’re going to win it but I think the big thing is going to be recovery. Enjoy the dressing-room with the lads, enjoy the review on Tuesday but we’ve got to switch fairly quickly to see how much we can really improve because we’ve got to travel as well, so it’s about looking after our bodies and getting switched on. As Pete (O’Mahony) said inside, it can’t be our final.”

Earls admitted: “I’m exhausted. It was a tough game, it always is, I’ve played with a lot of the Leinster lads in Ireland camp and I know how tough they are, I know how mentally strong they are and physically, tactically, emotionally it’s always close to international standard. And I know I haven’t played in a long time but that was definitely the hardest game I’ve played for Munster, 100%.”

As for how long he actually has left in the game, Earls, said he knew in his head, “But it’s kind of open-ended.”

To which Rowntree added: “Four more years”.