IDEFINITELY experienced the fickle nature of professional sport at first hand, going from being cast aside in Ireland, to being a regular starter at Gloucester and on the fringes of the Ireland squad, to returning to the wilderness again – all in the space of a few years.
I was in a very successful Ireland U20s team that won the 2007 Six Nations Grand Slam alongside Sean O’Brien, Cian Healy, Keith Earls, Darren Cave, Felix Jones and Ian Keatley. Being a part of that team helped to get me into the Leinster academy, one of the best in the world. My second year there was huge for me personally and for Leinster as a club, as they won their first Heineken Cup and I was the domestic league (AIL) top try-scorer with Blackrock RFC. But even playing as well as I was, it was very difficult to get an opportunity because the coach at the time, Michael Cheika, wasn’t there to blood new players, he was there to make Leinster winners so he focused on the senior talent pool which was pretty tasty to be fair!