DEEGAN BLUE
He could’ve been a Real Gone Kid but Max wants to stay at Leinster and try to stake his claim for Irish honours
MAX DEEGAN admits he’s driven to catch up on his World Cup final team-mates.
Deegan, 21, is making good strides at Leinster, especially given the massive competition for places in the back row.
But while it was he who was named player of the tournament after Ireland reached the U20 World Cup final, it is Jacob Stockdale, Andrew Porter and James Ryan who have all featured under Joe Schmidt (inset) over the past eight months.
The No8 said: “It’s not a frustration at all. It’s great to see the lads doing so well, and it’s definitely great to see that they are giving opportunities to younger players like that.
“That drives me to push on and get up to that standard. They’re all some of my best mates, so you want to be playing with them.
“I always knew that, even when we were in final of the U18s European tournament, that we had a good bunch of players. We always just concentrated on ourselves and didn’t really think about the future too much.
“We always just thought about the present and the games we were playing.
“Now, looking back on it, you think ‘Jeez, we had some bunch of players’.”
Deegan added: “I thought Porter was unreal (against Italy) at the weekend.
“For a tighthead to play that many minutes, especially coming off the bench early – I did that last year and it is a serious shock to the system.
“As a tighthead, he knew he needed to finish the game out, he did an unreal job. I thought he was top-class.”
So far this season Deegan has made nine appearances – five of which were starts – and scored three tries. With Jamie Heaslip and Jack Conan ahead in the pecking order at Leinster, was there a temptation for the emerging back row to look elsewhere for game time?
“Not particularly,” Deegan said. “I’ve always wanted to play for Leinster. “I also knew that it was so early in my career and that the standard in the back row is so high.
“I knew the competition; the level of training would push my game on.
“I knew if I went somewhere and was straight in there, I wouldn’t be at the same standard that is at Leinster.
“There is no other club with the strength we have. The level of training is just unrivalled.”
Deegan will be in action for Leinster against Scarlets at the RDS on Saturday.
He didn’t play in the Pro14 semi-final won by the Welsh region last year but said: “There are memories of last year.
“This week, Scarlets are in a similar position to us, where they are missing players.
“We will just be focussing on ourselves this week, get our set-piece right, get our launch right, get our attack right.
“Then, we will worry about them when it comes to the game.”