Our rivalry’s changed since I did this

KEARNEY ADMITS BLUES-REDS ANIMOSITY HAS DIMINISHED

O’connell coming up and smacking me on the arse and saying, ‘Best of luck kid, you’ll get the next one’.

“Then, after the game, I was talking to my old man and he couldn’t get over how nice Paul O’connell (right) was, encouraging me during the game. I told him he had a few things to learn.”

Whether he gets to play in the latest episode in the rivalry – on Saturday at the Aviva Stadium – remains to be seen.

But it’s an amusing anecdote from a different era when these interprovincial encounters were blood and guts affairs.

Professionalism has taken a lot of the bad feeling out of it as well as the fact players cannot get away with the sort of things they used to at the bottom of a ruck.

Asked if he missed those days, Kearney said: “You would. You had a lot of bragging rights, depending on how you came out of those derbies. The Leinstermunster game was always the big one.”

Then there was Kearney’s famous Enfield intervention in early

2009 – before the Six Nations championship that yielded that historic Grand Slam – when he questioned if Munster players gave more to the red jersey than to the green one.

He’s not taking credit for healing wounds as he points to the need for national unity to take precedence over local rivalries.

“Far from it,” he laughed. “No, I’d say the player management scheme has taken a little bit of the credit for it.

“It’s certainly different now than it was for my first ones. There’s not the same level of hatred. Guys get on much better in national camp now, a lot would consider themselves good friends and that certainly wasn’t the case 14 years ago.

“Maybe back then that was a little bit to the detriment of the national team’s performances. You need to have real strong relationships at national level to be a successful team.

“So if it has taken a small bit of the bite out of the provincial derbies, at least you’re getting something positive out of it.

“Certainly, the bond and the togetherness within the national squad is far greater than it was.”

The veteran full-back acknowledges the Reds may view it differently, given they have been in Leinster’s shadow for much of time since their last European Cup triumph in 2008.

“Listen, it’s not for me to comment on where their mental well-being is before these games,” he added.