How Dave Kearney gave himself puncher’s chance of making World Cup

Having a couple of big brothers to pave the way, not least with one of them breaking into the Leinster and Irish teams, has always been helpful for Dave Kearney. And never more so than last summer when the pair pushed each other in the off-season to new levels of fitness, which even contained donning boxing gloves.

Starting out in pre-season, and not having been capped since playing every minute of the 2014 Six Nations, Kearney was some way down the pecking order amongst the nine capped wingers in the original squad. But he resolved to train hard during his summer holidays in Portugal. Never die wondering and all that.

“It was different from past off-seasons when you kind of take your four or five weeks off and you go off and enjoy yourself and travel,” the younger Kearney admitted yesterday at the squad’s base in St George’s Park.

“This year I knew I had to give myself the best opportunity of coming back in the best shape I can and start off on the best step I can. I trained a fair bit during my off-season and obviously it was good having Rob there to do that with.”

In normal off seasons, he wouldn’t do any weight training and would let his muscle mass drop, but over the summer he decided to maintain gym work every day so as to maintain his body mass and then build from there in the pre-season.

Training hard with his brother helped. “If you’re doing fitness on the pitch on your own, it’s tough. Once there’s someone with you, it’s easier. It’s competitive too. You’re working hard against each other and trying to get the best out of each other. Some days the thought of going to the gym and doing fitness on your own is tough but having Rob there as well, knowing we could work together, made it easier.”

Pretty chilled

He and Rob encouraged, more than barked at, each other. “It’s pretty chilled. I suppose if you’re doing fitness no one wants to lose so you keep going hard against each other and that probably gets the best out of each other. It’s good having someone that you can work with and push each other on.”

And the boxing? “We sparred but there were no real headshots. There might been the odd one slipped in. If someone hits you in the jaw, you’re not going to take too kindly to it! It would get heated. It wouldn’t really matter who it is you’re going up against – Rob or someone else. It’s always going to get competitive if they’re knocking lumps out of you.”

There was no winner, even on points. “There wasn’t a referee so I wouldn’t know,” said Kearney, who reckons the last time they had a scrap was when they were much younger, “playing Playstation”.

His other brother, Richard, is 10 years older, and also played for Clongowes, while their dad, David senior, played for Clongowes as well and Dundalk before knee injuries curtailed his career. Yet for all Kearney’s impressive fitness levels in pre-season camp, it was only when he made the cut and then played Ireland’s first game at the tournament that he was able to enjoy it.

Har d to escape

Inevitably, the harder he tried to not think about World Cup squad selection, the more he did so. "You try not to think about it but it's always there at the back of your head. Even when you're out of camp and you're around family and friends, everyone is talking about it. 'How many wingers are they going to bring? How many centres? How many scrumhalves?' It's kind of hard to escape from. It got to a stage with the family where it was 'right, no more World Cup chat now'.

“I suppose, for the last kind of 10 weeks, I haven’t really been able to enjoy it because you’re always thinking of the squad being picked, if you’re going to be in it, if you’re not. Definitely the last week, I’ve got over here, things have built up, we played our first game and got to see what a World Cup is like, what the support is like, another intensity to the game, so it’s been great.”

Kearney won a couple of minor championships with Cooley Kickhams, and played with the Louth under-16s a little, and being a big Manchester United fan (particularly of Anthony Martial lately) he's excited about the possibility of taking the trek from St George's Park to Wembley on Sunday.

“There’s obviously a lot of history behind Wembley. It’s a really cool stadium and if I had a chance to play on it, it would be real cool, yeah.

“I would just see it as another opportunity to perform. You don’t want to give up a chance of playing a World Cup game again. I got a taste for it last week and it is pretty special, so if there is an opportunity I am not going to pass it up.”