Alan MacGinty - Principal, Blackrock College, Dublin

The whole concept of a search for excellence is important. That is a transferable skill - to give of your best so everyone around you has an opportunity to give of their best. To work to a common goal.

At this time of year, there is always a hard-luck story. The team was announced last week and some guys didn't get on it. You have seven on the bench who are disappointed and other fellows in the squad who missed the 22. How they react to those type of decisions is as much an indicator of the success of the project as the performances in Donnybrook or Lansdowne Road because it is an understanding that you all have to be contributors. We have all encountered these disappointments in our working life, so I think that is the biggest aspect.

We see it as the same major educational project as the school opera, the Leman concert (which took place in the National Concert Hall last Monday) as they all work to a goal. Now, the rugby does have a slightly different twist to it. There is a finality about it. You are in, you are out on any given day. You're not guaranteed success.