Interview with David Quinlan: You could strip David Quinlan on the back pitch behind the East Stand at Lansdowne Road and dutifully report that his percentage body fat is closer to zero than 10.
At six feet, four inches this imposing, lean centre has been casting his shadow long in Leinster. A dream season is in his lap, which he doesn't wish to disturb with bald analysis. Quinlan fears too much detail may draw down a hex. Fragile things these prosperous runs.
A reflective, academic face, there is something refined and personable about it there perched on top of a physique designed to batter and be battered. It's a face that, unannounced, has come into greater prominence this year due to Shane Horgan's injury. But Quinlan has made it considerably more difficult for the injured Horgan to step back in.
He has also paraded his talents at the higher levels before now. A winner at schools level where he won back-to-back Senior Cups with Blackrock, he also surfed the under-age peaks of the Irish under-19s, under-21s, sevens and Ireland A sides. Slow to burn, the 25-year-old has always remained within arms length of the representative teams. Although hauled on board now, Quinlan's pragmatism continues to keep him steadily moored.
"It's gone all right up to now. I wouldn't like to jinx it," he says. "I'm definitely happy about the way some things have gone this year. Ireland A certainly wouldn't have been one of my goals or objectives at the start of the season and to be involved at this stage of the European Cup is as good as it gets."
"I wouldn't be great for setting goals. I think there are too many things outside of your control that dictates whether you attain them. I wouldn't like to put myself under too much pressure by saying that If I don't do x, y or z then it's been a failure. Coaches and injury can dictate what you achieve in a season.
"If I'm playing for Blackrock in the AIL, for Leinster in the European Cup or Ireland A, the goal is always to go out and hope your in good shape and not to sell yourself short. Beyond that you can't get too caught up setting goals. I know what my strengths and weakness are."
With three years of Law at UCD behind him, a year in the Smurfit Business School and a Masters degree in Criminology from Cambridge University, Quinlan can manage to keep desire short term, focused and, importantly, in context. He is too intelligent not to know that while Horgan gains strength by the day his position at inside centre beside his old club-mate Brian O'Discoll becomes more perilous. While rugby occupies his entire horizon, he has sensibly orchestrated a soft landing for life after the professional game.
"When it's over I may go back to the law side but the life now suits me. I've played with Brian in school. He was a year behind in Blackrock but he wasn't playing centre at that stage. I played at 13 in our first cup win and at 12 the year after. I played with him more with the club in the AIL second division. It was two or three years ago when he was shredding defences up and down the country. He was just coming to prominence at that stage. I'd Emmet Farrell inside me and Brian outside. Happy days."
Against Perpignan, Leinster will face dedicated tourists who perceive themselves as the put upon underdogs arriving like fat French aristocrats to the Lansdowne guillotine. But Quinlan is a confidence player and sharp to his own misjudgments as much as to the areas where he excels.
Playing against Biarritz he'd a good game and stretched winger Bernart Salle with a tackle. With Cambridge in the annual university match against Oxford last year, he had another good game but missed a tackle.
"That's probably the low point of everything rugby wise, that Varsity match. Pretty much one missed tackle that led to them winning the game. People said afterwards that I'd played well but it wasn't any consolation. I was a mess after the game."
Coach Matt Williams has being building confidence and like other players such as Victor Costello, who react more positively to the carrot than the stick, Quinlan is rightfully comfortable operating between Christian Warner and O'Driscoll. Calibration more than wholesale change against Perpignan is where he can see improvement.
"Against Biarritz we were quite happy going in at half time," he says.
"A couple of chances slipped by that we'd have preferred if we'd taken but there was never a sense of 'jeez we have to start scoring here'. Against a decent team you'll always go into a patch where they'll put pressure on you. It was almost surprising that we found ourselves in the position we did in the last few minutes."
For the player who has studied the philosophy of punishment at Cambridge, Perpignan may well offer some opportunity of practical application of the theory. A European Cup semi-final, at Lansdowne Road, partnering O'Driscoll.
Happy days.
