RUGBY - European Cup: John O'Sullivan on the man likely to replace Reggie Corrigan against Biarritz tomorrow.

His moped had been stolen from outside his girlfriend's house. Racing to the scene, Peter Coyle encountered a squad car, flagged it down, to be told the bike had been found. But there was some bad news involving a tree.

"I thought they were going to tell me that they'd smashed the bike into a tree, but they'd actually stuck it up the tree," he smiles.

After this interview he's going to pick up the remnants, resigned to the fact his biking days are over, for now.

Leinster coach Matt Williams, for one, won't be displeased, recalling the day Coyle arrived on his moped for a match in open-toed sandals. When it was suggested the footwear wouldn't have saved him in a spill, he simply shrugged and said he was never going to crash.

Suffice to say Coyle doesn't fit the identikit of the modern rugby professional and is all the more refreshing for it. There aren't many props who regard the New Scientist magazine as compulsive reading, appear in the audience on RTÉ's Questions & Answers (with fellow Leinster players Adam Magro and Pete McKenna), admit to being a computer nerd and a sponge for useless trivia. More of that later.

But beneath the veneer of mild eccentricity there lurks a big-hearted, talented player whose loyalty to his team-mates is often in conflict with his own well being.

At lunch time today, Coyle is likely to be handed the number three jersey and the imprimatur to take part in the biggest game of his rugby career. Leinster captain Reggie Corrigan is expected to have to concede defeat in his rehabilitation from a broken forearm.

Coyle's name mightn't be familiar to many outside of Leinster rugby but he boasts a decent representative pedigree. Educated at Castleknock, he subbed for the Ireland Schools and, at 19, he played against England at Under-21 in a Triple-Crown-winning season.

Senior coach and then Under-21 coach Eddie O'Sullivan recalls. "He was noted for his scrummaging and was quite explosive around the pitch. He did a fine job of locking down the scrum against a big English pack in Northampton that night and offered the first indicator of potential to be an international prop."

Coyle sat on the bench in the other two matches and again the following season because of a lack of game time at club level. He admitted he wasn't the fittest around and probably got slightly big for his boots. Studying engineering at Kevin Street, he left after two years and joined St Mary's College.

Here his progress was blighted by neck problems. It reached crisis stage last summer and only the intervention of Liam Heavin and James Allen at the Documentation Based Care (DBC) centre in Walkinstown revived his prospects.

"They did wonders for me. You could almost describe it as faith healing if it wasn't so scientific. He (Heavin) put my problems down to a lack of flexibility and intrinsic strength in the neck. He strapped me into a chair, put this helmet on my head and he measured my flexibility, told me it was crap, and then set about rectifying the problem.

"He loaded up the helmet and got me to improve flexibility and in the space of two weeks there was a significant improvement. I went from a point where a month prior to that, when Simon Keogh grabbed my arm, just to get my attention, I fell to the ground in pain to a point where everything was fantastic."

Up to a point. "Frances (Moran, the Leinster physio) says she's got a small novella on my injuries. It goes back to shoulder problems at school. At the start of the summer I was having some serious problems with static pain down both my legs. I went in for an MRI scan and my spine looked more like a dog-leg at Augusta National than a proper spinal column. The core stabilisation and Pilates exercises have helped considerably. I should be a poster boy for people who have bad neck and back problems. You can get back to a perfectly normal life."

Coyle's delivery is matter of fact and self-deprecating as he explains the extent of the original problem. "I'm not sure how I did it. I fused two vertebrae together initially, two discs are completely gone at the top of the neck. The next five are collapsed and are eventually going to fuse or cause problems. They're dry, like cooked crab meat, so any impact could cause bits to fly off."

Thankfully he's in rude good health now, bolstered by a better attitude off the pitch. "He's got an enormous amount of talent," says Williams. "Last season, he was Leinster's most improved player. He was disciplining himself off the field, his training regime was good and discipline on the field was excellent.

"He came off the bench in a number of European Cup matches and was quite superb. He has had some bad injuries. No one doubts his talent; he's a courageous guy and he'll get an opportunity to prove that. Before, he hasn't been fit enough. His off-field work is leading to his on-field success."

However, Williams would prefer to see more piano pushing than playing. Coyle laughs: "The joke is with me that I've played everywhere on the pitch, not officially of course. I make it up half the time, which can drive coaches nuts."

And what about this useless trivia lark? "I do soak up absolutely useless information. I'm nearly an idiot savant at this stage." An example? "Red heads are more immune to alcohol and anaesthetics than other Caucasians. I found this reading the New Scientist magazine last month. Anaesthetists find that they require 25 per cent more anaesthetic to knock out redheads. They reckon it's down to the Scandinavian genes and the hard culture they experienced."

Conversation strays to the man he is expected to replace. "I'm never going to fill Reggie's (Corrigan) shoes as an individual, as a personality: as a captain he's even surprised me at how good he's been in the last two years. He's just outstanding, commands the respect of all the players and communicates extremely well. He's a tremendous loss no matter what position he played."

The boy from Navan may have taken his time reaching this point but possesses the aptitude for it to be a mere signpost on the road to success.