6 NATIONS: Johnny Watterson talks to Malcolm O'Kelly who tomorrow at Lansdowne Road equals Willie John McBride's record of 63 caps for an Irish lock

As much as it is an indication of Malcolm O'Kelly's excellence in the Irish second row, his 63rd cap tomorrow against Italy is an expression of the nature of the professional game. When he steps onto Lansdowne Road, O'Kelly will equal the record number of caps for an Irish lock, held by Willie John McBride. A week later he will probably pass that mark when Ireland play Scotland in their final game of the championship.

McBride, who began his radiant international career at 21 in the 1960s and finished at the top a year after he led his second Lions tour to South Africa in 1974, took 13 years to accumulate his collection. O'Kelly was born in Essex in the summer of that famous tour, earned his first senior cap in 1997 and has taken just seven seasons to play in 63 internationals. He is not yet 30 years old.

When O'Kelly's total was put to an Ulster rugby supporter as a credible comparison to McBride, the reaction was sharply sceptical.

"Are these professional caps? That's what they should be called," was the reply. "He (McBride) played 40 minutes each way you know."

A different era, a different game, different ways of measuring how great players were. O'Kelly, a product of a different rugby culture, has nonetheless retained his admiration of what went before him. He also has a sharp sense of perspective and humility.

"When I heard I'd achieved Willie-John McBride's number of caps, I thought to myself that if he was playing today he'd have a 100. Still, it's a fantastic, an unbelievable achievement for me. I'm actually finding it quite hard to believe that I'm on the same stats as Willie-John. Mind you it's only a stat. To really equal him, I've got to have Lions tours and captain a Lions tour as well, so I think I'll just be happy with the fact that I've equalled his record and get on with it."

Despite all the replacement caps in the modern game, O'Kelly is one of the Irish players who has had more starts than most. While his rugby may not have taken him up the dark alleyways that McBride and his players travelled before video evidence and television cameras weeded out much of the overt brutality, he has been a regular pick for entire matches.

He is also in a game where the physiques are bigger, the players faster and the collisions harder, while his body is in much greater demand than players of 30 years ago.

In the match program for Ireland's game against Scotland in March of 2002, O'Kelly is listed as having 35 caps. That's makes it 28 internationals in the last two years. However, with impeccable timing, he was dropped two matches ago only to get back into the side when Donncha O'Callaghan hobbled off injured against Wales.

"I think being dropped always gives you a reality check about the present situation in comparison to what it was. Maybe you should have worked harder. I was just lucky to get as much as I got in the Welsh game - so unusual," he says. "I've been lucky so many other times when I've been dropped. I've had the opportunities to get my place back when other guys just sit around and wait and wait and not get a look in. Someone's looking down on me.

"But it's very hard to know what gets a peak performance out of you. I always go out with the intention to give whatever I can.

"It's hard for me to come off the bench. That week was different in terms of preparation. In a normal game the whole emotion is there, everything is set for the guys who are playing. If you are on the bench it is easy to drift, so I had to focus myself a bit more."

O'Kelly has never spoken to McBride. But the legendary second row did turn up before the third test of the Lions summer tour to Australia in 2002 to engender the tough winning edge he regularly brought into contests.

"He gave us a speech before the third Test. Spoke to us at length. Gave the team talk. Very strong words said," says O'Kelly. "He had an aura about him to be fair. I never got a chance to go up to him, shake his hand and tell him I was going to equal his record."

McBride would have brought images of the summer tour of 1974. The apocryphal story goes that during their stay, the Lions squad in high spirits, broke loose in their hotel in the middle of the night. The manager, fed up of appealing for co-operation turned to the Ballymena man and warned that he was calling the police. McBride, in his dressing gown and pipe in mouth, replied: "Will there be many of them?"

A different era? A different universe.