Tadhg Furlong is quick to remind us that he has only started four games for Ireland. He is only finding his way in Test rugby. This is the first season where he is outright No.3 at Leinster.
Nobody is having it.
Even before he starts his first ever Six Nations game, pundits, fans, players and coaches are putting him on a plane to New Zealand with the Lions.
The Wexford native has not been around for a long time but the last 18 months have been a good time. In Chicago, on November 5, Furlong put in an immense performance in the 40-29 victory over New Zealand. Two weeks later and he rivaled Beauden Barrett for best player on the pitch.
That game confirmed what we had dared to hope – that Furlong has what it takes to be the very best. After the game, which Ireland lost in controversial fashion, Furlong dipped into the All Blacks dressing room and got himself Joe Moody’s jersey.
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As for the jersey from that famous win over New Zealand at Soldier Field, that was always going to one place.
During an interview with SportsJOE’s chief writer Dion Fanning, the deputy principal at Good Counsel [Furlong’s old secondary school] explained how the tighthead prop made a very special delivery. Aidan O’Brien comments:
Credit: Dion Fanning“Tadhg’s connection to the school meant something to him and the thing that highlighted that for me highlighted that most clearly was very recently, subsequent to the series of autumn internationals when the last game was against Australia on the Saturday.
“I was walking out that door on the Monday and just as I was going around the corner, Tadhg comes towards me in a tracksuit and an old t-shirt and goes, ‘Here Aidan, just came in to give you that’. And what he gave me was, and I just happen to have it here, was his jersey from the Chicago game.”
All players in the matchday 23 get two jerseys. Good Counsel got one and the other is in the Furlong family home.
O’Brien recalls how Furlong was only too happy to hang around for a chat and to meet some of the students. He says:
“It was lunch hour so I held on to him, so we went out and just strolled and obviously lots of the kids saw him around and took a few photographs and so on, but the perspiration was rolling off his forehead and it wasn’t because of the warm climate or anything, he felt I would say self-conscious.
“He would have been happy to come in and give us that jersey and just get out of here and I think I probably put him under a bit of pressure by making him hang around and meet the fellas. His modesty would be such that he would have no problem doing it and he would love to do it, but there was a degree of discomfort in it.”
Furlong has come a long way from the sports-mad student that would give his hand at anything, given the chance. He always stood out as a top rugby prospect but a love for GAA saw him line out for local [Horeswood] football and hurling teams.
O’Brien says Furlong is great for staying in touch with his old school and getting along to support them in sporting endeavours. Looking back to that visit and gifting of the Ireland jersey, he has nothing but good words for Furlong.
“The thing that struck me about the gesture was that he might have given me prior notice so I’d set up something.
“But he just walked in unannounced and it was the Monday after he had played against Australia and there was lots of stuff going around about a potential Lions trip so I think that probably says quite a lot about him.”
Furlong is going far but there will always be that connection to home.
KEEP AN EYE ON SPORTSJOE THIS SUNDAY FOR AN IN-DEPTH TADHG FURLONG FEATURE.
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