'A special person' - Earls set to join the Irish elite with 100th cap

You can tell a lot about a player through how he's viewed by those around him.

Mack Hansen’s tribute to Keith Earls may be the most colourful of the lot, but long before the Ireland wing dyed his hair green and shaved the initials KE into the side of his head, Earls’ standing among his peers was obvious.

From early this week, it became clear that the Limerick man would be joining an elite list of just eight other men to earn their 100th Irish cap.

Since then, his team-mates and coaches have been queuing up with tributes:

"A selfless person" - Andy Farrell

"Everything he does is about the team" - Josh van der Flier

"A superstar" - Conor Murray

"There’s no one who deserves it more" - Andrew Conway

It’s a century of caps that’s been a long time coming. Just under two years ago it seemed like a case of when and not if the Limerick man would reach the milestone of appearances.

In November 2021 he played all three of Ireland’s Autumn Nations Series games against Japan, the All Blacks and Argentina to bring him up to 96 international appearances, and despite missing the 2022 Six Nations championship due to a hamstring injury, he added two more caps in that summer’s tour of New Zealand to bring him with touching distance of the century.

The last 12 months have been riddled with injury though; a hamstring issue ruling him out of the Autumn Nations Series, before a calf problem in the Six Nations saw him miss out on the Grand Slam success. A groin injury while in action for Munster in April threatened to end his season, but after a miraculous recovery he was able to help his province to a United Rugby Championship title.

His route to Test rugby had been mapped out long-before his debut against Canada in 2008 at Thomond Park, where he scored