Beirne: I only ever wanted to play for Ireland

There's a world in which Tadhg Beirne could have been playing against Ireland this Saturday, rather than for them.

However, as the Munster lock explains, it wasn't an idea he really entertained.

Having been let go by Leinster in 2016, the Kildare man shipped up in Llanelli with the Scarlets, and soon gave his former province, as well as Munster, something to chew on when he helped the Welsh side win a Pro12 title at the Aviva Stadium a year later.

When Munster and the IRFU came calling the following season, his then Scarlets head coach Wayne Pivac made a final play to keep the versatile forward.

"I didn't have a conversation with Warren [Gatland], but I did have a conversation with Wayne [Pivac] before I left Scarlets," Beirne says, speaking from Ireland's team base at Quinta do Lago in Portugal, ahead of this Saturday's Guinness Six Nations against Wales in Cardiff.

"He [Pivac] tried to encourage me to stay because he did say the World Cup was the following year and I'd be qualified for it,"

"But I think I’d made my decision before that, that I wanted to wear green for the World Cup, not to be in red.

"I only ever wanted to play for Ireland, that was the reality and I think when it became a talking point that there was an opportunity to play for Ireland, the only thing I wanted to do was come back and play for Ireland."

Even if he didn't play for Wales, it's still a country that holds a special place in his heart, having given him the platform for a career which most recent saw him named to World Rugby Men's XV Team of the Year, as well as meeting his wife Harriet during his time at the Scarlets.

And those two years in Llanelli taught him a lot about the role rugby plays in everyday life in Wales.

"I learned that they're