With Peter O'Mahony, in his early years with ther Irish set-up, getting blockbuster answers and automatic headlines from him was hard going.
O'Mahony was there to do a job and that was on weekends. He gave short shrift to any reporter trying to draw him out of those safe-zone answers. A line of questioning could be shut down as quickly as one of his breakdown poaches, with a dismissive sniff or a straight-up glower.
The safe bet was to ask him how much playing for Ireland meant to him. What he felt when he heard the anthems. Passion. Ask him about passion and he could talk until the media officer gave everyone the wrap-it-up sign.
Everyone at Munster knew they had a gem when Peter O'Mahony started off with the underage teams. He was raw, he cared little about his own personal safety but he was a player his teammates followed. As a teenger, he was called in to train with the senior squad and the big n' hairies gave each other the nod - this lad has it.
In his autobiography, The Battle, Paul O'Connell wrote about a training session, when O'Mahony was still establishing himself. The former Munster captain felt the non-contact session was a bit flat, so he called over his young teammate from Cork.
The two of us will go full contact here, now'
'Are you serious?'
'Yes.'
O'Connell recalls that, within minutes, O'Mahony had spear-tackled Simon Zebo into the turf of the U.L training pitch. "After that," he wrote, "we had a really sharp session."
O'Mahony was captaining Munster by the age of 21 and would take over from Doug Howlett as permanent captain in 2013. For a decade, though, he never had the chance to lift a major trophy as captain. Speaking in March 2024, after leading Ireland to Six Nations glory, he reflected, "There have been days that you wouldn’t dare dream of, like today and lifting a trophy. I’ve been through enough losses to pick one – semi finals and finals with Munster."
As he mentioned the close calls with Munster [who did win the URC in May 2023], I thought back to the same Aviva Stadium press conference room, seven years prior. It was just over a week before the 2017 Lions Tour to New Zealand, but O'Mahony was hung up on a painful defeat to Scarlets. He delivered a stinging rebuke, that day, and it captured what he is all about.
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Peter O'Mahony takes a selfie with Jennifer Malone, from Clane, Co Kildare, ahead of the 2017 Guinness PRO12 Final between Munster and Scarlets at the Aviva Stadium in Dublin. (Photo by Diarmuid Greene/Sportsfile)
'I wouldn't accept that at all'
In 2017, Scarlets - inspired by Tadhg Beirne - would spoil plans for a PRO12 Final at Aviva Stadium by turning over Leinster at The RDS.
Munster made the final but, by half-time, were blown out of the water by Wayne Pivac's side. Munster got over for late scores from Andrew Conway and Keith Earls, but the Welsh outfit responded with tries from DTH van der Merwe and James Davies.
In the post-match press briefing, after his side's 46-22 loss, Peter O'Mahony cut a sombre figure. He was flying out to London the next morning - along with CJ Stander and Conor Murray - but there was little excitement in his voice. Understandably so.
The most animated O'Mahony got was when I asked if some Munster players were 'falling off tackles' too easily, when those late Scarlets tries were conceded. "Was that a disappointing thing,” I pressed, "that the fight wasn’t there until the 80th minute?" He bristled, fixed me with a stare and replied:
No, I wouldn’t accept that at all.
"When you go out and you are chasing a lead like that, you have to play rugby. When it gets to 60, 65 minutes and you’re twenty-odd points down, you’ve got to throw your plan out the window a bit. It’s no big surprise to people that we don’t play in our own twenty-two or up to our 10-metres line or whatever.
"When you’re firing balls out the back like that, you’re going to concede tries because, you know, that’s not the way we train. Any team that’s chasing a lead is open to a couple of intercepts or getting a pass behind you, getting caught behind the gainline and you’re in trouble then.
"So I wouldn’t accept that for one second, that there wasn’t effort or there weren’t trying out there."
His eyes never left mine for a second, and I was glad I was six rows back. It was his captain's perogative - defending his teammates to the hilt.
When O'Mahony scorched Reggie Corrigan, five months later, after a question about Munster not giving 100%, I knew exactly how the former Leinster captain felt.
Peter O'Mahony of the British & Irish Lions following the match between Crusaders and the British & Irish Lions at AMI Stadium in Christchurch. (Photo by Stephen McCarthy/Sportsfile)
Peter O'Mahony and his greatest captaincy honour
Weeks after the crushing disappointment of that Guinness PRO12 Final defeat, Peter O'Mahony was handed his greatest captaincy honour. With Sam Warburton carrying a knock, and O'Mahony in fantastic form, Warren Gatland named him as captain for the First Test against New Zealand.
Lions Uncovered, the documentary of that 2017 tour, captures the moment O'Mahony was announced to the squad as captain, in the team announcement meeting.
Conscious that he is stepping in for Warburton, who would be gutted at missing out, O'Mahony drops his head when his name is read out. He shows no outward signs of the immense joy and pride he must be feeling. It is only when a couple of Welsh teammates of Warburton congratulate him, after the team is named, that he cracks a smile.
"That’s it," O’Mahony would later tell me, "you certainly can’t be celebrating. There’s guys in the room who have done a huge amount of work and as much work as the guys who have been lucky enough to get into the 23.
"There’s a respect there and a few minutes there when it might be a bit of a surprise for guys. It’s a lot to take in but you’ve got to go then and train and train well because there’s only two or three sessions before you go and take the field. It’s a small window where you take a little bit in but you move on. There’s a job to be done."
The Lions would go on to lose that Test Series opener against the All Blacks, but the pre-match speech of O'Mahony, in the Eden Park changing rooms, still resonates. Standing in a huddle of Lions, he declared:
Boys, today, whoever means something to you, or whatever it means to you, whether they’re fucking at home, whether they’re in the stands or whether they’re not here any more, they’ve got to feel it in your eyes when you get out there today.
"From the first second you take to the pitch, it’s non-negotiable today. Everything after that is cool, collected discipline to it that they can’t live it. Everybody’s got to fucking see it!"
As noted, when it was time to talk passion or bring passion, there was no better man.
When you look back at that 2016/17 season, comparisons to rollercoaster rides don't come close. The arrival of Rassie Erasmus at Munster, early season promise, the shocking death of Anthony Foley, his rousing send-off at Thomond Park, missing that historic win over New Zealand but returning to star off the bench against Australia, back down the pecking order for the Six Nations then grasping his chance with both hands when Jamie Heaslip was injured, the PRO12 Final and all the Lions drama.
Whenever his autobiography comes out, that deserves at least two chapters. Maybe more.
O'Mahony, Conor Murray and Cian Healy moving on from this Ireland squad, at the same time, will be jarring. Like most things in the etheral sporting sphere, we will only truly miss them when the boots are hung up and they are gone.
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