Arriving relatively late to the international set-up, Tadhg Beirne now finds himself among the elder statesmen in the Ireland squad.
And such has been his impact and consistency that it's hard to imagine the team operating without the Munster forward.
Whether deployed in the second or back row, Andy Farrell gets Beirne into his teams, including keeping the 33-year-old Kildare man on for 80 minutes in all three of the British and Irish Lions Tests against Australia this summer, in which he started all at wing forward.
Beirne started off in the Leinster academy, making four senior appearances, but made his mark with Scarlets, and was the driving force of a URC title-winning team in 2017.
That led to a return to these shores with Munster and he earned the first of 61 Ireland caps in 2018.
He dominated in the province’s statement win over Leinster at the weekend, allowing him and his club-mates, outnumbered 22 to five, to walk a bit taller into Ireland camp on Monday morning.
"I suppose we did, not too many of us, but we certainly did coming in here which is brilliant," he told RTÉ Sport.
"We've been well used to coming in here after a loss over the years because Leinster have had our number, but I suppose it's nice to come in off a win, for sure."
Midway through the World Cup cycle, the Ireland camp has a different aura about it.
The absence of retired centurions Peter O’Mahony, Conor Murray and Cian Healy has elevated Beirne to senior status.
"That feeling has slowly become more reality over the last year or two, certainly not having Pete, Murr and Church [Healy] here," he said.
"Pete and Murr for me, being Munster, it's been all I've known and I can't remember the last time I was in a camp without Pete.
"That's definitely a bit different, I'm certainly one of the older ones in the group now, other than Bundee [Aki, Connacht’s 35-year-old centre].
"We were laughing, saying it's slowly been dwindling over the last couple of years as a few lads like Earlsy [Keith Earls] and Murr retire.
"That's just the reality of sport though, the exciting thing is seeing younger lads starting to come up through and bring an extra edge to training.
"Those boys will be missed, their experience will be missed, but it's part of sport.
"You have to move on, the game moves on and that will be me one day, stepping away from Ireland.
"The game keeps going."
Asked if he considered himself to be viewed by the younger squad members in the same light that he saw O’Mahony, slightly embarrassed, he said: "I've never really thought of it like that, yeah, I don't know.
"I looked up to Pete from day one, I didn't tell him though until he was leaving.
"I looked up to him until the day he left, he was just one of those figures that you probably couldn't help but do that, because he had such a presence, such leadership and he was such a quality player. One of a few players who would have been like that in this environment since then.
"I don't know if anyone looks up to me like that but I don't think they'd be telling me if they do either."
Beirne, who underwent elbow surgery after the Lions tour, played all but nine minutes of the last Six Nations campaign, starting at lock, while he played four games in the 2024 winning campaign.
His incredible levels of consistency, with an uncanny ability to turn over the ball, mean he’s one of the first names down on the team-sheet.
But ahead of the autumn games against New Zealand on 1 November in Chicago and against Japan, Australia and South Africa in Dublin, he’s not resting on his well-deserved laurels.
"That's the way Faz [Andy Farrell] picks his team, he's not afraid to make bold choices and he will do it," said Beirne, who revealed he hasn’t yet read the head coach’s newly released autobiography.
"If I don't play well, hopefully I'm selected [against the All Blacks], he won't be shy in saying I'll be dropped for the one after that.
"It's on us, all of us who are selected, to try and hold our position.
"As we get closer to the World Cup, we have to keep those performances going.
"It's easy for me to say now, but age is just a number until it isn't.
"Your performance will start to deplete and once that starts to happen that's when the squad is going to change."
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