Leinster head coach Leo Cullen believes Sam Prendergast has the mentality to overcome a difficult few weeks after losing possession of the Ireland No. 10 jersey.
The Leinster out-half was dropped after a couple of shaky performances against France and Italy in the first two rounds of the Six Nations and was excluded from the match-day squad entirely for Ireland's visit to Twickenham last Saturday.
His rival Jack Crowley then cemented his status as the first choice option - in the short term at least - as a rejuvenated Ireland proceeded to dismantle England in a record away victory in the fixture, a result which has completely changed the mood music around the team's prospects.
Though he wasn't part of the Ireland squad on Saturday, Prendergast won't be available for Leinster's visit to Cardiff this Friday as the URC returns to fill the space during the Six Nations gap week.
But Cullen is satisfied that his 22-year old out-half will be better for the bumpy experience of the past month.
"Personally, I think he'll be fine," the Leinster head coach told RTÉ Sport.
"But yeah, it's the rocky road, isn't it? You've got to just deal with some of the bumps along the way.
"Like Sam is someone who works unbelievably hard at his game. All aspects of his game.
"It's great thing to go through, isn't it? Because it's never smooth sailing, I think. The sooner we all understand that [laughs], sometimes the easier it can be.
"Young players come through, and particularly if you're playing with a good team, as a young player, you tend not to have that many bumps.
"And then suddenly you hit something, you're like, bloody hell, how do I figure this out?
"Sometimes the sooner you hit some of these speed bumps, the better. But listen, Sam's a great young man to work with, and I wouldn't have any worries about him."
Key to bouncing back, according to Cullen, is rediscovering the joy of playing the game.
"Just getting back out there and enjoying it. At the end of the day, I know it's great that there's so much analysis of the game, because it means there's a lot of interest in the game.
"But you're out there trying to just enjoy yourself playing a game that you love. So, bring the joy to the performance.
"And you saw it at the weekend, like it was an unbelievable performance, wasn't it? I think every player that was not there was like 'why wasn't I playing in that game!?'
"Because that's the game that they wanted to play in. That was a magical performance.
"Every team has that intention to go out and try and perform and put in a huge performance, like Ireland did at the weekend. There's all different factors that feed into these things, as we know.
"And there's just a certain flow that happens on any given day - a lot of people call it momentum.
"Ireland just weathered some early pressure from England and hit them with a couple of counter punches. Then they kick on well and were very, very clinical after that in terms of the opportunities that they created and capitalised on."
Friday's game in Cardiff Arms Park is Leinster's first since their win over Edinburgh on the last day of January, which was their seventh league win in a row and their 11th on the trot across the two main competitions.
With the bulk of the first team away on Irish duty, it took a hat-trick from Scott Penny to turn around an eight-point half-time deficit to secure a bonus point win. Cullen says it'll be a roughly similar line-up for the trip to the Welsh capital this Friday.
"It's a nice time of year. Yeah, there's not as much focus on Leinster at this time of year. But there's a lot of work that goes on behind the scenes in trying to help some of our young gang push on and improve," says Cullen.
"I thought we were quite poor in the first half against Edinburgh. A little bit passive. Maybe we over-respected the opposition or didn't try to impose ourselves enough in the game.
"But what was pleasing was there was a great composure at halftime. It was a really important bonus point win for us against Edinburgh who are not missing a huge amount of players. And we were missing plenty.
"It was a good couple of weeks for us. What does it do? It helps the senior coaches, in particular, work with some of the younger players.
"So, we have a younger cohort but there's some experienced guys coming back into the mix. Robbie Henshaw is back training with the group, as is Jimmy [O'Brien].
"It helps us build depth. It looks to the future and all that good stuff. We just need to try and produce a better overall performance. Because, as I said, we were too standoffish in the first half in our last game."
On Friday, they're facing the strongest performing of all the Welsh outfits, amid a traumatic campaign for Welsh rugby overall. Under Corniel Van Zyl, they've won seven from 11 in the URC and sit fifth in the table, just behind Ulster on score difference and one point ahead of Munster.
"It's a raucous atmosphere there," says Cullen. "And they'll be into it, the crowd. Cardiff are going well, the best of all the Welsh teams at the moment. They have a lot of cohesion and they've not lost a ton of players to Wales.
"Cardiff have a lot of consistency over the last couple of seasons. Amongst all the goings on in Wales at the moment, they've probably been the most stable.
"It'll be a proper test for our guys."
