All going to plan, Tadhg Beirne should hit his half-century of Irish caps during the 2024 Guinness Six Nations.
It's a mark that feels long overdue.
Beirne's story is well-told by now. Having struggled to get a shot at Leinster, the Kildare man bet on himself and went across the Irish Sea to the Scarlets as a 24-year-old in 2016.
Within 12 months he was one of the standout players on an electric Llanelli side that downed both Leinster and Munster to win a Pro12 title. One year later he'd been headhunted by the latter province, and was drafted into the Ireland squad for their summer tour of Australia.
If you bought your Tadhg Beirne stock in the summer of 2016 after he'd been released by Leinster, you could retire off it tomorrow.
At the World Cup in France he was one of Ireland's most important players, starting all five games, while the only minutes he missed came in the second half of the final pool win against Scotland, when he was one of the frontline players dragged off early in the second half to be wrapped in cotton wool.
If there was every any doubt how important Beirne was to Ireland, that substitution removed it.
The length of his journey to this point of his career is making him appreciate it all the more.
"I've had to work hard to get into that position where I’ve been playing the last couple of years," he says as he reflects on his career path.
"Whether I’m still playing in this Six Nations has yet to be determined. All you can do is keep your head down and keep working, keep working, to improve.
"That’s obviously been my goal the whole time I come into these camps, to keep improving and keep working on getting better, because every game you look back on, and there’s certainly a lot of areas to keep getting better at.
"On my journey I've had to work my way into the squad like a lot of lads and I think what Faz [Andy Farrell] has done with the group has been incredible. Everyone loves being here and the way we play, he’s certainly made me a much better player."
The 32-year-old has been kept busy since the World Cup, playing eight times for Munster across the URC and Champions Cup.
His role with the province has also changed.
Since Peter O'Mahony stood down from the captaincy in November, Beirne has replaced him as the province's skipper, and although he hasn't been given the role permanently by head coach Graham Rowntree, that confirmation seems inevitable.
"I'll make that decision when I’m ready," Rowntree told RTÉ Sport bluntly yesterday.
He admits, though, that the role is taking some getting used to.
"I think my form has gotten a little bit better as the weeks have gone on, but I think there's a bit of a lull after the World Cup too, to try and bounce back from, going back into a new environment again from being with the Irish camp for so long, and there’s an adjustment there from a different way of playing in some ways.
"It probably took me a few weeks to get used to that as well and obviously a lot of injuries [at Munster] and things weren’t going particularly well for us at times so there was a lot of frustration as well within the group.
"We just had to keep our heads and keep believing that we’d bounce back and we had some good performances but we still have a long way to go to get to that top level what we were at last season.
"But I do believe that we’ve shown glimpses in the last couple of weeks with Munster.
"On a personal note, I certainly think there’s still a big ceiling for us to reach for us so I’ll keep chasing that."
From an international point of view, Beirne (below) insists the World Cup is in the rear-view mirror.
Time is a great healer, and with Ireland having to take on France in Marseille to kick off their Six Nations campaign, that scar-tissue will be quickly tested.
"It's not that it's easier but it makes it exciting, doesn’t it, the unknown," he added.
"The Marseille stadium is a pretty exciting game to look forward to. The atmosphere is supposed to be incredible and it goes up a notch from Stade de France, so very much looking forward to being part of it if selected. So yeah, I think the unfamiliarity brings a lot of excitement.
"Time, you have to move on as quickly as you can. We're into a Six Nations now and that’s all our focus is, you can’t keep dwelling on the past.
"I’m sure when I retire I’ll be dwelling on it much, much more but that’s the beauty of it for us, I suppose, that we were straight back into games and we were able to move our focus.
"I think the three weeks off we had was much needed but there were a long three weeks in terms of replaying a game over and over in your head."
Watch Wales v Scotland in the Under-20 Six Nations on Friday from 7.05pm on RTÉ Player.
Follow a live blog on France v Ireland in the Guinness Six Nations on Friday from 7.30pm on rte.ie/sport and the RTÉ News app and listen to live commentary on RTÉ Radio 1.
