Tadhg Beirne (Image: Getty)
Tadhg Beirne’s Six Nations journey could have taken a very different turn – if not for a chance encounter and a Scarlets official’s skiing holiday.
Beirne is currently part of a dominant Ireland team that won their first two games against England and Scotland in the ongoing Six Nations 2025. Furthermore, on February 13 last week he signed a two-year contract extension with the Irish Rugby Union until 2027.
In contrast, Wales have been a struggling side recently, registering 14 consecutive Test defeats. This poor run of form also led to the sacking of their highly-reputed coach Warren Gatland.
Speaking to the Irish Independent, Beirne admitted that he was lucky to have not signed a long-term deal with the Welsh side Scarlets back in 2019. He said: “I was very close to signing on with Scarlets in the January of my first year. At the time, the person who did the contracts, I won’t name him, he was away skiing, so he wasn’t replying to my agent’s emails.
“I got a bit fired up, so I was very close to signing. I probably would have signed in that month or the following month. I wanted them to rip up the second year of my contract and re-sign a two or three-year contract but they weren’t willing to do that.”
Furthermore, the chance of an international career with Wales was highly likely for Beirne at that time. In 2019, Scarlets coach Wayne Pivac took over the Wales national team and it was at the time that Beirne would also have been eligible to represent the Reds.
However, an offer from Munster led to him picking the Irish club over signing staying with the Scarlets. He said: “At the time, playing for Ireland wasn’t even in the conversation. Then, luckily for me, it opened the door with Munster because the chat of eventually coming back to play for Ireland as well as coming back to play for Munster became a real conversation.
”So yeah, I was probably lucky I didn’t end up signing that contract, for sure, because I would probably be in a different place. Welsh rugby has probably taken a downturn from when I was there.”
In 2018, Beirne made the move from Scarlets to Munster, where he was handed the captaincy in the very first season. In 2023, he won the World Rugby Championship final with the Irish province.
As the Munster skipper, he remarked that he has had to speak up much more than he normally does, saying: “I’m not usually a man of many words so that’s something that I’ve probably had to add and I don’t know if I’m any good at it yet! But I’m working on it and hopefully, it has added to my game.”
Beirne received his senior call-up for Ireland in June 2018 and over the next seven years, he became an instrumental member of the national team. Ireland will now be gearing up to face Wales in the third round of the 2025 Six Nations, on February 22, with an eye on making it three wins on the trot.
However, for Beirne, the visit to the Principality Stadium will be a reminder of how differently his career might have turned out, if not for the switch to Munster.
Beirne remains sympathetic to the current struggles within the Welsh rugby circuit. While he understands that he has an important job on his hands as an Irish player, he revealed that he is also looking forward to meeting up with his old friends in Cardiff.
“The lads kind of slag me that I was a bit late getting to the game, so I have a few more miles in the tank, maybe at my age. I feel pretty lucky to be in the situation I’m in. When I was 23 to 25, this was never really on the cards for me.”