I’ve never been jealous of a 10-year-old child. Well, not until last Wednesday when I watched Pia McElligott playing piggy in the middle with the Kearney brothers for a shoot with the National Dairy Council (NDC), who this week announced Rob and Dave as their ambassadors for 2014 – the 50th anniversary year of the NDC.
It was the type of cold you get at 8.30am on a January morning – it had everyone bouncing in an effort to stay warm. But the guys were incredibly affable, smiling through the shivers.
To allow for the early exit of those who aren’t here for the rugby, let’s deal with crucial matters first. Dave (24) has a girlfriend so you can forget about him completely, but Rob (27) is single, yet claims he’s not searching as he’s “focusing on rugby at the moment”.
When Irish Country Living hopefully suggests his search will resume post-Six Nations, he makes the ludicrous claim that he won’t be searching “until my career’s over”. Which is four or five years by our count, but six or seven by his.
Thankfully, Dave steps in to put matters straight: “You know he’s searching, he’s just saying that.”
To which Rob adds: “But I can’t find. Maybe that’s the problem.”
Which we obviously don’t believe for a second.
He claims he’s looking for “a good down-to-earth country farming girl”. When faced with the blondes vs brunettes question, he says he’s all about personality and that hair colour isn’t important.
You can make of that what you like.
The Kearneys are from a tillage farm on the Cooley Peninsula in Co Louth. Dave paints a picture of the boys spending their youth racing through fields of wheat and barley with rugby balls in tow.
“I think the one thing about living on a farm is that you’re always active, there’s always things to do. At a young age, come summer time when the wheat and barley started, we used to absolutely love driving the combine and the tractors. And there’s so much space, as opposed to living in the city where you can’t go out to your back garden and hit a ball 30 metres.”
Wide open spaces are certainly something Rob knows how to make best use of, as demonstrated by a spectacular, almost full-length run of the pitch to score a try against New Zealand in November.
“I’m still tired from it,” he exclaims.
How did it feel?
“Running 80 metres to score a try for your country has to be up there. You get a huge, massive adrenaline buzz from it. After we scored that third try, I don’t think I’ve ever heard the Aviva Stadium as loud as it was for that minute or two, that will definitely be up there as one of the best memories I’ll hang on to when I retire.”
Do the boys think Ireland can reproduce the intensity displayed in that game?
“I think our aim is always to perform at the highest level,” says Dave, “and obviously we found out we’re able to do that by playing at that high level against the best in the world. That’s the benchmark now for us, to do that week in, week out, and start getting a bit of consistency in our game. I think that’s the key thing to winning a big championship like the Six Nations. If you can do that every week, you put yourself in a good position for winning trophies.”
Both Kearneys are adamant all is rosy in the Leinster camp, despite much-discussed potential defection to France.
“It isn’t tense, you joke about it,” says Rob. “All of those guys who are up for renegotiation, you hope they stay on because there’s some great players there. Every year, there’s always five or six renegotiating. It’s something you get a little bit used to. And deep down we probably realise that, at the end of the day, the guys are going to be staying.
“For all the chat of contract negotiations, over the last four or five years there’s only ever been one who’s gone and that’s Johnny (Sexton), and I suppose, to an extent, probably against his wishes.”
Rob concedes that players do use these negotiations as leverage to get a better deal from the IRFU, but he thinks the entire system needs to be looked at.
“The manner in which contracts are done between players, their agents and the IRFU is something that hasn’t been working well over the last few years and it’s a distraction.”
Rob notes that as late as last week, Jamie Heaslip was unsure about his future, with contracts hanging over his head.
“It creates a mental imbalance. I know guys will say they won’t let it affect their performance on the field, but it has to in some capacity, even if it’s only by 1% or 2%. Because these margins are so small, you need to make sure that everything within your life is as close to perfect as possible come Saturday afternoon, otherwise, it’s going to affect your performance.”
With only three years between the brothers, they are very close, but also very different. Dave is the more quietly-spoken of the two, while Rob is more assertive and comfortable in the role of the older, protective one. But this doesn’t mean he won’t slag his brother off.
He describes Dave as “airy”, a “space cadet” in fact, with “plenty” of annoying habits. In retaliation, Dave explains it’s difficult to keep everything “pristine clean” in line with Rob’s standards because the older Kearney (self-admittedly) has a “little touch of OCD”.
But for them, living together works.
“We live together, we work together and we room together when we’re away,” says Rob. “When I’ve got a day off, he has a day off. We eat our breakfasts at the same time. It really is quite bizarre how much we actually do together.
“It’s really important that we get on well. Which we do, probably more down to Dave being such a laid-back character and not really getting too uptight or too worried about too much.”
Such civility is a far cry from the escapades of their youth, not least potato fights back in Cooley.
“When it was rainy outside and we couldn’t play our sports, we used to go into the shed and have potato fights,” says Rob. “So you get the bales, set up your den...”
“You’d put your head up,” interjects Dave, “and you might get the odd potato in the head. There was plenty of black eyes.”
Wasn’t this dangerous?
“There were rules,” continues Rob, “you could only use certain sized potatoes. There was a weight restriction.”
Boisterous endeavours indeed, but their weight today is thrown around a rugby field instead of a potato shed. Both Kearneys were in flying form the last time we saw them in action for Ireland (in November against the All Blacks), and with the Six Nations kicking off Saturday, we’re expecting some serious Kearnage in coming weeks.
National Dairy Council
According to the National Dairy Council (NDC), between the ages of five to 12 years, 37% of Irish girls and 28% of boys have insufficient calcium in their diet, and 42% of teenage girls and 23% of teenage boys in Ireland are calcium deficient.
“Now more than ever before, the inclusion of milk in the diet from cradle to grave is important,” says the NDC’s chief executive Zoe Kavanagh.
Dr Catherine Logan of the NDC tells Irish Country Living: “There’s guidelines out there to help people follow a healthy, balanced diet and that’s what we’re promoting as part of the campaign in the National Dairy Council, so people know the role of cheese, milk and yoghurt in a healthy balanced diet. We aim to educate and assist parents and gatekeepers to make the smart choices for their family. That’s what parents want at the end of the day, to ensure that they are giving wholesome, natural, nutritious food to their kids.”
It’s therefore fitting that the Kearney brothers, who will no doubt help draw attention to this and other issues, are the ambassadors for the National Dairy Council in 2014 – its 50th anniversary year. A new television advertisement to promote Irish dairy will be filmed on the Kearney family farm after the Six Nations Championship, and will be launched to mark National Dairy Week in May. The advertising campaign forms part of the NDC’s three-year “Irish Dairy: Sustainable & Nutritious by Nature” strategy.
“The Kearney brothers are terrific role models who resonate with adults and children alike,” says Zoe Kavanagh.
“They are, collectively, an embodiment of a balanced diet and active lifestyle.”
The National Dairy Council also has a strong interest in promoting the positive role that milk can play in sports nutrition. Research from Loughborough and Northumbria universities demonstrate the potential effectiveness of skimmed milk as a rehydration from exercise-induced muscle damage.
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