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THE Ballymun flats have never been one of the heartlands of Leinster rugby, I think it’s fair to say. The schools cup has rarely set pulses racing in those parts. The problem of how you might rock the ‘Rock, in the unlikely event of such an opportunity arising, has not detained the locals unduly.

But bastions are falling everywhere these days. Not even Ballymun and Leinster rugby are mutually immune. A former GAA player from Louth – God help us – is currently holding down the full-back spot, not just for Leinster, but for Ireland too. And although Ballymun is a much more distant outpost than that, except in purely geographical terms, who’s to say it couldn’t be next? Enter Dean King. Or, in the short term, exit. The teenager is pure Ballymun: born 19 years ago into an eight-storey block of flats in a suburb synonymous with poverty and deprivation. But his unlikely love affair with rugby will take him to New Zealand at the end of this month, on an even more unlikely scholarship.