Despite not featuring in any of the eight internationals that followed last year’s summer series victory over New Zealand (including the successful Grand Slam campaign in the spring), Earls played the full 80 minutes in the warm-up encounter with Italy at the beginning of this month. He subsequently scored a spectacular try off the bench against England on the occasion of his 100th Ireland cap a fortnight later and while he was a late withdrawal for last Saturday’s narrow win at the expense of Samoa in Bayonne, Earls has held off competition from the likes of Jacob Stockdale to make the cut for the World Cup.

“There’s a huge amount of love for Earlsy out there at the moment and all of it warranted. He’s a real fans’ favourite. I remember playing with him at Thomond Park for his debut [against Canada in 2008]. He was playing full-back and Declan Kidney put me on the wing and it was a bit of a sore spot on the evening, but he’s grown so, so much over the years,” Kearney remarked at the launch of Virgin Media’s World Cup coverage on Tuesday.

“I remember having a big conversation with him in South Africa in 2009, he’d a bad outing on his first day with the Lions and it was a pivotal moment in terms of the growing that he did after that. He’s just gone from strength-to-strength.

“I suppose the most impressive thing for me is his turn of speed that he still has, his acceleration is lightning. He’s a massive defensive leader within the squad. He brings a real feel-good factor to the whole environment, which we know is something that is really important to Andy and his coaching staff.”

Earls is one of three players in the Irish squad who are set to feature at their fourth World Cup finals in the coming weeks, the others being team captain Jonathan Sexton and his Munster team-mate Conor Murray. Cian Healy was in line to make it a quartet of four-timers, but a calf injury sustained in last weekend’s test against Samoa ultimately ruled the veteran prop out of contention.

While Kearney is understandably devastated to see Healy (a long-time colleague of his with Leinster and Ireland) missing out on what was likely to be his World Cup swansong, he acknowledged Jeremy Loughman has now been afforded a golden opportunity to showcase his worth on the international stage in his absence. Having started his career alongside Healy and Kearney at Leinster, Loughman moved to arch rivals Munster in December 2017 and started their United Rugby Championship final triumph over the Stormers at the end of last season.

“I think Cian is a particularly unfortunate loss to the team, given how strong and important our bench is going to be. Particularly our front-row in the last 15, 20 minutes of some of those games. He gives you real solidity in the scrum and set-piece, which is going to be a key, key battle in the last 20 minutes of that South African game,” Kearney added.

“Unfortunately, it’s part and parcel of these warm-up games. It has happened Ireland, it has happened New Zealand, it has happened France. South Africa have picked up knocks, Australia. It’s a matter of your squad depth too, which you’ve been building up over the last four years.

“You have to be fair to Jeremy, his form has been really, really good over the last couple of years. He has come into that Irish squad and he has improved. He has embraced the way that they play. He has shown that he has got the skill set to be able to play and attack like them. It’s just reward for him.”

Rob Kearney is part of Virgin Media Television’s bumper Rugby World Cup coverage.