"Jesus, I hate it, " he says before the words can linger in the air. "People have a perception that Irish teams like to play in that weather but give me a dry ball anytime.

Anytime."

While that answer makes a good deal of sense . . . the Irish rugby player of the early 21st century, after all, is a fair deal more sophisticated than many of those who played in times past . . . it's something of a surprise when he also rebuts your suggestion that he's a bit of devil for the physical side of the game, the scant-regard-for-your-ownbody kind of stuff. "To be honest I don't like collisions that much, " he says laughing, "especially running into guys that are twice the size of you."

Having nailed down a couple of things that are not quite true about Leamy, it's even more enlightening to discover a couple of things that actually are. Like his penchant for self-analysis, or selfflagellation as it might appear to some. To most observers, he seemed to do very little wrong against South Africa last weekend as he put Ireland over the gain line almost at will, but to Leamy there were numerous things to pick away at.

"I have mixed emotions about the game, " he admits. "I did some very good things and then on the other side some pretty brutal things.

One or two passes went astray and I dropped a kickoff as well, which is never good. People said I played well but you're never going to have the perfect game, are you? It's funny because you come home and think about the game, you think about it for the next few days and no matter how good you've played or no matter how well you've done, there's always one or two bad things that are really pissing you off.

"You play them over and over in your mind, you say 'what if I did this?' but that's just the way it is I suppose. It's probably a good way to be, it makes you concentrate and want to improve as a player.

I've always been like that.

Anything negative in my game really annoys me afterwards. That's just the way I am. It drives me up the walls sometimes, watching mistakes on television."

He's the type that sees the hole, and not the juicy doughnut around it but even though much of his self-analysis may be overtly negative, you don't doubt it's one of the factors that's helped him to make the Ireland number eight shirt his own over the past 12 months.

Last November, before the All Blacks came to town to dish out a mother and father of a beating, Eddie O'Sullivan baffled most observers by naming Leamy at eight in his starting line-up. Before that game, the former Rockwell College student had spent a couple of years fitting in wherever he could get himself a game at Munster, blind side, open side and even centre, and his Ireland debut the previous February against Italy had come in the number seven shirt. But as O'Sullivan decided, in one of his canniest moves as Irish coach, Leamy's talents were best suited to number eight, the position he inhabited at both school and underage rugby.

"I suppose coaches had kind of forgotten that I played there when I was younger, " he says with a grin. "I was actually surprised to be picked there, I was basically told on the Tuesday that I was starting number eight against the All Blacks and that was it, I had to go out and do the job.

I've always really liked the position, it would be my favourite position if I had to the choice, there's no doubt about that."

His top-level education in the position thus far has been, on paper at least, pretty steep. In this 12 caps to date in the position, three have come against the All Blacks, two against Australia and he's also faced the likes of France, England and last week, South Africa. Rarely has a player of his tender age . . . he's still just 24 . . . stepped up to the mark, not only so quickly, but also against such quality of opposition and his performance against the French at the Stade de France last February still stands out as truly phenomenal. A back row would be expected to carry maybe 15 balls and hit nine or 10 rucks over the course of a game but that afternoon Leamy carried the ball 28 times and hit 19 rucks, all in the one 80 minutes of international rugby. Of all the figures that emerged from one of international rugby's most unusual days, Leamy's numbers that afternoon were as eye-catching as anything else.

It all points to a guy who has a genuine appetite for tucking the ball under his arm.

"That's one of the great things about number eight alright, " he says, "you definitely get your hands on the ball a lot more. At six you can be running around like a blue arse fly, hitting a lot of guys but getting little or no ball whatsoever. At eight you seem to be the first man around the corner after a ruck, ready to take the first pass. The ball's at your feet at the scrum, or else you're dropping back for a kick. It's just a position where the ball seems to arrive a lot, which is something I really enjoy."

His perfectionist streak, though, still nags away at him and despite his exceptional form over the past 12 months, he's already working on ways to make himself a better player. "I've looked at it with Mervyn Murphy (Ireland video analyst) and Brian McLaughlin (Ireland skills coach) and maybe I shouldn't be always looking to take contact, maybe I should be looking to offload before the tackle, throw a pass or something like that. A great example of a guy who's remoulded himself over the past few years is Jerry Collins of New Zealand. Maybe four or five years ago he was a bosh merchant but these days he's a playmaker. You see him bringing players into the game a lot more these days and possibly I'd like to emulate him in that respect."

Today, he faces Australia for the third time in his career and it's clear to see that Leamy is a fan. His words hint that at 15-11 ahead in Perth, with just under half an hour to go, Ireland should have closed the game out against the Wallabies last June, but he reluctantly accepts that the legs went, even if it pains him to admit it.

"Our game went from high intensity to a fairly mediocre one, and I suppose fatigue explains that best, " he says with reluctance. "They then went on to score two or three tries in the final 20 minutes but that's the kind of side they are, you can't give them a half-chance. They've got a great backline; they're big, strong, fast, they run terrific lines and they've got great handling as well. I really admire them. Pound for pound they're the best backline in the world, I honestly thought they'd do a job on New Zealand in the TriNations but I was obviously wrong there."

Not that he doesn't have a lot of positive things to say about his own crowd. "If you look at the team, if you look around the dressing room, there's not one fella you'd be fearful of making a mistake or anything. Any one of these guys can win you a game, especially in the backline. We have a lot of linebreakers and they're all able to produce a bit of magic to change a game. It's great to have them in the team."

You can be sure they'd all be expressing similar sentiments about him.

THE KEY BATTLES

THE FRONT ROW
Baxter, McIsaac and Shepherdson against Young, Best and Hayes is hardly high-pedigree stuff, but it could go a long way to deciding this afternoon's game. The Wallabies have put a lot of work into their scrum and while it has creaked in a couple of games over the past six months, it has improved. Ireland's front row, meanwhile, always performs better than you think it will and Marcus Horan and Hayes have never let anybody down in the heat of battle. But with Young in for Horan, the home side are slightly weakened on paper and the Wallabies just might fancy their chances.

RONAN O'GARA v STEPHEN LARKHAM
This pair are the undoubted two and three in the world out-half rankings, behind Dan Carter of course, and today's game will effectively decide which one earns the higher ground.

O'Gara has been in scintillating form over the past month or so and if he continues to mix his superb distribution game with his pretty much unrivalled kicking-from-hand skills, it's going to be a mighty close contest. Larkham is without doubt the best out-half distributor in the game but his tactical kicking constantly lets him down. At a windy Lansdowne Road, it could just be that O'Gara's capabilities are that bit more suited to the occasion.

THE CENTRES
Gordon D'Arcy and Brian O'Driscoll versus Stirling Mortlock and Lote Tiqiri is a mouthwatering prospect, principally because of the contrasts between the respective pairings. The Australian duo are blessed with speed and extreme power, although Mortlock can be a deceiving runner at times. D'Arcy and O'Driscoll on the other hand, are an all-singing, alldancing centre partnership that mix a touch of pace and power with world class running ability, especially from broken play. Mortlock and Tiqiri have a three-stone advantage on the Irish mid"eld but on their home patch you'd still fancy the Leinster duo to have the better of it.