I pitched up at the allotted time, hopped onto the launch and headed for the horizon. There were about a dozen people on board and all of them knew what they were doing. The charter crew got everybody to introduce themselves to each other. The guy next to me was a Latino - the coolest guy I've ever met - Jesus De Souza was his name (pronounced Hay-zeus). He had all his own gear, regulator, tanks, branded suit, super-sized flippers, a silver Tag Heure water resistant to 10 fathoms. He didn't say that, it was just something I imagined from the marketing blurb.

So this was cool, I was going diving with Jesus. As we were gearing up I was dazzled by this silver streak in the sun.

Attached to Jesus' calf strap was a knife that Anthony Perkins could only have dreamt about. A rhetorical question followed. "Are there tigers in there?"

This guy could walk on water, yet he needed a knife?

The launch stopped and Hay-zeus was over the side with his moth before you could say "hasta la vista, baby". A buoy was thrown into the water with a guide line attached. "In you get Irish."

I froze a little bit, but jumped after the initial hesitation. The buoy was three or four meters away. I really struggled to get there. The sea was choppy and aggressive. A wave slapped me in the chops and I downed half a pint; a fizzy saline cocktail, far less forgiving than the warm hotel pool chlorine and kiddie pee cosmopolitan. I eventually got to the buoy and struggled to get my regulator on properly. It was full of sea water.

The captain signalled for me to go down.

"How deep?" I spluttered. "About 20 metres." The hotel pool was only two metres deep. This wasn't such a good idea after all. I had already forgotten the safety drills, everyone else knew what they were doing. I was completely out of my depth in every sense. There were f***ing sharks in the water. Maybe I should just swim back to the safety of the boat and sit it out for two hours or so. The charter crew were good fellas.

Unthinkingly, I put the regulator in my gob, let the air out of my jacket, sank two metres and stopped. It felt good, I drifted down to the bottom and, Buddha-like, slow breathed until the rest of the party arrived. The next two hours were undiluted exhilaration. It went too quickly and when I got back onto the launch something had changed, I was one of them. Now I was as cool as Jesus.

The thought occurred as sombre reflection suspended the post dive giddiness: what if I had frozen completely and swam back in? The high of the dive was almost matched by the relief that I didn't have to sit with this crew for the 45 minutes back to shore with them looking at me. Another thought: the difference between the hotel pool and the deep blue sea was inestimable.

Thirty-one players went to Argentina with an opportunity to earn their ticket to the best competition that Rugby Union has put together. A good 23 places had been already allocated so there were seven up for grabs. It was going to be interesting to see how the competitors would perform. You knew about the guys who had swum in the ocean before. But what about the hotel poolers? Who would make the transition?

Barry Murphy, Kieran Lewis, Jeremy Staunton, Tommy Bowe, Tony Buckley;

were these players ever genuine contenders for a glittering prize? Well, yes they were. They had three weeks under the eye of the blade. They would all get some game time in a full cap international in a bear-pit arena in which nearly every major rugby nation has had its arse kicked from one side of the pitch to the other. All they had to do was focus, gear themselves up, gird their loins and say "I want that slot. I need the place, this is what I've been playing for."

Hotel pool to the deep blue sea. The transition would be made in the blink of an eye. The sign of a good professional is a player who keeps playing while the fabric of the side collapses around him.

Keep on making your tackles, keep on chasing the ball, closing down space.

Even mediocre pros can do this. In the two tests in Argentina Ireland had a good chance of winning both of them.

They were deservedly beaten in both games because the weaker players in the team didn't produce.

The Blade will never forget this. Anyone who failed him will be dispatched Blofeld-like into the shark tank. O'Sullivan's team has had its world rankings diminished. Worse than that, a team coached by O'Sullivan produced a duck egg in a test match. For a coach with selfextended standards, that is unacceptable.

The very least that was expected was that these players could perform basic tasks under pressure. A professional player should be able to put the ball in front of the intended receiver so that he is in a position to catch and run on.

Professional players should be able to go into moderate contact and be able to retain possession, or decide whose ball it is when there are two players in the vicinity under a high ball. Pros should sense when a low percentage play is not on; simple stuff, when to hold and when to give. When it is prescient to concede a penalty and when it is not.

There is no question that even before the pressure came on, some of these players were afraid. For the hotel poolers playing in the Magners League - having some drunken Welsh tosser roar abuse from the stand in Rodney Parade in the pissings of rain in January - they have to ask why they are playing the game. The quest for self improvement is not an answer. The opportunity to put yourself on a completely different stage at a World Cup is what 120 professionals in this country want to do. For the players who didn't perform, as long as Eddie is in charge of this team they will not feature again. Back to the hotel pool or, worse, stay on the boat.

As for the experienced players who performed well, you knew they would perform. They knew what was at stake.

Jerry Flannery will be Ireland's first choice hooker. The admirable Alan Quinlan performed. Malcolm O'Kelly, in the first test, stepped up to the plate.

Neil Best (right) confirmed his place with a bludgeoning staccato and Heaslip also had a big first test.

That is a disquieting statistic - only five players out of 31 played above par, all of them forwards and four of them certain of their places. They had everything to lose yet they performed. The hotel poolers had nothing to lose, yet lost everything.

It's also unnerving to observe how some of the players who will be chosen to go continue to show truly dreadful form. Geordan Murphy will go but he is a good player giving a good impersonation of a bad player.

Form is an amalgam of confidence and concentration. He is missing more than that.

Bryan Young's side of the scrum didn't go backwards but when was the last time you saw an international loose head get over the try line with the ball in his hands and get turned by a pint-sized three-quarter.

Mick O'Driscoll has been awful all season for Munster, had a shocker against Italy last March and in the second test in Buenos Aires, was an embarrassment. His attempted pass out of the tackle which went wildly forward was a shepherd's hook offence. If there was no lifting in the line-out he would be unemployed. Heaslip is half an inch shorter than him. Imagine the extra impetus that he would give in the second row.

What I've said is harsh but I can't comprehend his continued selection at this level, Edward.

There will have to be a few gambles taken, injuries to front-liners before the Coupe de Monde will necessitate it.

The bravest one will be the re-call of David Humphreys. There's no reason now not to include Paddy Wallace as back-up. I'm certain though that if Ronan O'Gara was run over by a bus at nine tomorrow morning, Eddie, after paying his respects, would have Humphreys installed as the number one out-half at 9.01am.

As the senior squad head for the unimaginable horrors of a week's camp in Spala, Poland, the hotel poolers will slowly but surely realise that they would give anything to be there.