RUGBY/Interview: "Typical really. During Tuesday's media day with the Irish squad, Malcolm O'Kelly was asked if he would be leading out his team-mates today in celebration of his 50th cap." Gerry Thornley talks to the laid-back Ireland lock as he prepares to win his 50th cap.

Typical really. During Tuesday's media day with the Irish squad, Malcolm O'Kelly was asked if he would be leading out his team-mates today in celebration of his 50th cap. The same journalist had been told by Brian O'Brien that it would be okay. The one person who hadn't given it any thought was, of course, the long fellow himself.

On the surface he conveys the impression of being as nonchalant about this 50th cap as he seems about most things in life. You put it to him that it's almost scary, the notion of O'Kelly, the young, laid-back kid, leading Ireland out as a 50-cap veteran. "Is the ship going to crash, like? Who have we got at the helm, like?" he says with a laugh and mock indignation.

"I know what you mean. You know me as Mal, the laid-back guy who's sitting back enjoying it all. And I still enjoy it exactly the same way as I always have. I probably enjoy it more now, enjoy the training and everything. But, I tell you, now I get more nervous before a game than I did five years ago.

"Maybe it's that extra responsibility that I take on now, and feel I should take on. It kind of rots your stomach, when I go out on the pitch, and I do feel that now. It makes you feel a bit more alive than just going out there and doing the best you can, and whatever else happens is a bonus."

O'Kelly has, of course, matured from the bright-eyed 23-year-old who first played for Ireland into the 28-year-old he is now. He's in a long-standing relationship with Stephanie, he's assumed the responsibility of Ireland's and Leinster's primary ball-winner, and contributes far more to the collective effort on the pitch and the training ground.

"There's a few more issues in my life now, but essentially I'm the same guy. I'd like to think I've developed my character a bit, that there's a little more to me. I'd like to think I'm a little more responsible than I was. I couldn't be any less responsible," he chuckles, self-mockingly. "But it's good to be a bit more responsible and have a few more issues. It kind of makes your life a bit more meaningful I suppose, doesn't it?"

People can misinterpret O'Kelly's easy-going nature, and in the past there has been some questioning of his heart. Scandalous really. He's seriously chilled, for sure, and is a bit out in left field, and seems almost to stand back from life and watch it all buzz past him with a knowing grin. He has a generous nature, is as sharp as a tack, and thinks through things with a clarity few possess. And few have taken a bigger heart onto the pitch.

"He is laid-back, but the thing to remember is that he's not like that on the pitch," says Eddie O'Sullivan, who's known him since Irish under-21 days. "Everybody is different at work from their private life. In his private life, Malcolm is very relaxed, and is sometimes too laid-back. But that is no reflection on the kind of guy he is when he pulls on a green shirt. That's the test of it really."

The impression of the young O'Kelly, which he helped to create, was of a talented beanpole who didn't really give much of a hoot. Maybe he just didn't realise how good he was, for as he points out: "I was driven enough to go up to St Mary's as a 16-year-old not knowing anyone, with no reputation."

He loved those early days. Playing with a host of good players, getting loads of ball in loads of space. Pretty soon he was in the first team and the word was out that Mary's had a gem. Playing in the first Irish under-21s side to win a Triple Crown, under O'Sullivan, reaffirmed the impression.

O'Kelly was a fan then: "A fabulous coach. He sets out what you have to do in a good way, but not a fascist way."

And he's a bigger one now. "I know him better now. As a kid you just do what you're told, 'yes sir, no sir', and he's had to develop his game," says O'Kelly, and describes a more consultative player/coach relationship.

O'Kelly has been through the bad times with Ireland, playing in all the horror days since his debut in the autumn of 1997. He was part of the ritual slaughters on the development tour to New Zealand earlier that year, and his subsequent debut was typical of the road he and the team would have to travel - the 63-15 defeat to New Zealand.

"Those were the days when, for me with Ireland, the result was never really an issue. As long as you played alright, that was the way. And I went out there with nothing to lose. Playing New Zealand, we weren't going to win the game. It was my first time playing against these guys and I was smashing into them. Robin Brooke went off concussed and I like to think I had something to do with it."

Think back to those times and the change in Ireland's performances and psyche is stunning, though as he remarks: "There were plenty of troughs." He picks out Lens, Twickenham three years ago and Murrayfield. Another one was losing at home to Wales after beating Scotland and France in Paris.

There have been good days too: England at home two years ago, winning in Paris three years ago, overcoming Australia this season. Recently, those days consistently outnumber the bad. This season he's been on a losing side just once, when Leinster surrendered their four-year unbeaten home record to Connacht ("and Matt Williams will never let us forget that"). Seventeen wins to one defeat.

He's had quite a bit to do with it too. The Lions tour jolted his confidence, but now he is supreme in the air. That setpiece confidence has been the springboard for his best season so far. He runs forever, makes big tackles and uses his reach to poach ball.

Right now you wouldn't swap him for any other second row on the planet. Nor would O'Sullivan, who agrees that in some respects O'Kelly's disappointing Lions tour was the making of him.

"I suppose the ultimate down he had was with the Lions last year, when he should really have been the guy who made the Test side but disappeared without trace on the tour. But I think that was the big test of him and, to his credit, he's come back now and is playing the rugby of his life. A lot of guys who had that setback might have just wilted, but to be fair to Malcolm he's proved a lot of people wrong who thought he might have gone down the tubes after that. If you were to pick a Lions team in the morning, he'd certainly be in the Test team in the second row."

There have been major influences over the years, none bigger than Willie Anderson, a lock himself.

"I've had him at under-19s, London Irish and Leinster," O'Kelly says. "He brings that hard edge to your play, because he's fairly full-on in what he tells you and he's very precise in how a front five and especially a second row should operate."

But most of all, you learn from playing games.

"The techniques of doing something are fairly set now, maybe bar tackling. You can always become a better tackler. I'm a long way from being Kevin Maggs in the tackle front."

Experience breeds confidence.

"I have a lot of experience, and I've played against a lot of these guys already, although this Welsh side is very new. I don't know any of them, especially the pack. But I find myself coming up against the old crew, the same old boys. So I think that takes a lot of fear away from the matches."

O'Kelly is only the 13th Irish player to reach the half-century milestone, yet is by far the quickest, having achieved it under five-and-a-half years.

Apart from missing the 1999 Six Nations with a shoulder injury, O'Kelly has, he admits, been lucky with injuries and has played in all bar four of Ireland's last 42 Tests.

"I suppose it's a credit to my attrition. I have been dropped a couple of times, but I've had reprieves. A lot of it was therapy. I think Warren (Gatland) thought I needed a kick up the ass and he was probably right. I probably didn't have as much drive as I should have had because it was a little easy for me maybe. I definitely don't think I need a kick up the ass at the moment. I'm driving it myself, y'know."

His fitness may alsohave something to do with his freakishly natural talent and physique.

"A couple of the lads say that," he smiles, "maybe burning the candle at both ends to a degree. I suppose I am very natural, in that I'm a very aerobically fit kind of guy, I don't naturally put on weight."

A half-century of caps, but there's buckets more to be won, and some of his best rugby is to come. He's only hitting his peak. How much more will there be? In the eyes of most observers, he's always had the innate talent to become, ultimately, Ireland's greatest lock.

His relative lack of success as a Lion, compared to say Willie John McBride, might count against his status in the pantheon of great Irish second rows. There is another one within his compass, in New Zealand in 2005 (when he'll still be only 31), though his experience the last time doesn't make it a burning desire just now. "I'll definitely want to size up who's coaching that one first," he quips.

In any event, "greatness" is a journalistic notion which embarrasses him slightly. But a big, long, endgame awaits. Given good health, touch wood, eclipsing Willie John's 63 caps and going a good few better would be a starting point. But, as is so often the case, most likely it will hinge on the collective achievements: Leinster in Europe, Ireland in Europe and the world.

If O'Kelly plays a big hand in capturing some major silverware, greatness will be his.