Celtic League: The teaming up of Trevor Halstead with Munster has proven fortuitous for both, writes Gerry Thornley.

It's testimony to Munster's openness and honesty, as well as their judgment, that overseas recruits settle in so famously and become part of the furniture. They tend to leave an imprint on the Munster story, and as Trevor Halstead's career testifies, the effect works both ways.

As someone who earned a Heineken European Cup winner's medal within a year, he is also one of the luckiest. With Barry Murphy sidelined, it's hard to imagine how Munster would have won the cup without Halstead, who emerged as their most regular source of go-forward ball with a series of tours de force.

"I prefer big games," he admits candidly. "I really do. It's the little one that you battle to get up for. Especially coming from the Sharks where I played so many years, and my heart was with them, to give everything for them, and then you come to another place where you have no history. I always give my best but sometimes you need to get some history behind you to bring the best out of you. So I feel that by the time we got to the quarters and the semis I had staked my own claim and that I also maybe deserved something out of it."

Listening to this strong-running, strong-willed centre recount, a tad bitterly, his time in South African rugby, you are left in no doubt Munster have also rejuvenated him. His fiancée, Faryn Martin from Johannesburg, arrives in November to spend the rest of this season with him. At 30, Halstead still has plenty of rugby left in him, but word has it he may return to his family's engineering business in Durban at the end of this, his second season.

Halstead came to Ireland in search of a new experience, and to renew his desire for the game.

"And just to start enjoying rugby again. Back home it got a little bit too - I wouldn't say cut-throat is the right word - but it wasn't enjoyable any more. There was just too much politics. That's not the reason I played rugby. I played to be the best that I could be and I wasn't going anywhere. So the opportunity came up to go to Ireland.

"Munster was a great side, good results, so I thought it was a great opportunity for me, and to experience something new."

Halstead was effectively sacrificing any chance of playing for the Springboks again.

"I sort of lost interest in the Springboks with Jake White coaching. I don't think I was ever in his plans, it didn't matter how well I played. Really and truly. And so I really couldn't care."

When he first came to Ireland, he accepts, he was still feeling bitter toward the Springboks.

"I'm past it now. Obviously my prime goal when playing rugby was to be the best I could be and to make the Springboks side. But when it doesn't matter how you perform, when you're playing your best and you're not getting picked, then what's the point?"

Ask him why this should be, Halstead says simply, "I just think Jake White had his favourites. He did. I suppose you can give him credit for it too, but he stuck with his guns. Even when guys weren't performing he still stayed with them."

There were good times in South Africa, albeit after an unexceptional schools career at Kearsney was punctuated by a knee injury and a shoulder break.

"I sort of figured rugby wasn't the route I was going to take."

He was wrong. A year out of school and rugby, he took up the game with the Collegians club side in Durban, graduating via the Natal under-20s to the Natal Currie Cup squad in 1998 via stints at scrumhalf and fullback before converting into a centre.

An excellent 2001 season with the Sharks, when they reached the Super 12 final, propelled him into the Springboks side under Rudolf Straeuli.

"That's when things were going exceptionally well. The results with the Springboks weren't great but I was still flying high, but then I came down with a huge bang."

He was sidelined for a year with an anterior cruciate ligament which was wrongly diagnosed for four months.

"Yes, it was a special time for me," he smiles sardonically. "And I think we went through about five (Springboks) coaches in the meantime."

The horror story continues: "Coming back it was difficult. I came back playing for Natal with a new coach, Kevin Putt, who I never saw eye to eye with either. He's a wanker, and you can quote me on that," he says, admittedly laughing. "I love my team-mates, but it wasn't a happy time. It was a nice refreshing start to come to Munster. I've actually enjoyed every second of it over here. It's been tough being away from my family and that. But it's opened my eyes up."

First impressions? "It was a lot more laid back than I was used to. A helluva lot smaller and quieter. But one thing I found was a tight-knit bunch of guys. It was not easy for me to share in everything because the guys had grown up together and they have their own history but the longer I stay here the more I get involved in that. I appreciate them. They're honest people, and as the season went on you saw it more and more, how the guys played and looked after each other on the field, which was a nice change."

As a person and a player, Halstead has been rejuvenated by Munster. After four losing finals, like Munster he'd begun to wonder if he was jinxed. The night of the European Cup final, in Shannon airport, he described it as the best day of his career and nothing has altered his view.

"It was the biggest win, absolutely, and it was the appreciation of the people and the camaraderie, and how everybody was supporting Munster in such a huge way, and that honesty. This season is going to be more difficult for us. A lot of the time we're going to have to work even harder for the wins, not because the teams are going to play harder, but because maybe things aren't going to go for us like they did last season."