The prop who knows most about not standing back from the Haka

Sampling the New Zealand experience at first hand represents the pinnacle of many a career, a benchmark for self assessment, and traditionally for an Irish player, a white knuckle ride.

On Saturday Ireland's loose-head prop Nick Popplewell will stare down the Haka for a 10th time, a remarkable achievement for a northern hemisphere player. At this juncture the Newcastle prop knows all the words to the Maori chant: indeed he probably knew them by heart following his first encounter in 1989, given that he was just six inches away from Buck Shelford's men.

Irish captain Willie Anderson's decision to march his team to within millimetres of New Zealand faces claimed a place in folklore. Popplewell survived the first encounter to go on and enjoy something of a rarity for an Irishman, a victory over the men of the silver fern, albeit with the Lions.

Popplewell has relished every encounter: "They have become familiar faces at this stage. Saturday will be the 10th time, the first was for Leinster when they toured here in 1989. I then made my debut for Ireland, toured there three years later playing two Tests, three more for the Lions, once for the Barbarians and then finally in the World Cup in 1995."

The long-serving prop is one of three survivors from the World Cup clash who will don a green shirt on Saturday, the others being Paddy Johns and Eric Elwood. He recalls: "We did quite well as I remember, scoring three tries through Gary Halpin, David Corkery and Denis McBride. We didn't know much about Jonah Lomu before hand - we certainly did afterwards."

This is once instance where familiarity certainly hasn't bred contempt as Popplewell anticipates another battle royal with the New Zealand front row of Craig Dowd, Norman Hewitt and Olo Brown. "I think I've played against Olo all bar three times and one of those was against Warren Gatland" (the current Connacht coach who is helping Brian Ashton prepare Ireland for Saturday's game).

"They are very, very strong in the scrum, applying continuous pressure on their ball and yours: there is no respite at all. It isn't as bad nowadays with the rule changes. Before there would be about 30 scrums in a match, now there are 15 or so. We will be trying to meet their hit and nullify the advantage they usually get in this area.

"When you play internationals people warn you that you have no time to think. Against the All Blacks, you really don't."

On a personal level, Popplewell is delighted to be once again free from injury. "I've had hamstring problems for the past two years but during the summer I was able to work on putting this right. Now hopefully I will be able to break out of a trot the odd time."

He is under no illusion about the immediate task. "The chances are something like 95 per cent that we are not going to win but no matter who we are playing we always have that small chance of winning. The main problem for Irish rugby has been consistency.

"In New Zealand in 1992 we were completely written off prior to the first Test. We lost that game by three points (2421) and there would be no exaggeration in saying we should have won. We always carry that threat of the one-off but realistically Saturday is all about putting up a good performance, making progress in each match, like the Canadian and Italian games.

"The worst scenario would be to stand back against the Blacks, it would be suicidal. We owe it to ourselves and the public to make a realistic and concerted effort to win the game."