Who'll play Paul O'Connell in the film?

TV VIEW:IT STRUCK us watching the US Masters these past few nights that Ken Brown is sort of BBC golf's answer to Ciarán Mullooly, you just never know when and where he's going to pop up.

While Ciarán patrols the Midlands for RTÉ looking for any sign of reportable activity, Ken wanders around golf courses doing much the same thing, with such enthusiasm you wonder if he chooses to do it on his days off too.

He’s not, it has to be said, always in the right place at the right time – for example when Rory McIlroy fought the sand and the sand won, at the 18th in the second round, Ken was off doing a David Attenborough, looking for silverback gorillas up Augusta’s Eisenhower Tree, or something like that.

And Ken loves his shrubs and bushes and flowery things too, seeking to educate us about them at every opportunity, which reminded us of Colin Byrne’s column on the Masters in this paper last week, when he recalled a fellow caddy describing the Augusta National Golf Club as the “Chelsea flower show with a flag pole in it”.

We liked that, largely because it’s true.

While Ken was off in search of mating octopuses and blooming hydrangeas on the 14th fairway, Gary Player was playing his final round at the course.

According to our calculator, Player was already in his 50s when McIlroy was born, a hair-raising fact, you’ll surely agree.

Peter “it’s very hard to tell the sex of parrots, you know” Alliss reminded us that he once called Player “the Queen Mother of golf”, although, in fairness, he did it at a time when the Queen Mother was still with us.

Gary didn’t, alas, fare too well on his, well, farewell, leaving it to Sandy Lyle to fly the flag for the elderly in the second round. Gary Lineker was gobsmacked: “Five birdies on the bounce!”

“He must be on new medication,” said Alliss, who, we thought, sounded a little weary. We couldn’t imagine why until he revealed all. “I found a 24-hour cowboy channel, keeps me up all night,” he said.

In time, we’re confident, they’ll make a movie about Munster, something along the lines of The Magnificent 15, with Paul O’Connell taking over from Yul Brynner, Ronan O’Gara stepping in for Steve McQueen and John Hayes filling Charles Bronson’s boots.

“Every ball bounced our way, we got a lot of luck,” O’Connell told Sky Sports after Munster squeezed home, 43-9, against the Ospreys.

“He talks rubbish, that Paul O’Connell,” giggled Will Greenwood back in the Sky studio, “it had absolutely nothing to do with luck.”

We were inclined to agree with Will, but who are we to argue with the Yul Brynner of Irish rugby?

“The King and I,” as Brian O’Driscoll should refer to himself and the big lad from here on in.

“How do you explain Munster’s success,” Simon Lazenby asked his panel. Will and Paul Wallace gave us conventional enough answers, but Scott Quinnell, inadvertently, we’re guessing, opted for “sex”.

“Sex!” gasped Wallace.

“This is Easter,” Lazenby reminded Quinnell.

“Eh, success,” Quinnell corrected himself, “success breeds success. I’m really red now, amn’t I?”

He was too, poor lad.

Our hopes, then, of an All-Ireland semi-final at Croke Park – hardly a rarity, but welcome nonetheless – rested on Leinster’s efforts against Harlequins.

To be honest, we thought we understood bloody and non-bloody substitutions in rugby until yesterday. Now we realise they are the nuclear physics of sport: a bit unfathomable.

Nick Evans was a bit banjaxed and hobbled off, but Harlequins needed him back on at the end on the off-chance that they’d have a drop-goal chance. But was he bleeding when he went off? And was Tom Williams bleeding when he came off to allow Evans back on? See? Confusing.

Well, a Niagara Falls of blood flowed from Williams mouth as he left the pitch, his wink in the direction of the Harlequins’ bench leaving co-commentator Stuart Barnes going “hmmmm”.

“Who punched Tom Williams in the mouth?” he asked. Silence.

“Tom Williams,” he suggested. Gasp.

Come full-time Lazenby offered apologies to the Harlequins’ management team for “any doubts that were cast” on the issue of Evans having a bloody problem, but when their man spoke to Leinster coach Michael Cheika post-match he suggested some on the Leinster bench suspected it was “vegetable dye” that was pouring out of Williams’ mouth. Vegetable-dye-gate? Seriously, you couldn’t make it up.

A bit like Brian Kerr taking over as Faroe Islands manager. “What will you bring to the job?” Ryan Tubridy asked him on Saturday night.

“I was thinking of bringing rosary beads,” he grinned.

But he’s up for the challenge, and if he leads them to the promised land he’ll take over from Eli Wallach in that Magnificent remake.

““He must be on new medication,”

said Peter Alliss of the rejuvenated Sandy Lyle. We thought Peter sounded a little weary. We couldn’t imagine why, until he revealed all.

“I found a 24-hour cowboy channel, keeps me up all night,” he said