My Day As Mascot – Niall Daly

Niall Daly received the chance to be a Munster Match Day Mascot when he won a ‘Caption this Picture’ competition in a recent Junior Club e-mail. He describes his experience below.

I was supposed to be up at my cousins in Co. Tipperary for the weekend that I won the Munster mascot competition so my uncle drove me back down to Cork on Saturday. We met my Dad outside the ground and we went in with Shauna from Munster.

I got the brand new Munster kit at the Lifestyle shop and I got changed. After a little while we met Greg the other mascot and we went into the Munster dressing room while the players were out on the pitch warming up. The match jerseys were all hanging up so I could see who sits beside who (11,14,15,23). And I could see what they eat before the match.…more fruit, less wine gums lads! We were actually doing them a favour by stealing a few!

We went out to the tunnel then and the players high fived me on their way back into the dressing room. Anthony Foley said "Hi Niall" and stopped for a quick chat. The Italian players had a lot of crazy Gordon Darcy beards and did loads of roaring and shouting before they came out for the match. Then the Munster players came out, CJ Stander took my hand and we went out onto the pitch. I played on the pitch at half time at Pairc Ui Rinn and Turners Cross earlier this year but this was the biggest crowd and it was brilliant. We took a photo with CJ out on the pitch, then I went back to my Dad and up into the stand to watch the match with my brother and my cousins. It was CJ of course who scored the 2 Munster tries and Munster won!!

I had a fantastic time so thank you very much to the Supporters Club for organising it for me.