“Everything happens for a reason,” shrugs Chris Cloete. “If you carry on, eventually doors can open in different places.”

All being well, the explosive openside flanker will be playing for a Springboks coach over the next three years. The irony, not lost on him, is that it has required joining Munster and linking up with Johann van Graan, who succeeded Rassie Erasmus last month following a five-year stint with South Africa’s national set-up.

But the 10,000km between southern Ireland and Cloete’s birthplace of East London constitutes just one segment of a remarkable, meandering path in rugby. His early days, encompassing an education at prestigious Selborne College and an appearance for South Africa Schools in 2009 against an England U18 outfit featuring two Vunipolas plus George Ford and Owen Farrell, were conventional enough. From there, Cloete’s trail grew far more circuitous.

Snapped up by the Sharks, his progress was stalled by serious injuries. When he moved to Cape Town to represent Western Province, glandular fever struck and stripped 10 kilograms off him, costing seven months of recovery. Cloete fought back to fitness, impressing for Nelson Mandela University in Port Elizabeth and then Durban club side College Rovers before the chance of a season in Sri Lanka with Kandy emerged in 2014. It proved to be a cathartic spell flying solo.