📍Clontarf, Dublin 3, Ireland
1979 – 1997“Brian O'Driscoll was born in Dublin in January 1979 and grew up in Clontarf, a comfortable, leafy suburb on Dublin Bay's north shore, with its seafront promenade and the wide green spaces of St Anne's Park. His parents, Frank and Geraldine, were both GPs, running the family medical practice that his grandfather had founded in Clontarf in 1944. He was the only son, growing up with his sisters, Susan and Julie, in a sporty family: his father had played rugby for Ireland, as had two of his father's cousins. He spent his boyhood playing games with neighbourhood friends in St Anne's Park and at the grounds of Clontarf Rugby Club. He went to Belgrove primary school and then to Willow Park, the junior school of Blackrock College on Dublin's south side, where he first played rugby seriously. At Blackrock, a famous rugby nursery, he was surprisingly dropped from the senior team that won the Schools Cup in 1996, but he trained harder than ever, captained the team the next year, and later said he had never been fitter. He studied at University College Dublin, and in 1999, at twenty, he won his first cap for Ireland. Three tries against France in Paris in 2000 made him a national hero. He went on to captain Ireland and the British and Irish Lions, winning a Grand Slam in 2009, and he is widely regarded as Ireland's greatest player. He has often returned to St Anne's Park and Clontarf, where his love of the game began.”
🗺️ Approximate location today
📍 Street view today