Rob Kearney believes captain Rory Best is the”glue” that holds Ireland together however a farewell for him personally and head coach Joe Schmidt is not crucial against Wales on Saturday.
Best, 37, will play his final home game in the Aviva Stadium on Saturday against Wales and will retire in baseball following the World Cup in Japan.
Schmidt will also resign following the tournament following six successful years at the helm, where he has overseen three Six Nations names.
However, Kearney played down the importance of a send-off for the group.
“Obviously it is important but it is not at the forefront of our thoughts,” he said.
“Performance is huge for us and even in the event you scale the performance, it’s putting it into cubes; the first 10 minutes, the next 10 minutes, and so on.
“We actually must ensure we are shooting at all cylinders for this first week, [of this championship ] so that this weekend is really a very significant thing for us.
“And you get to enjoy and feel pleased with committing Joe and Rory the huge send-off.”
Best, who played his final match for Ulster in May, will receive his 120th cap against Wales – producing him the restricted player in Ireland’s history – supporting Ronan O’Gara and Brian O’Driscoll.
“It’s huge, is not it? And sometimes I think it gets a bit undervalued,” Kearney stated on Finest’s leadership before Ireland’s final World Cup warm-up match.
“Some of those momentous victories we’ve had as a team have been beneath Rory. He’s a leader that is brilliant, he’s the glue that brings the group.
“Again, he’s a man who is training really well and I am sure he’s very eager to get out there and also demonstrate that he’s still exceptionally effective at generating big performances, even at his ripe old age.”
Ireland returned to winning ways last weekend after they were comprehensively beaten by England 57-15 in Twickenham, edging out Wales 22-17 at Cardiff on Saturday.
Six months prior to enjoying hosts Japan schmidt’s unwanted face Scotland in their first World Cup group stage match September 22.
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