Hat-trick hero.

Keith Earls marked his Munster return after a hugely successful autumn series with Ireland last night by bagging a quick fire hat-trick as the southern province dispatched of Edinburgh with an eight-try rout.

The Limerick winger’s hat-trick in the 44-14 bonus-point win came in eight first-half minutes and absolutely smashed a record set by former teammate Simon Zebo.

Zebo scored a 22 minute hat-trick against Zebre back in 2014 to set the record for the quickest Munster treble, but Earls’ eclipsed that last night, scoring his trio of tries almost three time faster.

Earls has a way to go yet however if he’s to catch Zebo on the all-time Munster try-scoring chart. Earls now has 50 tries for the southern province, but Zebo still leads the way on 60.