FOUR PROVINCES, FOUR professional rugby teams, four chances at making a career.
Ireland has often been something of a closed shop for young rugby players, the limited opportunities both ensuring that those who rise to the top are of the very highest quality but also meaning that the numbers in the player base have plateaued.
James Coughlan has been a major success in Pau.
Whereas moves abroad in the early years of professionalism were rife as the provinces found their feet in business and organisational terms, there had been a wholesale decrease in Irish players heading abroad ever since.
That trend appears to be reversing, with several Irishmen heading abroad to both England and France in the last number of years and many of them making strong successes of their moves.
That can only be a good thing for Irish rugby as a whole. The top-tier internationals are being kept in cotton wool at home of course, but players at a wide range of different stages in their careers are getting away and actually playing games.
Niall Woods – the former Ireland international who now represents professional rugby players and a host of sports media figures through his Navy Blue agency – has a number of men in the exiles boat, all of them making an impression abroad.
Lock Mark Flanagan has joined the Bedford Blues in the English Championship after two excellent seasons in France’s Pro D2. Kilkenny man Peter Lydon was London Scottish’s player of the season after joining from Stade Français in 2014.
Darren O’Shea will be playing in the Premiership having helped Worcester to promotion from the Championship last season. Jerry Sexton has earned a pro deal with the growing force that is Exeter after stints at two Pro D2 outfits since leaving Ireland.
Willie Ryan, a man plucked from Cork Con in the Ulster Bank League, had a strong season with Rotherham Titans in 2014/15. Former Lansdowne captain Charlie Butterworth has pitched up in beautiful Jersey following a season with Ulster.
Later in their careers, Dave Ryan will play in the Top 14 with Agen this season, while James Coughlan is regarded as a son of Pau after driving them into the French top flight.
Each of Woods’ clients had their own reasons for getting out of Ireland, but his desire to ensure they found the right club is reaping rewards. Coughlan is perhaps already one of the most successful Irish exiles of them all.
“The president in Pau has said it’s probably the best signing he has ever made,” said Woods, who also represents Ireland internationals such as Marty Moore, Jordi Murphy, Tomás O’Leary and Rhys Ruddock, as well as the likes of Isa Nacewa and Andrew Conway.
“Everyone here would probably know that because he’s never injured, gets man of the match eight or nine times last year and had always been like that in Munster.
“Simon Mannix knew that from Munster, and knew that he worked very, very hard. He’s the kind of person that Simon wanted in the team and it’s worked.
“James could have gone to the UK a few years before, but he didn’t. The thing with him was asking ‘do I want to end my career not starting?’ He didn’t.
Coughlan may have seasons ahead of him yet, but he’s at a different point in his career than the likes of Lydon, O’Shea, Ryan, Butterworth and Flanagan. Those promising players are still working hard to establish themselves and turned to the Championship as an arena to do so.
O’Shea is in the Premiership a year after moving to the Warriors, while the impressive work of Lydon, Ryan and Flanagan means they have high hopes of taking that same step too.
Another potential future move could be home to one of the provinces, returning with the experience of racking up game time that some Irish players in their early 20s yearn for.
Butterworth has joined Jersey in his second year as a professional player. Source: John Dickson
Woods’ past as a prolific wing for London Irish and Harlequins means he knows the English game inside out, has a strong contact base on that side of the Irish Sea and is therefore able to find the right move for his clients.
“Having played in England, I know the standard of the clubs and the standard of the Championship,” said Woods. “It’s getting stronger every year, but it’s a matter of getting the right club. It’s not just about going to the Championship to any club.
“It also depends on the player. I’ve been lucky with the clients I have in that we’ve been able to decide where they will go.
“The Championship clubs like Irish players because we work hard as a nation. Everyone knows that, there’s no bullshit with 99% of Irish players and they’ll get on well with the other players in general.
Being English-qualified, as Lydon and Flanagan are for example, also means the players are more attractive to Premiership clubs when their form makes the top tier sit up and take notice.
Woods points to Rotherham as an example of a feeder to the Premiership, having provided 16 players to top flight clubs over the course of two recent seasons. Northampton have links with Moseley, while Saracens are closely tied to Bedford.
As Coughlan and Ryan attempt to make a mark on the Top 14, the efforts of second rows O’Shea and Sexton to impress with Worcester and Exeter, respectively, in the Premiership will be intriguing to follow.
Sexton played Ireland U20s but was not brought into the Leinster academy. Source: Cathal Noonan/INPHO
Sexton, the younger brother of Ireland out-half Johnny, had spent a year with Auch in France before he linked up with Woods. After a short and ill-fated spell with Mont-de-Marsan at the beginning of last season, Sexton had returned home with the intention of playing club rugby with St. Mary’s, but Woods got to work.
“I was in contact with Rob Baxter at Exeter and we spoke about Jerry,” said Woods. “He’s EQP (English Qualified Player) and he has Johnny’s traits of maybe being cranky and working hard; Jerry has that too.
“We got him a three-month trial and he went over. In the second month, I met Rob and they were really happy with him; Rob felt he’d gone way past the other lads who were there. He takes nothing for granted and he’s on a full contract now for the next year.”
22-year-old Sexton made his Premiership debut last season, while 6ft 9ins O’Shea has already run the Worcester lineout at the same age. The future looks bright for both locks, as well as Flanagan at Bedford, a second row who is bring tracked by several clubs.
Opportunities to play have been vital for all the players Woods has found contracts for outside Ireland, but there is of course more to the moves than pure rugby. How does the remuneration compare?
Woods says he has had only one client whose sole focus was taking the most lucrative offer, regardless of whether it brought a positive lifestyle and more playing chances.
“The sterling is so strong that you might actually get paid more in the Championship than here,” said Woods. “In some cases, it would be more or less the same. That brings it down to the individual: ‘I can get 20 games in England or be third or fourth choice in my province.’
Woods won eight caps for Ireland during his own playing days.
“At the age of 22 or 23 I’d be telling guys not to be as concerned with the money. It’s more or less the same most of the time, maybe €5,000 or €10,000 more. If you go and play 20 games for a good club in the Championship and get noticed, your salary is going to go way up if you get picked up in the Premiership.
Retaining strength in depth at home in Ireland is naturally a priority, but the hope is that the trickle of successes enjoyed by Woods’ clients so far becomes more of a stream in time.
Players like Lydon, Ryan, Flanagan and Coughlan, in a very different way, have opened the eyes of many other Irishmen to the possibilities abroad. Woods may find himself in even greater demand if that continues.
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