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'Would you do 10 or 12 hours? We've no budget for it but it could lead somewhere'

By Liam Heagney
(Photo by David Rogers/Getty Images)

Ian Costello, the soon-to-depart Wasps assistant coach, has some invaluable advice for coaches aspiring to make it in the professional game – take every opportunity you can get as you never know what doors it could open. Costello’s career trajectory bears this out. Around a decade ago he was asked to do some skills training for gratis with Tony McGahan’s Munster squad. It led to a contract the following year and progress that culminated in a two-year stint as the late Anthony Foley’s defence coach.

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Then, after cutting the umbilical cord with his native province, the Irishman swapped countries and headed to England in 2016 to become head coach at Nottingham in the Championship, an adventure that paved the way for him to step up into the Gallagher Premiership two years later with Wasps, the club he helped reach the final last October.

With a new position now secured back at Munster as head of the academy, next Saturday’s East Midlands derby versus Leicester will be Costello’s English farewell and he will return to Ireland a far wiser, more developed coach who hopes his own experiences clambering up the pro coaching ladder can serve as an inspiration to others, especially those whose CVs don’t include a stint as a professional player.

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Increasingly, coaches working in the professional game are ex-players who used to play professionally but Costello is a shining example of how you don’t have to have taken that route, the Kerryman graduating with a university sports science degree and then carving out his career as a pro rugby coach who has occupied enviable roles in Ireland and England.

For sure he can be rightly proud of his achievements. “You have to work hard for opportunities coming out of Ireland if you haven’t a well-established career as a player, and it’s about maximising those opportunities when you get a chance,” said Costello to RugbyPass, whose correspondent vividly remembers getting a warts and all insight to the inspiring roll-your-sleeves role he had taken on at Nottingham when visiting a Lady Bay captain’s run in December 2016.

“My first opportunity at Munster was when Tony McGahan said to me, ‘Look, there is a need for some skills here, would you do ten or twelve hours? We have no budget for it but it could lead somewhere’. I ended up doing 20 hours a week while I worked as director of rugby at Bohs. That translated into a full-time contract the year after so my advice to everyone would be to just take every opportunity you can get, coach as much as you possibly can, meet as many people as you can, network – something I’m not particularly good at but have tried to get better at – and then if you have got that you give yourself a chance.

It’s certainly a route I would encourage if you got the opportunity. It’s fantastic to work over here in England. I thought it was a much bigger deal than it was. You are in a bubble sometimes (in Ireland). I was at Munster for a long time. As soon as I moved I was, ‘This is brilliant, a great experience for me and my family’.

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“It’s about opportunity and I was very fortunate to get the opportunity at Nottingham with some really good people that when I sat down with them day one it felt right and then that Nottingham job led to the Wasps job. I was very deliberate in what path I went.

“I wanted to experience a head coach role and that opportunity was likely to be at a level below Premiership or pro rugby and that Nottingham opportunity was just a fantastic fit for me. For two years, that head coach experience was about how to manage a programme, run a programme, manage a team, interact with committees and make an awful lot more decisions than I would have made traditionally when I worked as an assistant coach with Munster.

“That was massive in terms of my development and then the next three years, to experience a different league, the Premiership is so attritional week in week out, you have to be so consistent, you get challenged in so many different ways. I have worked under two more head coaches here as well with a different coaching team that has quite a bit of change and a squad that has transitioned.

“Without getting too deep I’m quite reflective, quite critical in the way I think about things so I tried to take every opportunity to learn and develop and I have had some incredible opportunities over here to learn from other people and learn from players.

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“The one thing about the UK in terms of its size as well to Ireland is you are interacting with cricket coaches, rowing coaching, rugby league, football – we were lucky enough that we got a lot of opportunity over the last five years to learn from people like that and hopefully I can bring that (back to Munster) and transfer it to a different context.”

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J
Jon 22 minutes ago
Jake White: Are modern rugby players actually better?

This is the problem with conservative mindsets and phycology, and homogenous sports, everybody wants to be the same, use the i-win template. Athlete wise everyone has to have muscles and work at the gym to make themselves more likely to hold on that one tackle. Do those players even wonder if they are now more likely to be tackled by that player as a result of there “work”? Really though, too many questions, Jake. Is it better Jake? Yes, because you still have that rugby of ole that you talk about. Is it at the highest International level anymore? No, but you go to your club or checkout your representative side and still engage with that ‘beautiful game’. Could you also have a bit of that at the top if coaches encouraged there team to play and incentivized players like Damian McKenzie and Ange Capuozzo? Of course we could. Sadly Rugby doesn’t, or didn’t, really know what direction to go when professionalism came. Things like the state of northern pitches didn’t help. Over the last two or three decades I feel like I’ve been fortunate to have all that Jake wants. There was International quality Super Rugby to adore, then the next level below I could watch club mates, pulling 9 to 5s, take on the countries best in representative rugby. Rugby played with flair and not too much riding on the consequences. It was beautiful. That largely still exists today, but with the world of rugby not quite getting things right, the picture is now being painted in NZ that that level of rugby is not required in the “pathway” to Super Rugby or All Black rugby. You might wonder if NZR is right and the pathway shouldn’t include the ‘amateur’, but let me tell you, even though the NPC might be made up of people still having to pull 9-5s, we know these people still have dreams to get out of that, and aren’t likely to give them. They will be lost. That will put a real strain on the concept of whether “visceral thrill, derring-do and joyful abandon” type rugby will remain under the professional level here in NZ. I think at some point that can be eroded as well. If only wanting the best athlete’s at the top level wasn’t enough to lose that, shutting off the next group, or level, or rugby players from easy access to express and showcase themselves certainly will. That all comes back around to the same question of professionalism in rugby and whether it got things right, and rugby is better now. Maybe the answer is turning into a “no”?

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j
john 3 hours ago
Will the Crusaders' decline spark a slow death for New Zealand rugby?

But here in Australia we were told Penney was another gun kiwi coach, for the Tahs…….and yet again it turned out the kiwi coach was completely useless. Another con job on Australian rugby. As was Robbie Deans, as was Dave Rennie. Both coaches dumped from NZ and promoted to Australia as our saviour. And the Tahs lap them up knowing they are second rate and knowing that under pressure when their short comings are exposed in Australia as well, that they will fall in below the largest most powerful province and choose second rate Tah players to save their jobs. As they do and exactly as Joe Schmidt will do. Gauranteed. Schmidt was dumped by NZ too. That’s why he went overseas. That why kiwi coaches take jobs in Australia, to try and prove they are not as bad as NZ thought they were. Then when they get found out they try and ingratiate themselves to NZ again by dragging Australian teams down with ridiculous selections and game plans. NZ rugby’s biggest problem is that it can’t yet transition from MCaw Cheatism. They just don’t know how to try and win on your merits. It is still always a contest to see how much cheating you can get away with. Without a cheating genius like McCaw, they are struggling. This I think is why my wise old mate in NZ thinks Robertson will struggle. The Crusaders are the nursery of McCaw Cheatism. Sean Fitzpatrick was probably the father of it. Robertson doesn’t know anything else but other countries have worked it out.

15 Go to comments
A
Adrian 4 hours ago
Will the Crusaders' decline spark a slow death for New Zealand rugby?

Thanks Nick The loss of players to OS, injury and retirement is certainly not helping the Crusaders. Ditto the coach. IMO Penny is there to hold the fort and cop the flak until new players and a new coach come through,…and that's understood and accepted by Penny and the Crusaders hierarchy. I think though that what is happening with the Crusaders is an indicator of what is happening with the other NZ SRP teams…..and the other SRP teams for that matter. Not enough money. The money has come via the SR competition and it’s not there anymore. It's in France, Japan and England. Unless or until something is done to make SR more SELLABLE to the NZ/Australia Rugby market AND the world rugby market the $s to keep both the very best players and the next rung down won't be there. They will play away from NZ more and more. I think though that NZ will continue to produce the players and the coaches of sufficient strength for NZ to have the capacity to stay at the top. Whether they do stay at the top as an international team will depend upon whether the money flowing to SRP is somehow restored, or NZ teams play in the Japan comp, or NZ opts to pick from anywhere. As a follower of many sports I’d have to say that the organisation and promotion of Super Rugby has been for the last 20 years closest to the worst I’ve ever seen. This hasn't necessarily been caused by NZ, but it’s happened. Perhaps it can be fixed, perhaps not. The Crusaders are I think a symptom of this, not the cause

15 Go to comments
T
Trevor 7 hours ago
Will forgotten Wallabies fit the Joe Schmidt model?

Thanks Brett.. At last a positive article on the potential of Wallaby candidates, great to read. Schmidt’s record as an international rugby coach speaks for itself, I’m somewhat confident he will turn the Wallaby’s fortunes around …. on the field. It will be up to others to steady the ship off the paddock. But is there a flaw in my optimism? We have known all along that Australia has the players to be very competitive with their international rivals. We know that because everyone keeps telling us. So why the poor results? A question that requires a definitive answer before the turn around can occur. Joe Schmidt signed on for 2 years, time to encompass the Lions tour of 2025. By all accounts he puts family first and that’s fair enough, but I would wager that his 2 year contract will be extended if the next 18 months or so shows the statement “Australia has the players” proves to be correct. The new coach does not have a lot of time to meld together an outfit that will be competitive in the Rugby Championship - it will be interesting to see what happens. It will be interesting to see what happens with Giteau law, the new Wallaby coach has already verbalised that he would to prefer to select from those who play their rugby in Australia. His first test in charge is in July just over 3 months away .. not a long time. I for one wish him well .. heaven knows Australia needs some positive vibes.

21 Go to comments
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