What future for the retiring stars?

After the RWC it'll be the end of the road for many star names. ROG, BOD, Geordan, Moods, Shane, Shaw etc.

Whatever will they all do?

Limited opportunities are available for national admin Young farts, after-dinner speakers, newspaper scribes, TV pundits, club/country coaches... All sorts.

What's going happen to them all?

Because it's my post I'll have first dibs. BOD will initially be senior rugby pundit for RTE or Sky. And eventually the first president of the reunited all-Ireland.

Lewis Moody will become a car mechanic and Simon Shaw will run a pub.

The young players coming through nowadays nearly all have university qualifications

OK then Stag.

They'll go on the dole then.

e.g jamie roberts

although i suspect the likes of shane williams, Stephen jones etc may go on to do coaching roles

but then again the famous ones such as shane, BOD, o gara etc will have no problem as they famous through out the rugby world and can make a living from that, with either doing sponsorships for companies, making speaches, commentry and media side, also they can as i said above they can take on coaching roles, its the less well known players around the world such as shaw who would find it more difficult

Luke Fitz talked about this. He said that he is 23 years old and has a university qualification. He says the amount of actual work experience he has is of course minimal but he has experiences such as the pressures of interviews in front of millions of people since aged 18, having to try give his best in new environments and often having to live/work out of a suitcase.

O'Gara will be grand after the RWC considering he has a contract through to 2013. I think Brian O'Driscoll is in the exact same situation.

WHEN these players retire, I don't think they'll have any more trouble finding a job than anyone else. The problems they have will be down to the state of economy and job market in Ireland, not them as candidates... Better question would be; what future for anyone?

red_stag wrote:

Luke Fitz talked about this. He said that he is 23 years old and has a university qualification. He says the amount of actual work experience he has is of course minimal but he has experiences such as the pressures of interviews in front of millions of people since aged 18, having to try give his best in new environments and often having to live/work out of a suitcase.

Luke Fitz will be well qualified to do a training video for the dole shop to tell the other unemployed graduates how to get a job then.

There are plenty of oppertunities out there for players after they retire.
Some go into media work, others go into coaching at differing levels. You only have to look at the Welsh Premiership below the magners league to see how many ex-international players are trying to compete for for top coaching spots.

Pontypridd
Head coach: Dale Mcintosh
Backs coach: Paul John
Fitness coach: Gareth Wyatt

Neath:
Head Coach: Patrick Horgan
Forwards: Richard Webster

Cross Keys:
Head Coach: Mark Ring

Bridgend Raves
Head Coach: Steve Tandy

Clearly a large proportion of ex-players go into coaching at various levels.

Shane will move in to a job with the BBC/S4C. He did a bit of punditry for S4C on the U-20's.

Yh Shane already does some work with the BBC/S4C so can imagine him having a very lucrative media carear.

Minster/Ireland could do a lot worse than using ROG as a kicking coach.

Surely the point is this,IF you are very top draw you will be on top dollar[hopefully]proper investment should set you up for a while.
BUT if you take just the top 8 countries and say that 30 players a year retire,thats 240 a year going into retirement.
At best if you stay fit 38 is about the best you can hope for playing ,then if you have taken a coaching course.You may have hopes of that long term when those already there fade.

You'd be surprised how many of these players have business interests and investments. I often hear of players who own coffee shops, are in property, have nightclub investments, are studying for degrees and doctorates, are doing coaching badges. Even Nathan Brew, not the biggest rugby name on the planet (brother of Aled Brew, and was the first of the brothers to make a name for himself in rugby with Newport and then the Dragons) has a mexican restaurant of some sort in Swansea.

The questions really is, although they don't earn football-like salaries, if the players have not invested their money wisely for retirement then what have they done with it all???!

Just to add that Neil Jenkins, great kicker but if you heard him speak you'd think he was a bit 'slow', managed to get a kicking coach job at the WRU. If he can go into coaching on reputation alone then anyone can!

From the welsh point of view:
Martyn Williams - forwards coach at the Blues (or Cardiff RFC), then to replace McBryde in the national setup if Dai Young gets head coach
Steve Jones - some form of coaching role at Llanelli RFC or the Scarlets
Shane Williams - pundit for S4C, and BBC.

I think from an Irish perspective probably only John Hayes will be hanging up his boots and maybe flannery too. Hayes is a farmer and Flannery own's a pub (I think). Most of the other 30 somethings are still going strong and should be around for a couple of seasons yet.

Lewis Moody would make a good crash test dummy.

I think Moody has been lined up by the BBC to do the pitch side analysis during the 6Ns as they were using him for that this year.

Shane Horgan recently completed his bar exam in NYC and is off there to practice law when he retires...

Im pretty sure BOD and ROG still have jobs until 2013-14..

As for Shaw... surely he can walk straight into the state pension, n'est pas?

Don't think BOD has any interest in going into punditry but the president of the United Ireland would be an ideal post for someone as god like as he.

Mickado wrote:Don't think BOD has any interest in going into punditry but the president of the United Ireland would be an ideal post for someone as god like as he.

I hear Mary is retiring. Theres a ready made job for him post RWC

Boyne is Horgan playing on next season?

Agree, think Moody will be a pundit.
Shaw, maybe forwards coach at wasps? If not I think he could be a good pub landlord.

red_stag wrote:

Mickado wrote:Don't think BOD has any interest in going into punditry but the president of the United Ireland would be an ideal post for someone as god like as he.

I hear Mary is retiring. Theres a ready made job for him post RWC

Senator David Norris is the front runner at the moment. That would be interesting, a gay president for a country which only made homosexuality legal in 1993!

roddersm wrote:Boyne is Horgan playing on next season?

Sure is... big battle with Carr for the 14 spot though. Hes pretty crushed about the injury- he was hoping to be off down under for the WC.. it meant allot to him - his Da's a kiwi..

But he'll be in blue next season fo show..

In some ways he'd be excellent. Other ways he has a tendency to say some stupid things. The political version of Gatland

Please, no David Norris referances on this site.. there maybe kids on here!

"

Shaw, maybe forwards coach at wasps? If not I think he could be a good pub landlord."

At least no one would get out of line in his pub, eh?

Maybe he could go into business with Shane Williams. Kind of the long and short of it.

Why has nobody mentioned reality tv? Surely that will be the first stop for these men.

Soon after the RWC it'll be possible to flick between a dozen channels and see ex rugby players on every one. I can hardly wait to see ROG try cooking in hell's kitchen or BOD take rugby to the ghetto's of LA, or the wonderful John Hayse in Strictly. It'll be such fun! Poor Mr Henson though may have to go back to playing rugby though with the surge in competition. Oh well.

Stephen Jones and Dwayne Peel own a restaurant apparently - im hoping its called The Halfbacks...

Supernova, Neutron implosion and finally black hole, usually.

wales606 - I'm pretty sure it's just called Sospan, something like that anyway, tis opening up in Llanelli in the middle of July.

A lot of players, espescially in the academies have vocational qualifications like plumbing/eletcrics etc. They'll have no problem getting jobs when they have to retire.

red_stag wrote:

Mickado wrote:Don't think BOD has any interest in going into punditry but the president of the United Ireland would be an ideal post for someone as god like as he.

I hear Mary is retiring. Theres a ready made job for him post RWC

Would you ever think of persuading him to take his politics North? He never gives up and has a capacity for getting up after serious knocks on the head. Sounds like he'd be perfect for the grassroots stuff in Inner City Belfast