MUNSTER LEGEND JOHN HAYES hopes to give a little something back to Irish rugby by moving into a coaching role in the future.
The legendary prop said a teary goodbye to the Thomond Park faithful last month when he made his 217th and final appearance in the famous red jersey after deciding to call it a day at the age of 38.
But it’s hard to keep a good man down and the man they call ”the Bull” revealed today that he is already making plans to take up coaching now that he has retired.
In an interview with Ray D’Arcy on Today FM, Hayes said that he hopes to fit rugby in around his new full-time job on his cattle farm.
But first, he’s taking a well-deserved break.
“I haven’t thought about it yet but I would like to help out once I’ve taken a break for a little while,” Hayes said.
I just think it would be nice to give something back and to help people because I got a lot of help over the years as an individual myself or as a team. You’d always like to give something back.
Hayes famously never played rugby as a youth, devoting himself to GAA in his native town of Cappamore before switching to the oval ball at the age of 18.
His late arrival onto the scene makes his career CV — which includes a Heineken Cup medal and an Irish grand slam — even more impressive and when it came time to hang up his boots, Hayes had no regrets.
“You realise when your time comes that you’re getting older and you can’t do it forever. Everybody would love to play rugby until they’re 65 but you can’t do it. You have to realise that it comes in your thirties.
When it was coming, I knew it was time and you just have to try and get as much enjoyment as you can out of it. When it starts to take that extra toll on the body and it starts to take an extra couple of days to recover after matches, you know then that it’s time to go.
Far from resting on his laurels, there’s plenty of work to be done now that Hayes has retired to the farm. Spring can be a busy time for a Bull who has to watch over a herd of suckler cows.
“There’s plenty of work to be done at this time of the year. We’ve suckler cows so they’ll be calving now in the next month. Once you get into the middle of it, you’ve to get up once or twice in the middle of the night to have a look.”
