THE SOD TURNING takes place at Musgrave Park today as Munster’s commitment to producing their own top-class players continues with the start of work on a new Cork Centre of Excellence.
The indoor centre will include a synthetic pitch, a big gym, as well as the physio, meeting and dressing rooms needed to provide the province’s underage teams with cutting-edge training facilities. Local clubs and schools will benefit, while Munster Rugby staff will also be housed in the new building.
Munster have another centre of excellence in Fethard, Tipperary, there’s one in Tralee, Kerry, and there are plans to build another in Rosbrien, Limerick in the coming years.
It has been impossible to miss how Munster have started to get talented young players through their pipeline in greater abundance recently. Following in the footsteps of Jack Crowley, Craig Casey, Tom Ahern and John Hodnett are the next wave of Brian Gleeson, Edwin and Seán Edogbo, and Ruadhán Quinn.
As outlined in a fascinating discussion at Thomond Park this week, Munster believe there is much more to come. Ian Costello was the man to deliver the rundown on what they’re doing and what they can still improve.
Costello – who previously coached with Munster, Nottingham, and Wasps – moved into his role as head of rugby operations ahead of this season after doing fine work in charge of Munster’s academy. While he still does some on-pitch coaching with the senior team, his role focuses on the province’s player pathway, succession planning, and recruitment.
He is across everything to do with rugby in Munster. He sits in on every meeting with Rowntree and his coaches, is at every senior training session he can get to, works closely with academy manager Gar Prendergast and head of rugby development Colm McMahon, and ensures everyone is as aligned as possible. The idea is not to have silos within Munster that are unconnected.
Costello’s work is all about systems and structures and strategy. The energy he has for this stuff is impressive and it all really boils down to overseeing work that will help Munster to be a better team now and in the future.
The academy houses the biggest young prospects but underneath that is the National Talent Squad [NTS], an IRFU programme in which each province looks to identify and then support talented players between the ages of 16 and 21 – helping them towards the academy and on into professional rugby. Munster also have their own Provincial Talent System [PTS] underneath that.
As Costello outlines just how deep Munster’s depth charts for the seasons ahead extend, down to how many games they predict each youngster could play in a few years’ time, it’s clear that the pipeline is a major part of the province’s modus operandi. Every academy player, NTS member, and PTS player is included in the long-term planning.
Out on the pitch at Thomond Park just before Costello sits down, Munster have been training with 60 players – their senior squad plus academy players. They sometimes even have an additional group of young players training on the back pitch at Thomond Park simultaneously, meaning any injuries in the senior session can instantly be covered.
When senior second row Cian Hurley suffered a horrific knee dislocation in training during pre-season, young UCC lock Conor Ryan was with that additional group of players. Ryan slotted straight into the senior session and ended up playing in the friendlies against Bath and Gloucester, impressing Graham Rowntree.
And while opportunities to get in with the senior team are crucial, Costello explained that every player is different.
“That’s a demanding environment [with the senior team], so sometimes we need to pull them out of that environment,” said Costello. “They might work separately for a while. We’re getting really good results out of it but it can’t be a one-size-fits-all approach.
“Development is individual and long-term. So Gene O’Leary Kareem doesn’t go in the same way as Seán Edogbo even though they both arrived at the same time in Year 1 [of the academy].
“We manage his progression into that type of training. It’s making sure everyone in the building understands there’s an individualised approach to each player, protecting their development window so they get the S&C to be able to train like that.”
Munster are keen to ensure the door is open for later developers. The province is working with players from the age of 16, with the biggest talents well-flagged from that stage. Others like Ryan, who came through Clonakilty RFC and is still in his early 20s, might not have been the biggest underage stars. Munster don’t want to miss them either.
Still, spotting talent early is crucial and Costello says Munster have refined their talent identification system this year. Former players Ian Keatley and Seán Cronin – who are now provincial talent coaches for Munster – led that work to ensure there are people all over the province scouting and flagging talented players.
They have at least 25 people who can go to matches every weekend to watch players, sending reports from their phones into a centralised system. It’s not perfect, according to Costello, but they feel they’re getting greater breadth in their talent ID now.
There is plenty of ground to cover. Year 2 academy out-half Dylan Hicks, who hails from Bantry, used to undertake eight-hour round trips with his father, Damien, in order to get to training with Munster’s underage teams.
Conall Cournane, who recently played fullback for Munster U19s and featured for the Ireland U18 7s team, has come through Iveragh Eagles RFC in South Kerry, “as remote as you can possibly get,” where his father, Tony, was a founding member.
It’s a long way to travel for sessions, but Munster feel they have the systems in place to ensure talented young players from these areas don’t get missed.
Munster have studied how other organisations structure their player development, with their model stemming from conversations with football club Southampton. Costello said no stone is left unturned in being up to speed on the latest research on player development, coaching, and more.
He is upfront about all aspects of Munster’s work and where they needed to fill gaps in their succession planning.
“Props and centres have probably been the slowest because we were further back,” he said.
In terms of the propping problem, there are exciting signs with Shannon’s Emmet Calvey having played for the Ireland U20s a year young, Abbeyfeale RFC product Christian Foley impressing for the Munster U19s, and Jamie Conway of Castletroy College being part of the Ireland Schools side during the summer.
The hope is that these young men can push on towards the academy as Munster continue to produce more players of their own, particularly given financial challenges, but Costello stresses that recruitment will always be part of the picture too.
“We’re aware of the ever-changing financial model and we want to have the best systems producing the best players so we have the chance to have those homegrown players,” he said.
“But outside influence is good. Alex Nankivell is brilliant for our players. Billy Burns coming in from another environment… I know he’s not NIQ but one of the reasons we recruited him is because he’s good with younger players. We researched that. Yes, he’ll challenge Jack Crowley but he’ll be brilliant for Tony Butler, Dylan Hicks, and Tom Wood.
“It’s getting the right people at the right time from the outside but we have to have a pipeline of players coming through and no gaps in that system. And if there’s a gap, no gap for two years in a row, that’s what we have to avoid.”
It’s not long since Munster signed RG Snyman and Damian de Allende at the same time, a real statement of intent from the province as the two World Cup winners brought proven world-class ability.
Those moves were supported by private investment, but Costello admitted signings like that are less likely in the coming years. This summer’s additions of Burns, Thaakir Abrahams, Tom Farrell, and Diarmuid Kilgallen were comparatively low-key.
“The financial model is trickier, there’s no doubt about that,” he said. “There’s a different level of external support. The IRFU want us to meet certain standards around our financial model and last year, we broke even, etc.
“It’s probably about how good we can be internally at bringing players through and then being very, very targeted in our recruitment.
“It’s funny listening to the outside perception of ‘Munster are going to be weaker this year’ but we think we’re in a far better position. We thought everybody was moving upwards, so we’ll have unbelievable competition and we’re really, really happy with the guys we’ve signed.
“We have to be strategic around recruitment. Being able to go out and get two World Cup winners was great, whether those days are going to the same again, I don’t know.”
Munster are still raising funds from the outside with their successful dinners in big cities abroad and Costello confirmed that much of that money goes directly into improving the quality of the province’s pathway, whether coaching, strength and conditioning, mental skills, or more. €100k can make a huge difference in the pathway.
It’s six years since Munster signed two South African schoolboys into their academy, with Keynan Knox going on to play senior rugby for the province before being released last season.
There are obviously lots of talented young players in Leinster who miss out on the academy there and Munster have also signed a few of those players in the past. Is it something they’d do again given how much is going on within the Munster pathway now?
“We look everywhere,” said Costello. “I heard a really good phrase last week, ‘Before you go looking for something else, make sure you know what you have.’
“So us being really informed on what we have, knowing where they are, how we benchmark them, how we rate them on performance potential. It allows us to look at somebody through that type of lens, whereas before we might have seen it as a bit of a punt, or a bit of a feel.
“We don’t discount feel but now there’s a bit more substance. I looked at a guy recently from another sport similar to rugby union, but we probably won’t go there, and looked at two people from outside the country but again, we haven’t signed them.
“But yeah, we’re open to anything that makes us better. We definitely, from an identity point of view, would love to be producing our own but not to the detriment of us being successful.”
Munster have put lots of time and energy into building stronger relationships with their clubs in the past few seasons, with players being released for more game time in the All-Ireland League than ever. AIL rugby is key to their development.
Costello said head coach Rowntree is fully committed to that, modifying players’ training weeks to make sure they’re fresh for their AIL games, while the annual presentation by Munster to the clubs always includes the slogan ‘Strong clubs = Strong Munster.’
There have been frustrations for the AIL clubs in the past about A inter-provincials clashing with he league but the demise of the B&I Cup, then the Celtic Cup, has made things a little easier.
There will still be six A inter-pros this season, with Munster likely to play a few development team games as well. Back in May, the Munster A side took on an AIL Select XV from the north of the province, with a clash against players from the south of Munster to follow this season.
There is a little more work to be done with the schools game, with Munster often unable to get hands-on time with young players while they’re chasing success in the Munster Schools Senior Cup.
“The Schools Cup is sacrosanct so getting access to the players is difficult,” said Costello. “If you’re in the NTS, we can bring them out to Musgrave Park or UL to do their conditioning but if we wanted 20 contacts with them in a year, we might be lucky to get 10.
“So it’s pre-summer and the summer programmes that we put huge resources into because we know we have them for eight to 10 weeks.”
There’s plenty going on for Munster and Costello. You wonder how he is able to calm his mind after a working day overseeing all of this stuff.
When he came home from Wasps to take on the academy role in Munster, he was worried he would miss the “drug” that is coaching a senior team every single week, but he loved being in charge of the academy. His current role is another level up.
“The systems and the structures and the complexity of it stretches you more,” said Costello.
“It’s a bit more challenging but I’m just really lucky to have been all of my life so passionate about coaching and this is just another branch of it that I love and am very passionate about. So far!”
