Conán O’Donnell’s 45-minute Ireland career: ‘I’m very grateful I was caught out’

“Andy Farrell said to me, ‘Conán, this is the shortest career in international history.’”Between the Ireland Under-20s, Connacht, the Sunwolves, Highlanders and Toronto Arrows, Conán O’Donnell lasted the bones of eight years in professional rugby. When handed an unlikely chance to join up with Ireland, he was only in the door for 45 minutes. Michael Bent, the former Leinster and Ireland prop, memorably earned one last appearance in green during the victorious tour of New Zealand in 2022. A crisis of availability at frontrow left the semi-retired former international as one of the only options left available to Farrell. Bent got five minutes off the bench in Ireland’s second midweek game against the Maori All Blacks. When he returned to the changing rooms after an Irish victory, Bent was mobbed by team-mates, recognition of a surprise good-news story for the then 36-year-old farmer. A video of the moment was posted online and O’Donnell’s father sent it on to him. He was sick. READ MOREIt could have been him. O’Donnell’s nomadic rugby existence is full of unlikely stories. After leaving his home province of Connacht aged 22, he ended up in Japan. The Sunwolves, a now defunct franchise, needed a medical joker. Being involved in the Super Rugby system led to opportunities with the Highlanders and Crusaders, as well as various gigs in the Mitre 10 Cup, New Zealand’s provincial system below Super Rugby. In 2021, O’Donnell contemplated going home. Call it luck, manifestation or soothsaying but a decision was made to stay. It nearly paid off. “I was probably going to go home a year earlier but I knew All Blacks were playing Ireland,” O’Donnell explains. “Covid was still about and New Zealand is so far away – there were barriers to getting players out there. They were playing the Maoris as well so it was a big tour. I chanced my arm, signed another contract to stay in New Zealand on the off chance anything would happen.”O’Donnell now works in tech sales in Dublin but based on this yarn alone he could make a better living predicting lotto numbers. In the first game of the tour against the Maori All Blacks, Jeremy Loughman suffered a concussion and Cian Healy picked up a nasty ankle injury. O’Donnell was supposed to be the solution. Before that opening game turning into a propping bloodbath, Nucifora caught wind of a Sligo lad with Super Rugby experience still in the country. Willie Ruane, the Connacht CEO, passed on a phone number. It didn’t take long for O’Donnell, then working as a teaching assistant in the gap between the Super Rugby and Mitre 10 seasons, to jump in the car for the journey from Northland down to Auckland. Sligo RFC’s Conan O’Donnell celebrates after last year's Bank of Ireland Connacht Men's Cup Final victory over Galwegians. Photograph: Ryan Byrne/Inpho “I was like Billy Maddison in the corner of the class playing Lego with these little kids,” says O’Donnell, laughing. “On lunch break I looked at the phone and I had a text from David Nucifora. ‘We have a shortage on the prop front, would you mind coming down to be 24th man and do the warm-up [for the Maori game]?’ So I went in to the principal. ‘I could potentially play for Ireland here so I can’t work tomorrow.’“There were precautions around Covid so I had to go to the pharmacy. I couldn’t afford the Covid test as my pay didn’t come in till six o’clock. The test was like two dollars more than what was in my account. Some lady stepped in to my left and paid, not having a clue what I was going through. “I did the test; didn’t have [Covid], so I drove the three hours down to Auckland. I rang my mum and dad, ‘You’ll never believe what’s happened!’ My dad always said I was a chancer when I told him why I wanted to stay in New Zealand.”When O’Donnell arrived, the team were going over lineout calls. He then had dinner with former Connacht and 20s team-mates he hadn’t seen in years. “Then they had a meeting the night before the game,” he continues. “I wasn’t sure if I was meant to be there. Peter O’Mahony was like, ‘Stay there kid, you’re involved tomorrow.’“Keith Earls was on that tour, talking about facing the haka and how intimidating it was. Don’t let it get the best of you. Then back to my room, I get a text from Nucifora: ‘Can you come meet us in the meeting room’?” This, alas, is where the dream dies.O’Donnell had disclosed to Nucifora that he was nursing an injury. Just not the full extent. Ten days previously, he broke his cheekbone in three places in a club game. O’Donnell originally told Ireland’s head honcho that the injury had happened a month before. Eventually, someone at Northland got in touch with the Ireland medical staff to tell them the truth. There was no way they could clear O’Donnell to hold tackle bags, let alone travel to the ground as the next prop up should someone get injured in the warm-up for an actual match. His sinus was banjaxed for good measure. Breathing heavily through his nose could further damage the fracture. International rugby sounded a great idea. Conan O'Donnell, Counties Manukau squad training, 2020. Photograph: Andrew Cornaga/Inpho/Photosport “I thought it was my choice,” O’Donnell explains. “Northland’s S&C coach was my housemate and he said ‘You better think twice about going down and risking your contract with an injury; it could get ripped up.’ But I was willing to lose that even if it was to only hold a tackle bag.”For his trouble, O’Donnell was offered tickets to the Test match in Auckland. He already had one. Besides, he wanted to get back to Northland, do what training he could and – after taking an extra day off – get back to the teaching work. “On the way out, I bumped into Tom O’Toole and Ciarán Frawley in the lift. ‘What’s the craic lads? I’m off.’ I was in the building for about 45 minutes. At the end of the day I got a free dinner and caught up with friends. I drove three hours for that. Through hilly roads, rough villages a lot of biker gangs.“I was willing to put my head on the line. Thank god, hearing awful stories about lads with long-term impact from rugby, mentally and with concussion, looking back now I’m very grateful I was caught out. It would have been nothing in the grand scheme of my life.” After the injuries to Loughman, Healy and even O’Donnell, Bent, the former Leinster prop who already had four Ireland caps to his name, ended up travelling with Ireland for the first Test as cover. He repeated the job for the second Maori game, ultimately featuring when Bealham went down in the warm-up. “That was meant to be me,” says O’Donnell, half jokingly, half wistfully. “What could have been?”While certainly the most memorable, this near miss is but one entry into O’Donnell’s large collection of nearly moments. After finishing up with the Highlanders, he was at a concert outside Dunedin – SIX60, if you’re asking. O’Donnell deliberately forgot his phone at home. “I left it to not spend money; I was out of contract.”Conan O'Donnell and Paul Boyle, Connacht squad training, 2019. Photograph: Bryan Keane/Inpho Fast-forward to next morning’s hangover: there were five missed calls and multiple messages from ex-team-mates saying the Highlanders coach was looking for him. Playing in Argentina against the Jaguares, they needed prop cover. On the way to the airport, O’Donnell stopped at McDonald’s for what he now calls the Buenos Aires special: 20 nuggets, a milkshake and three triple cheeseburgers. Props, eh? The game in Argentina never happened. With Covid restrictions increasing globally, players didn’t want to risk injury and being stranded in a hospital far from home should New Zealand shut its borders. Another time, O’Donnell was named by the Crusaders to play against the Blues in Auckland. Only the city was shut down as Covid measures came in once again. The game was cancelled as the other two Kiwi Super Rugby franchises, the Highlanders and Hurricanes, nonetheless squared off elsewhere in the country. Despite appearing in preseason action, O’Donnell was never capped by the Crusaders in a competitive game. He can still see the funny side. Moving around New Zealand rugby ultimately saved him from other, ill-fitting jobs. “I was a landscaper for a week, a painter for two days.” And a teaching assistant. The near misses shouldn’t detract from a career that brought multiple appearances for Connacht and Ireland Under-20s. Still, O’Donnell is more than happy to indulge in self-deprecation. “I nearly played for teams but nearly never milked a cow,” he says. There’s even time for one last prediction. This one sounds slightly less far fetched than hanging around another year on the other side of the world on the off chance that Andy Farrell comes calling.“I’ll be the fellah in the pub in 20 years time back in Sligo telling everyone how I nearly played for Ireland.”