Legendary rugby player Paul O'Connell talks Christmas, rugby and leadership at Limerick Chamber event
RUGBY legend Paul O’Connell has admitted he struggled to enjoy parts of his career, as he turned every game into a “life or death” situation.
The former Munster, Ireland and Lions captain, who was the guest speaker at a special Limerick Chamber event, said it’s only since he became “process-driven” that he began to enjoy things more – and he believes he became a better player because of it.
“Everyone says focus on the process, and it’s just a question of how you go about doing it,” he said. “I figured out a few bits that worked for me towards the end of my time.”
The big thing for the player is to “figure out what’s important and don’t get distracted by the small stuff.”
“There is a lot of noise you need to learn to ignore: being next moment focused and not too obsessed about the future. There’s a time and place for planning, but often you need to deal with what’s right in front of you as well as you can.”
Paul, who skippered Munster for eight years, addressed the business community at the monthly First Tuesdays event, in which a high-profile figure in Limerick’s life is invited to impart their wisdom.
For the 43-year-old, it was all about leadership, with the lock now also a coach with the Irish rugby set-up.
“Since I started coaching, it’s been a big learning curve for me,” he said.
The start of his coaching career came during Covid-19, where Ireland were playing Six Nations matches in empty stadia.
“It was quite bizarre. Players could hear you giving out to them from the sidelines. So to be back in full stadiums with the atmosphere, it’s been brilliant.”
Paul compared the role of a coach to that of an entrepreneur. “I think one thing as a sportsman you can be a little bit selfish. You need to be cognisant about how you make other people feel and that’s important. But the best thing very often you can do is prepare yourself as well as you can and be the best you possibly can be. Whereas, with an entrepreneur, you have a whole host of challenges – recruiting staff, keeping the good ones, keeping morale high, having a good culture. That’s the big challenge coaches have among players too.”
Paul won’t stray too far away from the world of rugby this Christmas. “We have three children, so there won’t be a lot of going out for me, but we’ll have great fun with the kids. We are lucky enough my wife’s parents and my parents live near to us. Brothers and sisters live near, so there’ll be plenty of catching up with family – and watching plenty of rugby hopefully,” he laughed.
Of course, Munster face Leinster in the traditional St Stephen’s Day fixture.
Unfortunately, Paul said he does not think his province will prevail.
“It’s hard to look beyond Leinster in these games at the moment. Hopefully. the way we’ve played the last few weeks, we can continue to improve and have a good crack at them,” he stated.
At the peak of his playing career, Munster were the sporting kings of Limerick, with the province winning the Heineken Cup in 2006 and 2008. Back then, hurling played second fiddle. But the tide has turned, with the hurlers winning four All-Ireland titles. Paul sees this a challenge for Munster.
“Munster, we need to be better, we need to be better right across the board in terms of how we develop players, how we market the game and how our senior team does.
“People at Munster do work extremely hard, and hopefully that hard work will come to fruition sooner rather than later,” he concluded.