Anti-showman Ryan will be wondering what all the fuss is about

Stalwart won’t want it to be all about him, but he will deliver again

DONNACHA RYAN probably won’t want you to read this piece, because it’s all about him. He played his final home game for Munster last Saturday on the same weekend John Terry played his last game for Chelsea. I hardly need to add that that’s where the similarities end.

In the warped world of the Premier League, John Terry followed the plan as laid out by John Terry by leaving the pitch in the 26th minute to a guard of honour by his team-mates.

The previous evening, Ryan fought off the Munster players like a MMA fighter as they tried to put him up on their shoulders after the game.

Terry wanted the world to see how much he was loved by Chelsea fans at Stamford Bridge. Ryan didn’t want anyone in the world to think it was about him at Thomond Park.

In another world, Ryan (pictured) could have been playing for the Tipperary hurlers against Cork last Sunday.

Imagine him: black tape around his forehead, that steely look on his face, using his athleticism to outleap all-comers to catch the sliotar in the air (he does enough damage with his own physicality, imagine him with a hurley?)

Hurling was Ryan’s first love and he only started playing rugby to toughen himself up for his original pursuit.

Munster and Ireland have a group of kids from Canada to thank for initially getting Ryan into rugby, as well, of course, as his parents and his first rugby coach and mentor, Pat Whelan.

Whelan organised a group of kids from Canada to come over to Nenagh to play rugby. He needed families to host them so Ryan’s parents put up two kids in their home. Their son ended up playing one of the games.

Whelan remembers that first game of rugby Ryan ever played: “Everywhere the ball was, he was.”

What struck Whelan about Ryan was his attitude. He remembers him spending evenings in the big field at the back of the Ryan home running for around 45 minutes with each hand carrying a bag of sand or a half a block.

To build up his agility, Whelan sent Ryan to renowned athletics coach Sean Naughton in Nenagh, who created an programme for him.

Long before this became the norm for rugby players, Ryan was doing exercises over hurdles and plyometrics as he played catch-up to other players who started playing rugby a lot younger than he did.

“He was a good but he was behind some of the other kids as regards the knowledge and the skill of the game. But the one thing he took complete ownership of for himself was that there was no-one going to be fitter than him,” Whelan says.

Because Ryan didn’t grow up with the advantages that a schools or academy background brings (he moved from Nenagh CBS to St Munchin’s College in his Leaving Cert year after only taking up rugby the year before), it adds to the impression that he is a selfmade player helped along the way by coaches like Whelan.

Former Munster, Leinster and Ireland second-row Trevor Hogan grew up a few fields away from Ryan in Nenagh. It was the way Ryan came back from a serious foot injury which threatened to end his career that particularly impressed Hogan.

“I think one of the greatest achievements of his career was how he came back from that injury,” Hogan says.

“A lesser injury finished me off. But he came back from that mentally and physically in better shape than maybe he was before.”

When Ryan sits at a top table for a press conference, he does so with the air of a man who wonders why anyone would be interested in what he’s got to say.

When I bumped into him a few months ago he mentioned how I congratulated him on making the Ireland squad for the 2015 World Cup after his injury, and he couldn’t believe how happy I was to hear him say that. Most players wouldn’t remember something like that, and most players certainly wouldn’t mention it. Hogan laughs as he remembers Ryan just being himself as they played a game before a training session years ago at Munster. Nenagh folk have a turn of phrase where they call people: “Hey Sir”. And Ryan, who was just starting out, wasn’t going to change who he was just because he was now a professional rugby player. “Donnacha was so athletic, so fast, so agile. Jim Williams was playing and he was the man everyone looked up to,” recalls Hogan. “Williams had the ball and it was Donnacha who was sprinting up alongside him. It wasn’t like ‘Jim, pass the ball!’ “But instead Donnacha said to Williams ‘You sir, pass, you sir pass’. Everyone just burst out laughing. Donnacha just wanted to be himself and he’s brought that trademark throughout his career. He’s Donnacha and that’s the way he is.”

The day after Anthony Foley died in Paris last October, a book of condolence was opened in the civic offices in Limerick.

Ryan was the first Munster player down there that Monday morning. He stood in line like everyone else, he signed the book like everyone else and had a few words with anyone who came over to offer their condolences.

He’ll return to Paris to start a new phase of his career when he joins Racing 92 this summer. I hope he gets the king’s chair from his team-mates after Munster’s PRO12 Final against the Scarlets at the Aviva Stadium today.

He’s nothing like Terry – he’s the anti-showman. But he could always be counted on to show up for Munster. And he’ll do it for one final time today.