BUCKLEY OUT ON A LIMB
Ireland prop faces an uncertain future afterbeing dumped by Sale
TONY BUCKLEY is ticking off the boxes, tying up the loose ends. Having left Sale Sharks a few weeks ago, he’s busy concluding a series of college courses before heading home with the family to Co Cork at the end of this month.
Solar panel installations, building regulations, rainwater harvesting… he has immersed himself in everything and anything to do with newera plumbing so that he is ready for the rugby afterlife.
Going full-time with Munster all those years ago meant he chucked in his apprenticeship and when he attempted to restart it after getting up to speed with the requirements of professional rugby, he was told by FÁS he couldn’t pick up where he left off due to the fact he was now in alternative full-time employment.
No such red tape existed in England and he filled his boots.
‘Ever since I came over here I enrolled in college, went to night school and have done as much as I can. Renewable heating systems are very popular over here, so it’s going to take off in Ireland as well and I’m just getting all my qualifications up to scratch,’ he explains during a lunchtime break away from the studies. ‘This way I can go into work fully qualified and get a fully qualified wage.’
Buckley’s thirst for knowledge isn’t an admission he has officially knocked his professional rugby career on its head. He most definitely wants to keep playing but the future’s uncertain right now.
‘I’m looking for a club and that’s not going very well,’ admits the 33-yearold, 6ft 5in prop.
IONLY played eight to 10 games the last year, that’s only around 260 to 280 minutes of rugby. At 33 years of age, it’s hard when you have only played that amount. I just need to find somewhere else and it’s taking quite a while. ‘Looking around, there are no offers in England so I’m trying France. There is a bit of interest in Division 2 and a small bit in Top 14 but it’s very slow. They come in, say they’re interested, then p*** around for a few weeks and you hear nothing.’ What about the Irish provinces? ‘They have my number if they want me. I wouldn’t be holding my breath, though,’ he admits.
‘I don’t want to go out on such a low. Ideally, your last year should be enjoyable and you’d be playing, but you can’t dictate the terms when leaving this career. It’s hard to go. I’ll hang on another while but, if not, I have a few contingencies in place and I’ll go back into the workforce.
‘It’s not as daunting as for some players. I like working, so I’ll be alright. But I’m going to keep looking for a club in the meantime.
‘I’d prefer to get it sorted sooner rather than later. We have got school places for the kids and somewhere to live at home to worry about, but the wife has been good about it. We’re going to go home to Ireland at the end of this month and will operate from there.
‘If something comes up somewhere we’ll head off again, but we’re going to head home first. I always planned on playing professionally until I was 35. If I got another year I’d be happy, two would be unreal.
‘If it doesn’t work out, I can just play club rugby with Kanturk. That was always my plan, to do a year with them and finish where I started, to have a bit of closure.
‘It’s just that it might be happening sooner than I imagined.’
Buckley and wife Elaine, a former women’s rugby international, were home last month, dropping their three young children off with family in Newmarket and then spinning up to Belfast to watch Kanturk beat Instonians to qualify for the AllIreland League for the first time.
The flying visit was a tonic for flagging spirits after a difficult third year at the Sharks where the prop, who plays both sides of the scrum, played very little.
Buckley’s decision to join the Premiership was originally a gutsy one. Not since Tommy Bowe went to Ospreys in 2008 had an Irish international flown the nest but the tighthead was furious when the IRFU withdrew a central contract offer in the run-up to Christmas 2010 just as his family were dealing with his wife’s cancer diagnosis.
The union eventually came back to
The provinces have my number but I won’t be holding my breath
the table with reduced terms but Buckley, who had a shoal of offers from abroad, had made his mind up.
Manchester was his new home, a decision that took into account the medical care available there for his wife. It’s been time well spent.
‘She was in the Christie, the leading hospital for cancer research in Europe, and she has got a very good result.
‘It [follicular lymphoma] will never be gone but it’s the best-case scenario. She goes to the gym now, she’s running and racing, she has a parttime job. She’s much better now than she was three years ago,’ he says.
The same can’t be said about Buckley’s rugby. His first two seasons with Sale were positive but a fractured femur just over a year ago derailed him and he never got back up the pecking order.
‘My knee was pushed into my femur in a tackle and it took two months to diagnose,’ he recalls.
‘I was hobbling around for two months but, when I was diagnosed, I was operated on within three hours. I was out for six months. It was only November when I started back playing and the season didn’t go well.
‘ I t was i ncredibly pai nf ul . I wouldn’t have been able to squat with the right leg, so when you were trying to squat down for a scrum you couldn’t get very low.’
‘There was no power, but I can squat and do everything now. Everything is fine again but it took a long time to recover and when I was out, the guy who came in [Vadim Cobalis] played really well, so I couldn’t complain.’
ESPECIALLY when Sale’s results have been on the rise, the club benefiting from the recruitment of defence and scrum coaches to secure a top-six finish and a place in next season’s new Rugby Champions Cup. ‘I was happy enough the first two years. When you’re playing it’s great but this year there were games where there was a three-minute run, an eight-minute run… it’s all about playing and it’s incredibly frustrating when you are not.
‘It’s a very hard thing to get your head around. Eight months of training pretty much for nothing.
‘I’d nothing much to talk about this year. Got on fine in training but didn’t have enough games to make use of it.’