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Donncha O'Callaghan on protecting his daughters from rugby

Ireland rugby legends Donncha O'Callaghan and Niamh Briggs first met in rather awkward ...



Donncha O'Callaghan on pro...
Rugby

Donncha O'Callaghan on protecting his daughters from rugby

Ireland rugby legends Donncha O'Callaghan and Niamh Briggs first met in rather awkward circumstances, as they revealed on last night's edition of TV3's The Clubhouse.

The pair were on the show to discuss the conclusion of the Six Nations and assess Ireland's performance in the championship. But before that, they recalled their first meeting, which provoked some moments of exceptional comedy from O'Callaghan.

Briggs began by explaining how the Munster women's rugby team took exception to comments made by O'Callaghan, in which he said that he didn't want his daughters to take up rugby.

A visibly mortified O'Callaghan took up the story from there and gave a humorous explanation of his thought process that led him to look at sport in that regard.

"It was an awful moment. I was on Today FM with Ray D'Arcy and he said, 'will your girls play rugby?' and I said, 'good God no.' The next Tuesday I ran into the whole Munster women's team, who were like, 'oh cheers pal.'

"I'm protective of my kids. I'm the fella that togs them out in sleeping bags, when they're going out on their scooters. It's just, I can't see them doing anything that would hurt them.

"I want them to have their heroes like Niamh and Katie Taylor - people to aspire to. But I want them to be golfers. Even tennis is a bit rough."

Further on in the discussion, O'Callaghan described Munster's win over Glasgow in the aftermath of Anthony Foley's death as 'medicine,' and said he 'would have done anything' to have played that day.

You can watch the full interview here.

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