Hughes’ world mission

Date published: 18 October 2013


OLDHAM RL fitness expert Mike Hughes will be Ireland's head conditioning coach in the forthcoming world cup.

Hughes (26) was assisting England until Ireland's top man was injured.

Said Hughes: "I didn't want to burn my bridges with England, but they told me a head of department job with Ireland was an opportunity not to be missed. I was interviewed and offered the job the next day."

Oldham coach Scott Naylor has regularly acknowledged that Hughes is a valued member of the Roughyeds' backroom team. His work was key to much of what the squad achieved last season.

He will do a similar job with the Ireland squad, based at Preston.

Ireland are in group ‘A’ with Fiji, England and Australia and open up their campaign against Fiji at Rochdale on Monday, October 28 (8pm).



Oldham chief Chris Hamilton, meanwhile, has lauded the first year's work of coaches Naylor and Lee Spencer ahead of the club's end-of-season dinner and awards at Whitebank tomorrow.

In building a new, young squad from scratch and guiding Roughyeds to second in the division, they did a “fantastic” job, he said.

“Scott was brought in to change the dressing room mentality and he did that.

“There has been a lot of interest in our players but we are working hard to make sure we keep the majority of last season’s squad together. I think the quality of our new signings also makes it fairly obvious what our intentions are in 2014.”