Leinster wing sees her Gallagher High Performance Academy journey as a huge stepping stone in her coaching career
Emily McKeown’s coaching and playing careers have always run alongside each other and been mutually beneficial. She’s now taken it one step further, participating in the Gallagher High Performance Academy.
It was while she was a student at the Institute of Technology in Carlow, in the south-east of Ireland, that McKeown began her coaching journey.
“Sports coaching was a module there and I really found I had a passion for it,” McKeown told World Rugby.
“So, I coached before I played and I think both, for me, have gone hand-in-hand. I became a better player when I was coaching at provincial level with Leinster Under-18s, which led to me playing for Leinster.
“My experience from being coached in Leinster has then improved my coaching massively. I have gone full circle, and if I didn’t have either of those experiences I don’t think I would have been as successful in my playing or coaching career.”
Having helped Naas, her hometown club, win the Leinster Women’s Division Four title in 2019 in the first season after the side re-formed, McKeown now plays for the Suttonians club in Dublin, where she is employed as Leinster Rugby’s Women’s Development Officer.
McKeown is also Head Coach of the Leinster Metro Under-18 girls’ team, while her own playing career has seen her progress to the senior Leinster side.
Coaching remains McKeown’s passion and she was thrilled to be part of the Gallagher High Performance Academy, and to have had the opportunity to share her own experiences with, and to have learnt from, other motivated women coaches from across the rugby world.
“As I am speaking about it, it seems kind of unreal,” she said.
“Getting to see how they fully manage and coach a team was truly an incredible experience; one that is a big stepping stone in my coaching pathway, and one that I really didn’t think at the start of the year was something I imagined happening.
“Even now the support is ongoing.
“The people I got to meet along the way - everybody has such different backgrounds and I had so much fun with all of them.”