Ryan's ready to help US get back on track for 2031

PADDY RYAN’s career has taken off in a big way in the last few months and the Coventry and US Eagles player is hoping he can help both club and country reach for the stars.

- JON NEWCOMBE

Space-themed messaging is a big part of USA head coach Scott Lawrence’s mission to rebuild the Eagles after their failure to qualify for the 2023 World Cup and Ryan is happy to be on board after a chance message to defence coach Nick Easter on LinkedIn did the trick.

“I saw he got announced as the forwards coach and I had been trying to get in contact with someone before and I didn’t really go anywhere so I thought I might as well reach out to him on LinkedIn,” the former Northampton academy player explained.

“I thought to myself that he’s English, I’m in England, he’s not too far away, I’ll send him a message. You want to play at the highest level you can and I thought, ‘nothing ventured, nothing gained’.

“I introduced myself and gave him some details and he asked me some questions as well and then it sort of went quiet for a bit. Then I got a text from Scott Lawrence asking me if I would be interested in a call. I couldn’t quite believe it. It was 5 o’clock in the morning, you know when you just roll over to see what time it is and see if you have any notifications or whatever. I couldn’t get back to sleep after that.