This time last year, Declan Danaher wouldn't have envisaged where his career was about to go, but rugby is becoming just as volatile off the pitch, as it is on the field of play.
The Englishman, who played under-19 for rugby for Ireland before representing England Saxons later in his career, has been a one-club man since his teens.
The back row forward played 275 times for London Irish before retiring in 2014, and that was followed by a swift move into coaching at the Exiles, most recently working under Declan Kidney and Les Kiss.
Last summer, the financial chaos in English rugby left him out of a job, as London Irish followed Wasps and Worcester into administration.
A brief spell in Japan followed as he helped their Sevens side ahead of the Asian Games, before the call came from Ireland head coach Scott Bemand, who Danaher had known for some years dating back to their coaching courses.
Not only is the new Ireland assistant switching from men's to women's rugby, he is also adapting to the differences between club and international rugby, which provide varying challenges, opportunities for preparation and access to players.
And although the 44-year-old admits it has been a leap of faith to take this role with Ireland, their performance in Saturday's opening-round Guinness Women's Six Nations defeat in against France has excited him about what's to come.
"I looked at it and thought 'What a challenge, two things I'd never done before'," he says.
"Probably a little bit out of my comfort zone. I was somewhere for 24 years, probably a little bit comfortable and all of a sudden you get an opportunity to do something like this, and I think after Sunday I've reflected on it and think yeah, it was completely the right decision.
"What an opportunity to work with a great group of people in a very cool organisation that has made me feel very welcome coming in.
"It's brilliant, I just see it as an amazing challenge that's going to hopefully make me a better coach, and if I become a better coach then hopefully I'm trying to make the girls better as well on the back of that."
Rugby coaching is not a one-size-fits-all approach. There are subtle differences between how the men's and women's games are played, while a recent feature in The Athletic found that female players tend to be more inquisitive of coaches.
"I've got two daughters, so I’m pretty used to it," he laughs, when asked about his early experiences in the women's game.
But Danaher, whose parents hail from Limerick and Kerry, says he's been impressed with the squad's appetite to learn in his first couple of months with the squad.
"Do they ask more questions? I can only talk from my experience with this group and I just think they’re interested in getting better. I’ve said to them that if there’s anything they want to talk about then I’m here to chat through things, whether that’s as a group or individuals.
"It’s probably made me realise, if maybe I hadn't been where I'd been for 24 years, maybe the boys were a bit bored with me, so I probably didn’t get as many questions, but it’s been great.
"There’s a genuine interest. They want to get better and it makes me a better coach because I probably have to take a little bit more time thinking about how I explain things in certain areas, whether that’s defensive line-outs, defence off scrum, which is a good thing."
Danaher's work with the Ireland defence appears to have got off to a good start, with most analysis praising the defensive line in Le Mans last weekend, despite conceding 38 points to France.
Ireland missed 17 tackles on Saturday in comparison to more than 40 in their previous meeting with Les Bleues, but the Ireland assistant says as a defence coach, there's one statistic he will always go to first.
"Points conceded, and then the reasons behind why we've conceded those points.
"It’s like a paper trail, isn’t it? So, there will be reasons why and it tends to be no one individual, it tends to be a system or a group error - or it could be fatigue - but that’s always what’s interested me, forensically going back.
"A lot of people will see the score happening but it’s maybe two phases before, how we set up at the lineout, so I’ll use that information then to try and figure out why, and obviously then try to get that across to the girls so that we’re better prepared next time.
"Sometimes that’s easier said that done but I think there were clear things we could have controlled last Saturday if maybe we’d got little things around our set-up at line-outs, and things like that, we could have made it even harder for the French to score."
Sunday's opponents Italy travel to Dublin off the back of a 48-0 defeat to England in Round 1, with the Red Roses overcoming a sluggish first half to eventually run out comfortable winners.
The Italians were 24-7 winners when the sides met in Parma 12 months ago, with Ireland's defence cut open on several occasions by a fast-paced attack.
And Danaher says they'll be very wary of how quickly this weekend's opponents can shift their attack.
"I watched the game on Sunday and I think for about 30 minutes they put it up to England, didn't they?
"In the end, England's power sort of gave them the control to go on and win the game, so I think they're going to come with a lot of intent to move the ball. Obviously we're going to have to be prepared for that and offloads, and on the back of the weekend we're probably ready to scramble a bit and be prepared for that.
"Then I've already spoken about the [lineout] drive, I think if you watch our game that's an area they're good at anyway. They'll probably come to try and focus there, so forwards will have a big opportunity to stop them when they come in our 22, be prepared for them to move the ball, and then we'll see after that.
"But like I said, the better we get our attack, our set-piece, and continue to grow those areas and attack, it probably takes a little bit of pressure off the 'D', and we've done great work this week.
"We're just off the back of a training session now and the attack was pretty tasty. I was a little bit disappointed with how we defended but at the same time, when you look at it from a purely attack versus defence, it's great that our attack did that today and we'll hopefully learn the lessons from France, because we did have opportunities if we had moved the ball to put France under a little bit more pressure."
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