Revived and ready, Horan back for more heroics
The Irish international admitted that he had been troubled for the past four seasons by worrying symptoms which confounded medical experts.
The issue came to a head last October when he was forced to retire midway through the first half of Munster’s Heineken Cup victory over Treviso. Crucially the province’s doctor Tadhg O’Sullivan reacted quickly and soon discovered the cause of Horan’s problems.
“It was going on for maybe four seasons and I didn’t know what it was,” the 32-year-old from Clonlara, Clare said yesterday ahead of Munster’s clash with Leinster in the Magners League on Friday night.
“I would be feeling faint, dizzy and light headed during games – for periods after a scrum or a period of extreme exertion. My legs would feel like jelly but I would try to run it off and it might go away for a while.
“The adrenalin was the catalyst that would set it off. There were days before I even took the pitch that I would feel it in the dressing room. That particular day against Treviso last October was one of them. It was uncontrollable. Nothing was registering with me. I could see things happening in front of me but couldn’t react quickly enough.
“I had been tested for different things like asthma and breathing difficulties at different periods. I thought it was something I was taking, maybe a supplement, so I cut that out and it would go away for a while and then come back. During the Grand Slam last year, I had a bad run in Rome when I came off. I went and got tested for my heart but nothing showed. That was the nature of the condition because after a while it would die down and if I got tested a day or two later, or even a couple of hours later, it would be back to normal.”
All that changed on October 17.
Twenty minutes had elapsed in the host’s Heineken Cup clash with Treviso when the symptoms struck Horan like a sledgehammer. Horan praised the subsequent actions of O’Sullivan.
Horan recalled: “He lay me down on the bed in the medical room and got all the wires hooked up to me just to test me and they spotted an irregular heartbeat.
“It was still going like the clappers even a few hours after the game. So I went to the Regional Hospital that night and it didn’t settle down until about midnight. I knew there was an issue and there was a huge amount of uncertainty for the next week or so.
“I went to a specialist in Dublin and got bad news. I was told more or less I had to finish my rugby career.”
Horan went looking for a second opinion.
“Then I met a good guy in Cork... I spoke to the guy on the Sunday. I went down to his house and more or less made the decision. He was extremely positive and had done the procedure on numerous occasions. He told me he was going to bring in another Cork guy working in the US and a mad rugby supporter.
“He just couldn’t have been more positive and from being very low and depressed, we wanted to get it done the next day if we could. One of the options was Friday the 13th, so I put that off until the following week! I had a procedure done – similar to Frankie Sheehan’s – and I haven’t looked back since.”
But it wasn’t just the day job which the Irish international was worried about. “Regardless of getting back playing rugby, I wanted to give myself a quality of life. It might have hindered me even if I didn’t play rugby. So just to have it done and get it sorted out was a great feeling.”
THE autumn of 2009 was a busy time for Horan and his wife Kate. They were expecting their second daughter (Grace duly arrived to keep Heather company) and inevitably with all that was happening, it was a momentous time for the family. The break allowed him time to take stock.
“I’d had a brilliant career up to that, it had been fantastic but your priority is your health and your family, to be able to spend the rest of your life with them,” he pointed out. “I didn’t want to put that in jeopardy. Rugby is very important to me but there’s a limit you’ll bring it to.”
Once given the all-clear to train and play, not everything went Horan’s way. His comebacks with Shannon were postponed again and again as pitches were unplayable due to the winter cold snap.
But eventually the grounds thawed and Horan was back packing down with the club and Ireland A before making the bench for Munster’s Heineken Cup pool decider with Northampton. However, there wasn’t enough time to push for a place in the national squad ahead of their Grand Slam defence.
“I didn’t have enough opportunities before the Six Nations to put my name in the hat and that was hugely disappointing,” he mused.
“You see other guys that were out for a while and they got in so that was pretty hard to take. It’s difficult. You’re trying to do as best you can but just the opportunity wasn’t there. I didn’t have much control over it.
“But now I do. There are big shop windows there to play over the next couple of weeks.
“It’s a great goal and a great challenge to have at this stage of your career. When you’re winning things it’s always great but this is a new challenge for me. It’s an experience I haven’t had before.”
Horan, who has won 66 caps, isn’t giving up on his international career and has set his sights on being in New Zealand and Australia with Ireland in June.
“Definitely,” he stressed. “There’s no point in playing on if I don’t do things like that. I don’t see why not.
“There’s a perception out there that I’ve missed a huge amount of rugby but I haven’t. We’re in the business end of the season now and Munster are in contention for things so I’m going to really give it a go.”
And for opponents expecting a soft touch, some words of warning – “Each game that I’ve played, I feel I’m getting stronger and stronger. They are getting more and more serious and more and more competitive.
“So that will benefit me hugely and hopefully with the break that I did have I will be that bit stronger come the latter stages of the season.”
Ireland coach Declan Kidney frequently mentioned Horan during the season as he patiently made his way back to full fitness and that won’t harm his prospects for the summer tour. And, of course, the loose head prop is just one of a number under Kidney’s close scrutiny in the two big games looming in the next nine days.
“They are huge but they’re all huge,” Horan said of games at the business end of the season. We had a tough outing last week and I think we did well. There are tough battles right across the field.”
But Munster v Leinster is in a different stratosphere.
“We realise that business is business. We need to get into the top four in the Magners League and getting four points on Friday night is key. You can lose sight of that a small bit because of who you’re playing but I think the focus for us is that this is just another game where we need the four points.
“Munster-Leinster has been tit for tat. People say it must be tough to play against guys you play with for Ireland but it just goes to show where Irish rugby is at the moment. These are the games that guys train for and want to play in. I think the rest of Europe are probably envious of what we have here, the competitiveness of it and how much it means to people. Of course the Heineken Cup defeat hurt, obviously in the manner in which we lost but because of what we lost out on as well. And the game in Dublin this season hurt as well.
“But we’ve had those periods in our history as well and Leinster have come back from that and been strong.
“So it’s up to us now to have a go and try and put things right again.”
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