When John Hayes and Fiona Steed were still just going out, one year in particular the latter was at a loss as to what to get the farmer who has everything for Christmas. And then, thankfully, she had an epiphany: more cattle, of course!

From Silvermines, Co Tipperary, growing up Fiona’s family had a small self-sufficient holding, growing vegetables and keeping a cow for milk. But still, Fiona knew she would need some expert help for this particular plan.

At the time she was working in Nenagh as a physiotherapist, and so, Fiona enlisted the help of her then boss Pauline Seymour, who is a farmer.

John Hayes and Fiona Steed with their children Sally, Róisín and Bill. \ Finbarr O’Rourke

“I asked would she take me to the mart some Tuesday, that we’d take a couple of hours off work and go,” smiles Fiona as she recalls the story. “She said, ‘You can’t just do that, you need a herd number’.

“Her cousin at the time had just bought a load of weanlings. So she came in the next day and said, ‘I have a plan. You can come out to the farm some day after work and pick out which ever one you want. My good cousin will sell it to you at the same price he bought it for’. And then she said, ‘I’ve enquired about the herd number for Mr Hayes’.

“I bought it off her cousin and he kept it for me until Stephen’s Day. I took a picture of it, put it in a box, wrapped it in a bow and presented it to John Christmas day.”

That was the Christmas before John asked Fiona to marry him. She laughs that it definitely sealed the deal. The weanling was called Mossy and the cow went on to have 11 calves. All parties are in agreement that Fiona’s initial contribution to the farm was a good one.

Mossy died last year, having been retired to grass two years previous, having failed to go in calf twice before that. Irish Country Living remarks that Fiona must have great clout. “She was the only one ever allowed to retire,” says John, a knowing look on his face.

Traditional methods, modern tech

Since the gifting of Mossy, John and Fiona have of course gotten married and had three children – Sally (13), Róisín (10) and Bill (7). When Irish Country Living visits their home and farm just outside Cappamore, Co Limerick, it’s prior to social distancing

measures. As we all sit around the table there’s great banter, from Mossy to GAA rivalries and of course, plenty of rugby talk.

For those who don’t know, John and Fiona are both ex-Irish rugby internationals. A power couple of the sport if there ever was one, although, they’re both extremely humble (some may say understated) when it comes to their achievements. Retiring in late 2011 from the Munster and Ireland teams, John has 105 Irish caps. Fiona won 62 caps during her 10-year playing career with the Ireland women’s rugby.

John is a suckler farmer. His father was in dairy until the early 1980s, when he then went into sucklers. His mother Marie is chair of the Cappamore Show, an event the whole family rows in on.

The kids take great interest in their father’s animals, particularly their genealogy. They take turns naming calves and the name must start with the first letter of the dam’s name. Róisín is chief registrar in this respect and has a page hand-ruled with columns of names, calving due date and date calved.

Of course, the official registering of calves is John’s department. Remembering his mother sending away cards, John says modern technology has revolutionised farming, but to avail of this you need good broadband. And so, in this regard he has become an ambassador for IFA Telecom.

“It’s the 21st century. It’s so important to have good broadband. If all farmers had it, it would be huge. So much of modern new dairy farming relies on technology, it’s not the old-fashioned way that some people might think some farms are. They don’t realise how good they have it,” says John nodding towards the children.

Sally is the only one of the children to have a phone. John indicates that he thinks she spends too much time on it and she makes a face. A very normal family indeed!

GAA start, rugby finish

Sally, Róisín and Bill all play a range of sports from hurling/camogie to soccer and rugby, but for John and Fiona, surprisingly, growing up they were all about GAA. They only got into rugby in their late teens. John was a month away from his 19th birthday when a neighbour encouraged him to start training with Bruff Rugby Club.

Sally, Róisín and Bill all play a range of sport from hurling/camogie to soccer and rugby. \ Finbarr O’Rourke

“It was late to start at any kind of a sport, I suppose. I just started it,” says John simply. “I hadn’t any notions other than just giving it a go. I played with Bruff, then played a bit with Shannon. There was a New Zealand guy living in Bruff, playing at the time.

“He was going back to New Zealand, so like a lot of fellas would be doing, just heading off some place for a year or two, I went off to New Zealand playing rugby then as well. None of it was majorly planned, it all just happened one after the other.”

Fiona interjects: “He makes it sound easy, doesn’t he?”

“It was like that,” John replies earnestly, “because there were no goals set, there were no targets. It was just the age I was at and that I was doing something I loved doing. I was an age that you could just go away and do anything.”

The bull

Upon coming home, he played in the All-Ireland League (AIL) with Shannon for another year, before getting involved with Munster. The rest of the story about The Bull (a nickname he doesn’t mind: “I’ve been called a lot worse”) is well-known – Lions Tours, Heineken Cups, a Triple Crown and a Grand Slam were to follow.

Fiona played camogie underage with Tipp. She then moved to England to study physiotherapy at Teesside University in Middlesbrough. In the early 1990s camogie opportunities were sparse in the northeast of England, so she took to rugby.

“I started playing rugby in college. Then I started playing with Novocastrians when I moved to Newcastle. There were regional trials, so I went for the regional trials. Then it was a case of north trials or going for the Irish Exiles. I was passionately Irish, so said I’d try the Irish Exiles route. Out of that I got selected for the Ireland team in 1994.”

Fiona may be taking a leaf out of her husband’s book in making it sound easy!

She is now involved in punditry for women’s rugby with RTÉ. She says women’s rugby has come a long way from when she was playing, with a particular boost in visibility after the Grand Slam win in 2013, but there’s still work to be done.

“There’s a full-time coach now, a proper setup with strength and conditioning and physio,” explains Fiona. “The first World Cup I played, back then it was called the World Championship, I had just started playing and I had just qualified as a physiotherapist the year before. I was the team physio as well as playing all the matches – how mad is that?

“It’s now much more professional. The skill level is much better. The support structures are good. We still have a way to go though,” she highlights.

New life, old rivalry

John feels rugby has become a much more accessible sport over the last 10 to 15 years, that it once had an image of being associated with private schools and coming up through certain systems, but with more clubs, schools teams and academies, that’s gone now. He also notes that there are and were a fair few farmers playing on the Irish team. Straight away Sally begins to name some of them.

Although all of the kids play, none of them were forced into rugby. John and Fiona waited until they asked could they join a club. They both coach on a Sunday morning with Bruff, where the children play. Fiona says coaching and punditry helped incorporate rugby into her life in a new way after she finished playing.

It’s actually Tipperary soil. It came in on a load of topsoil. So what it’s grown on is Tipperary soil

John is of the opinion that he is happy enough to have gotten out of rugby injury free. For Fiona, after 10 years of playing, her priorities changed, she wanted to have children. Now they’re happy living on the farm with the life and space that brings.

Fiona has taken to growing vegetables in a polytunnel and says the Limerick soil is hampering her carrots.

“It’s actually Tipperary soil,” quips John. “It came in on a load of topsoil. So what it’s grown on is Tipperary soil.”

There’s constant good-natured slagging. Fiona and Róisín support Tipperary, while John, Sally and Bill support Limerick.

The biggest rivalry in the house, and it doesn’t even lie on rugby lines.