Ollie Hoskins - The Burgess Podcast

In Episode 6 of The Burgess Podcast we got the opportunity to talk to former Western Force and current London Irish Prop Ollie Hoskins. This podcast is a long one... but be assured it is full of insight on life as a professional rugby player and the journey Ollie has taken himself to reach this level. Ollie also provides a wealth of advice throughout the podcast which I am sure young aspiring rugby players can take away.

We began in Perth, where Ollie's rugby started and spoke about the influence his parents had on his game and how his love for rugby grew as a child, Ollie attended Scotch College as a schoolboy where he spoke about having some of his most enjoyable times playing rugby. As well as this at this time Ollie was part of the Western Force Academy where he trained and learnt off some high quality coaches. We then proceeded to talk about Ollie's debut for Western Force and how his time there impacted his development. We then spoke about when the opportunity to move for more game time came about and how close he was to signing for Scarletts before signing for London Irish. 

Ollie's first season for Irish was in the Championship which he said at first came as a slight disappointment but how that turned into a humbling, career changing experience where he got the chance to develop and grow as a player without the pressure always on him. We then continued to speak about Ollie's time at Irish speaking about promotion, relegation and the impact that had on the team and himself. We then progressed to more recent times and spoke to Ollie about how he found training during COVID-19 and the restart of rugby and the intensity that this came with. Following on from this we moved onto talking about this season and more specifically the special occasion that was his 100th appearance for Irish in an exciting 27-27 draw Vs Harlequins.