Healey ponders his switch to Coventry

By Coventry Evening Telegraph
April 28 2006

British Lion and England international Austin Healey will not be making a decision over his playing future until after a summer holiday. But the Leicester half-back insists he is serious about playing for Coventry next season in National Division One.

 

Coventry Evening Telegraph

John Wilkinson

25^th Apr 2006

 

British Lion and England international Austin Healey will not be making a decision over his playing future until after a summer holiday.

 

But the Leicester half-back insists he is serious about playing for Coventry next season in National Division One.

 

Healey retires from full-time rugby at the end of this season to take up a job with Credit Suisse, but intends to be available for Leicester during the autumn internationals and Six Nations tournament.

 

And he believes that playing for Coventry - or Nottingham, who have also made an approach - over the rest of the season would be the perfect way of keeping match-fit.

 

"The reason I went to see Coventry is because I am connected to Darren Grewcock (Cov's conditioning coach) and because it was an opportunity to try to help out another side," Healey told the Leicester Mercury. "I might not have the pace I once had but I can still control a game.

 

"The general idea is that I remain a Leicester player but, because I'm not going to play that much, this is an opportunity to stay match-fresh with someone else.

 

"I have not agreed a deal and I'm still looking at my options. It depends how busy I am, and how much training I have got to do with Credit Suisse.

 

"I'm not going to make a decision until I've had a holiday."

 

While Leicester want Healey to play part-time next season, a deal has yet to be agreed.

 

"The situation with Leicester is that we agreed I'd play next season,'' said Healey, who is having a testimonial next year.

 

"But Pat (Howard) wants me to train every Tuesday and Friday, and I said that I couldn't guarantee that commitment.

 

"I wanted to spell that out at the beginning so they didn't think I'd conned them."

 

* COVENTRY favourite Lee Crofts will be back at the club next season.

 

Currently player-coach at Stourbridge, Crofts - who made 247 appearances for Cov in the second and back rows - is joining the coaching team at the Butts Park Arena.

 

"He's keen to get involved in some capacity," said head coach Mike Umaga. "We need to have a second team running next season and we feel that appointing a local lad like Lee will be best to help get things moving."

 

Crofts and ex-Cov scrum-half Toby Handley will be touring South Africa with British Police at the end of the season, playing games in Johannesburg and Durban over a 12-day period.