Five years ago, having just won the Super League title in England with Wigan Warriors, Australian rugby league international Phil Bailey was just starting what he thought would be his rugby league swansong. Then, in pre-season training with his new club, Salford City Reds, a ruptured Achilles brought his playing career to the most abrupt of halts.



The former Cronulla Sharks stalwart is just starting another new adventure: as boss of Hong Kong Football Club rugby union team. A different sport, another different continent. Bailey has worked in Australasia, Europe and America. Now it’s Asia’s turn. The one-time New South Wales centre is going to spend the next few months in the middle of the world-famous Happy Valley racecourse in Hong Kong, coaching rugby.



If it wasn’t for that ankle injury, Inverell-born Bailey would be either in the Australian armed forces or in England contemplating retirement after wrapping up his Super League career, as his brother Chris has just done after five years with London Broncos and Huddersfield Giants. Instead, Phil headed from Manchester to New York City and a whole other life opened up for him.

“I was going to join the military but that was ruled out because of the Achilles injury,” explains Bailey, now 35. “I’d met Nicole, who was then my fiancée, in America and we were deciding whether we would go to my home in Australia or to hers in the US. We chose New York.”

Once in the Big Apple, he befriended the local rugby league team, New York Knights, and in the league off-season went with some of them to play rugby union at New York Athletic Club, despite having little experience of the 15-man game. “I went because I wanted to meet new people. I went to a league school [Holy Trinity and then Inverell High] but I’ve always followed rugby union – as an Aussie we are into all sports.”

Despite having almost no experience of the code, he soon became their coach – and discovered he was a natural. NYAC won the US club championship and Bailey was head-hunted to become the US national team’s defence coach in December 2013. “My first game was against the New Zealand Maoris. I was in at the deep end.”



It helped that Bailey played under some of the most successful coaches of their generation: among them Bob Fulton, Phil Gould, Chris Anderson and Michael Maguire. They all impressed and impacted upon him. “There are so many good things you can take from coaches,” says the former centre or second row.



As an Australian rugby league star, in many ways Bailey felt at home in the USA rugby union camp as they prepared for the recent Rugby World Cup in England. He was surrounded by players and coaches who had climbed on board an adventure bus. Assistant coach Justin Fitzpatrick used to play for Ireland and there were 13 players from outside the US, including four Sydneysiders, two Kiwi brothers, two Irishmen, a South African, Tongan, Fijian, Zimbabwean, and an English captain.

“Sport is such a great melting pot. The best players play. It was like that at Wigan and in Australia it’s like that with players from different countries: New Zealand, Polynesians, Papua New Guinea, England. It’s alpha-males who want to win, which is great. You pick the best players and the best coaching staff to give you the best chance of winning. That’s team sport.”

Having beaten Canada and Japan in the build-up, the US thought they were making great strides towards the top of the “tier two” nations. In England they fell to earth with four straight defeats, including a 64-0 thrashing by South Africa in London’s Olympic Stadium. But Bailey still enjoyed working with aspirant athletes in a world class environment.

“In the World Cup it was all first class. Everything was spot on. It was great to be in the middle of it rather than on the outside looking in. The players knew they were on show, too. Clubs were shopping for them.”

Indeed they were. Star number eight Samu Manoa from Concord in the San Francisco Bay Area has moved from Northampton Saints to French giants Toulon in a major deal, while half-back AJ MacGinty impressed enough to seal a return to his native Ireland with Connacht. Others have succeeded purely by, like Bailey, transferring their skills to international level rugby union from a different sport, particularly American football and basketball.

“Only a few have played rugby since they were a young age. Take Zack Test – he was a wide receiver in college football at Oregon, finished that at about 23 and he’s starting rugby late. It makes it a lot easier because there’s not a lot of pushback, they’re very receptive, which makes it fun.”

Bailey, who still speaks to his friends Andrew and Matthew Johns for advice on rugby matches they have seen his team play, hopes to remain a part of the USA Rugby group even though he is now on another continent. Being in Asia won’t necessarily prevent him from contributing. “I stayed in New York when USA Rugby are based in Boulder in Colorado, but everything can be done conferencing. I would like to stay involved with USA Rugby but it will be a matter of timing and commitments.”



As head coach of Hong Kong FC on a three-year contract, Bailey is starting an intriguing project in the Far East.

“It’s an interesting dynamic,” he admits. “I’m the full-time head coach and we have amateur, semi-pro and full-time players all playing together. Our aim is to build a core 30-man playing squad that will consistently feature in finals rugby in Hong Kong, and to develop local players and selected imports who have not been capped by other nations and funnel them into semi-pro and full-time contracts in HK or overseas. It’s a natural progression to take your own team and you never know what will happen next.”

With his wife Nicole, whose background is in the New York fashion industry, already securing a job in event production, the Baileys are settling in to the hustle and bustle of one of the Orient’s most thrilling cities, living amid the breathtaking skyscrapers of Mid-Levels. Wigan must seem a long way away. “This is another stop on the world tour.”