Ross Doneghan (born 8 October 1988) is a Scottish rugby union coach now with Harlequins and

Ealing Trailfinders Ealing Trailfinders Rugby Club is an English professional rugby union club based in West London. The club's first team are the current champions of the RFU Championship but will remain in that league due to ineligibility for promotion to Premi ...

. He previously played for

Glasgow Warriors Glasgow Warriors are a professional rugby union side from Scotland. The team plays in the United Rugby Championship league and in the European Professional Club Rugby tournaments. In the 2014–15 season they won the Pro12 title and became t ...

, London Scottish,

Ayr Ayr (; sco, Ayr; gd, Inbhir Àir, "Mouth of the River Ayr") is a town situated on the southwest coast of Scotland. It is the administrative centre of the South Ayrshire Subdivisions of Scotland, council area and the historic Shires of Scotlan ...

, Stewart's Melville and

Border Bulldogs The Border Bulldogs is a South African professional rugby union team that participates in the annual Currie Cup and Vodacom Cup competitions. They are governed by the Border Rugby Union (BRU) and are based in East London. History The Border Ru ...

Rugby Union career

Amateur career

Doneghan started playing mini rugby in Linlithgow with the wee reds. He continued his rugby at

Stewart's Melville College Stewart's Melville College (SMC) is an independent day and boarding school in Edinburgh, Scotland. Classes are all boys in the 1st to 5th years and co-educational in Sixth (final) year. It has a roll of about 750 pupils. The school is twinned w ...

. He was part of the Stewart's Melville team that won the Bell Lawrie Scottish Schools Cup of 2006. From Stewart's Melville he moved to the Rugby Legends Academy in South Africa, run by former

Scotland Scotland (, ) is a Countries of the United Kingdom, country that is part of the United Kingdom. Covering the northern third of the island of Great Britain, mainland Scotland has a Anglo-Scottish border, border with England to the southeast ...

and

South Africa South Africa, officially the Republic of South Africa (RSA), is the Southern Africa, southernmost country in Africa. It is bounded to the south by of coastline that stretch along the Atlantic Ocean, South Atlantic and Indian Oceans; to the ...

international player John Allan. While with Glasgow Warriors, he played with

from 2011. During this time at

he converted from a Flanker to a Hooker. He played for Darlington Mowden Park from 2013–14, who at the time played in

National League 2 North National League 2 North is one of three, level four leagues in the English rugby union system and provides semi-professional competition for teams in the northern half of England, the North. The remainder of England is covered by the two counte ...

. That season the Darlington side won promotion to

National League 1 National One (last season known as National League 1 and previously known before September 2009 as National Division Two), is the third of three national leagues in the domestic rugby union competition of England. It was known as Courage Leagu ...

for the 2014-15 season.https://uk.linkedin.com/in/ross-doneghan-455305101 Doneghan played at Hooker for the Darlington side.

Professional career

In South Africa, Doneghan played for the

in season 2009-10. He switched between

Lock Lock(s) may refer to: Common meanings *Lock and key, a mechanical device used to secure items of importance *Lock (water navigation), a device for boats to transit between different levels of water, as in a canal Arts and entertainment * ''Lock ...

and Flanker for the South African side. He moved to England to play with the

Rotherham Titans Rotherham Rugby Union Football Club, or Rotherham Titans is a professional rugby union team from Rotherham, South Yorkshire, currently playing in the fourth tier of the English rugby union league system, following their relegation from the Nat ...

in the RFU Championship in the 2010-11 season. He became part of

set-up as a back-up player in the 2011-12 season. He played one match for the Warriors in that season; turning out for the Glasgow club in a pre-season friendly against

Newcastle Falcons Newcastle Falcons is a rugby union team that play in Premiership Rugby, England's highest division of rugby union. The club was established in 1877 as the Gosforth Football Club. Around 1882 the club merged with the Northumberland Football Cl ...

. The Warriors won the match 17 - 7. After a successful season with Darlington, Doneghan was signed by London Scottish for 2014-15. His brother Mike Doneghan was playing with Scottish at the time.

Coaching career

During his time with London Scottish Doneghan migrated to a coaching role. He remained a coach there until 2017. Doneghan also began coaching with Serge Betsen Rugby for the 2015-16 season. He became a Community rugby coach for Harlequins in 2015, and was their Schools co-ordinator from 2017 to 2018. From 2018 to 2019, he was Head of Community coaching for

. Since 2019, he has been Head of Rugby at

Latymer Upper School (Slowly Therefore Surely) , established = , closed = , sister_school = Godolphin and Latymer School , type = Public schoolIndependent day school , head_label = H ...

. He was also the Head coach at Haringey Rhino Ladies, where they finished the 2019/2020 season undefeated and top of the league, moving up for the coming season. Ross coined the phrase on the team #teamtobeat. He joined Richmond FC in 2021 as the women’s forwards coach.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Doneghan, Ross 1988 births Living people Ayr RFC players Border Bulldogs players Darlington RFC players Glasgow Warriors players London Scottish F.C. players Rotherham Titans players Rugby union players from Linlithgow Scottish rugby union coaches Scottish rugby union players Stewart's Melville RFC players Rugby union flankers Rugby union hookers