From Gauteng to Galway - Shayne Bolton thriving at Connacht after wing 'experiment'

If you were new to rugby and encountered Shayne Bolton, you'd be surprised to learn the 24-year-old was South African.

A Pretoria native, his strong Irish accent is striking and also quite charming. At times, he sounds more like an Irishman who's lived in South Africa for three years, rather than the other way around.

When he arrived in Ireland in 2021, he was a complete unknown. After two years with the Cheetahs academy, Bolton couldn’t get an extension with the Bloemfontein franchise, but continued to play for the University of Free State in the Varsity Cup where he caught the eye of Connacht and their former head coach Andy Friend.

Looking back on his signing, current head coach Pete Wilkins admits the province were taking a bit of a punt.

"We plucked him out of a backwater in South Africa and saw him as a project," Wilkins said of Bolton this week.

Even if his Irish accent contradicts it, Bolton admits it was tough to settle in Galway initially when he arrived in the summer of 2021, having just turned 21-years-old.

"I was so nervous. It was my first time travelling alone too," he says.

"It was in Covid time, the plane was empty. I had my own row, it was all open. It was crazy, masks on and couldn't really speak to anybody. The airports were so quiet, I didn't know where to go or what to do.

"I was so nervous travelling on my own and then I had to quarantine for 14 days in a hotel in Dublin because I was coming from a red-listed country.

"I was in the hotel for two weeks on my own. At least I had a bit of gym equipment that Connacht sent up. That was really tough at the start, I was just on FaceTime all the time talking to family and friends back home.

"But I made it through that and I was excited to get stuck in and start