Mack Hansen 'cherishes' reconnecting with Irish roots

Injured Ireland winger Mack Hansen has been using his time off to reconnect with his Irish roots.

The Canberra-born Ireland international moved from Australia to join the westerners in 2021 and was a regular under Andy Farrell until a dislocated shoulder last January ruled him out of the current Guinness Six Nations.

The ex-Brumbies man qualifies for Ireland via his Cork mother, Diana O'Shea, who hails from Castlemartyr.

After getting through 30 Connacht games and 21 Irish caps largely unscathed, Hansen has had to deal with a foot injury and then a shoulder injury, which he told RTÉ Sport yesterday was "the worst injury I've had."

The 25-year-old hopes to return to action in May in time for the URC knock-out stages, while Ireland will tour South Africa in July.

Speaking as a Wings for Life ambassador yesterday, Hansen (above) revealed he has been catching up with his Irish family in the south.

"I've been down, saw the old family home and caught up with a lot of cousins, made a trip around Cork and all that," he said.

"No, it was great fun. It was really cool to see where my mum grew up.

"It's now a Chinese takeaway or something like that, which was funny enough.

"It's called like Mr Tasty [Bite] or something. It was cool to see where she grew up, where my nana grew up and stuff like that.

"It made me feel a lot closer to that side of the family, catching up with all of those cousins that I hadn't seen before.

"It was a really cool experience, something that I cherish.

"I made a choice to come over here and I still had an opportunity to head back to Oz at some point before I put [the jersey] on so no matter what I was always going to give the jersey 100% and knew how much of a privilege it was."

After getting his Ireland call-up in