{"id":196886,"date":"2025-10-13T10:45:10","date_gmt":"2025-10-13T10:45:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/196886\/"},"modified":"2025-10-13T10:45:10","modified_gmt":"2025-10-13T10:45:10","slug":"stuart-hogg-on-retirement-mistake-and-montpellier-reset","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/196886\/","title":{"rendered":"Stuart Hogg on retirement mistake and Montpellier reset"},"content":{"rendered":"

Former Scotland captain Stuart Hogg has said he ended his playing career in order to save his marriage but the decision was the “biggest mistake” of his life.<\/p>\n

The 33-year-old, who pleaded guilty to a single charge of domestic abuse<\/a> of his ex-wife Gillian last November, retired at the age of 31 in 2023.<\/p>\n

The three-time British and Irish Lions tourist made the announcement two months before the start of the Rugby World Cup, citing wear and tear on his body.<\/p>\n

He reversed that decision last summer and was granted bail to allow him to travel to France to play for Montpellier after he had breached a court order to avoid contact with his ex-wife.<\/p>\n

Hogg, who won 100 caps for Scotland and is one of the greatest players the country has produced, said he was “up to his eyeballs in anti-depressants” prior to his retirement at the end of a four-year spell at Exeter Chiefs.<\/p>\n

“I gave up on my rugby career to try to save my marriage. At the time, I didn’t know who I was,” the former Glasgow Warriors full-back told The Rugby Paper., external<\/a><\/p>\n

“I didn’t know what was going on in life, whether I was making people happy or sad. I used alcohol to escape. I was purely existing.<\/p>\n

“I’m in a better place mentally than I’ve been in years. I used to think being selfish was strength.<\/p>\n

“But I took that too far. I hurt people. Now, I’m learning to be selfless for the right reasons – for my kids, my partner, my team. I know I’ll never be the same Stuart Hogg I once was, but I’m OK with it. I’ve found peace.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Former Scotland captain Stuart Hogg has said he ended his playing career in order to save his marriage…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":196887,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[49,50,51,47,52,48],"class_list":{"0":"post-196886","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-headlines","8":"tag-headlines","9":"tag-news","10":"tag-top-news","11":"tag-top-stories","12":"tag-topnews","13":"tag-topstories"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/196886","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=196886"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/196886\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/196887"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=196886"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=196886"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=196886"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}