Monaghan’s Rory Beggan says he is prepared to go “full throttle” in his pursuit of an NFL contract, insisting that it is “not a tick-box exercise”.

Beggan, Down goalkeeper Charlie Smyth, Wicklow’s Mark Jackson and ex-Connacht rugby player Darragh Leader, will compete at the NFL Combine in March.

Beggan, 31, admits leaving Gaelic football has been “hard to wrestle with” as he embarks on a new chapter.

“It’s an unbelievable opportunity,” Beggan told BBC Sport NI.

“[It’s] something that hasn’t come around too often in Irish quarters.

“You’re looking at Dan Whelan at the minute, who is nailing it with Green Bay [Packers] and that’s something that we want to do.

“We’re not going over here to just tick a box, to say we have been at the NFL Combine, that’s not what we are trying to do. We’re going over here to try and get a contract and try to become one of the best 32 kickers in the world.

“It’s not a tick-box exercise or a bucket list, we are going over here to succeed.”

Beggan has been training three times a week for the past six months under Tadhg Leader (Darragh’s brother), the Irish-born former rugby union player who heads a project dedicated to introducing Irish sportspeople to American football.

Along with Smyth, Jackson and Leader, he will travel to Florida for a training camp before being put through their paces in front of NFL scouts at the combine at Lucas Oil Stadium Indianapolis on 3 March.

Confirmation of Beggan, Smyth, Jackson and Leader’s inclusion in the NFL’s International Player Pathway (IPP) follows the shock news earlier this week that Wales rugby star Louis Rees-Zammit is also chasing an NFL contract.