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51.4559°N, 0.3415°W
Saturday, 26 September 2015. England v Wales, World Cup Pool A match
Three minutes left. Mike Brown takes it up into contact. I’m on him like a flash. This is mine, sunshine. This is my turnover.
Jérôme Garcès blows. ‘Red 7, not releasing.’
I can’t believe my ears. That was a legitimate jackal all day long.
Don’t argue. The referee’s word is law.
George Ford sets his body away from the posts. They’re not going for three points and the draw; they’re going for the corner and the try, and that is an insult to every single player in a red jersey on this pitch. We don’t think a draw’s good enough, that’s what England are saying. We don’t think you’ve got it in you to hold us out.
Right. Bring it on. Bring it on.
Ford drills it into touch on our five-metre line. We set ourselves for the lineout while the England forwards take their time, walking slowly upfield, knowing this is their big chance, and wanting, needing, to get it right.
I march up and down our line like a sergeant major at Rorke’s Drift. ‘No way they get this! Stand your ground. Stand your ground! No f***** comes through here.’
Saturday, 28 September. Tottenham v Chelsea, White Hart Lane. We’re invited to watch the match from one of the hospitality boxes. A club official asks me if I’ll come down at half-time to be introduced to the crowd. No way, I say. He says they’d really like to, and after the Lions victory in Australia I’m sure to get a good reception. I’m not so sure – the vast majority of Spurs supporters surely couldn’t give a toss about rugby – but eventually I agree.
They take me down to the pitch side just before the break, so I get to see the players coming in at half-time: chatting, laughing, having a go at each other, just like I’m used to. Then I’m brought out onto the pitch and they announce my name. I’ve got my tail between my legs, convinced that no one’s going to know who the hell I am and I’m going to be greeted with an embarrassing silence.
There’s a huge cheer, followed by a prolonged round of applause. I can’t believe it. This is the club I’ve supported for the best part of 20 years, and here they are welcoming me as though I was playing for them. It’s one of the highlights of my career, it really is.
They interview me on the pitch.
‘Tell us about your dogs, Sam.’
‘I’m such a fan that all my dogs have been named after Spurs players. I’ve had Glenn after Glenn Hoddle, Ted and Gus after Teddy Sheringham and Gus Poyet, Dawson after Michael Dawson, Alfie after Alfie Conn, the first player my dad ever saw score, and now we’ve got Ledley.’ Ledley King retired last year, plagued by a knee injury so bad that he couldn’t even train; he’d just turn up every Saturday and still play everyone else off the park.
‘Doesn’t your fiancée get a say in all this?’
‘Ha! I can’t tell you the number of names she came up with this time. But I just said it has to be Ledley. He’s my all-time hero.’
‘Why do you like him so much?’
‘He was just so classy, on the ball and off it. I can’t remember him making a mistake. He never put a foot wrong. He played in my old position, central defence, and like me he had more than his share of injuries. And I love the fact he was a one-club man. I’ve only ever played my professional club rugby for Cardiff Blues, and I hope I only ever will. I’m very proud to be Cardiff.’
‘That’s great, Sam. Thank you very much.’
I turn to go back up to the box – and standing there in front of me, holding a Tottenham shirt with WARBURTON 7 on the back, is Ledley King himself.
I’m dumbstruck and starstruck. I’m so nervous that my leg’s shaking. I know, I know. I’m a grown man. I’m Lions captain. But I have my heroes just like everyone else, and Ledley King is mine. I want to ask if we can have a photo together, but I can’t get the words out. Luckily Ledley realises that’s what I want, and so we pose together for a snap.
I go back up to the box grinning like a loon. Dad’s filmed it all on his phone. I ask to see the footage. While all the Spurs fans are applauding, I see the Chelsea fans are giving me the wanker sign. Some things never change.
I told the Spurs interviewer that I wanted to be a one-club man until the end of my career, and I mean it, but increasingly it seems as though things on that front might be out of my control.
It’s no secret that the WRU has been at loggerheads with the four regional teams (the Blues, the Dragons, the Scarlets and the Ospreys) for some time now. I try to keep out of the politics as much as possible – there’s little I can do to influence things even if I wanted to, and I know it would be a huge distraction to my training and game preparation if I did get involved – but it’s hard to avoid all of it when you know it may have direct implications for your career.
To cut a (very) long story short, players’ contracts are with their regions, not the WRU. When those contracts are up, the best players find themselves offered more money – sometimes much more – by clubs in England and France. Careers are short, and players have every right to maximise their earning potential. But the trickle overseas has now become a flood. George has gone to Northampton; Phillsy, Jamie and Lyds to Racing Métro; Hooky to Perpignan; and Foxy to Clermont Auvergne.
The WRU is proposing to stop this by centrally contracting the elite players themselves and loaning them back to the regions at no cost. Sounds like a great deal for the regions, right? Not as far as they’re concerned. They fear that if the WRU control elite players’ contracts they’ll also control where and when those players can play, with the needs of the national team always taking precedence over those of the regions. No region wants to pick an international player for an important Heineken Cup match, say, only to be told they can’t have him.
From a player’s point of view, this is manna from heaven. At the moment we’re pieces of meat, more or less. Sure, club coaches care about player welfare, but they care more about winning games. In a 50–50 call, you’re always going to be under pressure to play. And players do themselves no favours by acting all alpha and playing through injury when they shouldn’t. Central contracts would take care of all this. Central contracts would mean proper rest.
The WRU will want a player for maybe a dozen matches a season, with more in World Cup years. A club will want that same player for two or three times that many games. ‘Rest’ means different things to club than it does to country. Add to this a lack of trust and a whole host of tensions between the various sides – Blues chairman Peter Thomas saying the WRU ‘couldn’t run a corner shop’, the regions saying they don’t get enough funding from the WRU and looking at signing some kind of deal with England’s Aviva Premiership – and you can see why Welsh rugby’s garden is a lot more thorns than roses.
I want to continue to play for the Blues if at all possible. I’m Wales captain, a role I take very seriously, and I think it’s really important that a country’s captain should play his rugby in that country. But like everyone else I’ve got my own career to consider, and there’s at least one French club that’s coming in hard for me. The richest of them all, with the largest collection of famous players on its books, the Real Madrid of rugby: Toulon.
Even the mention of Toulon makes people think it’s about the money. It’s not. It never has been for me, in any walk of life. If I’d been that motivated by money I’d have gone to an English club and earned three times as much as I do for the Blues. I’m not that materialistic – my idea of extravagance is putting an extra bedroom into our semi-detached house – and I know I’ll be able to earn money after my playing career’s over.
But it is about success, as it should be for any rugby player who takes the game seriously. Toulon are Heineken Cup champions. The nearest I’ve got to club success with Cardiff has been as a sub in the 2010 Amlin Challenge Cup victory, when we overcame massive odds to beat – ironically – Toulon in the final. The prospect of winning serious silverware, and continuing to improve my game by playing week in, week out with Toulon’s squad, is pretty enticing.
I go over to Toulon with Derwyn to have a look. Jonny Wilkinson comes to have a chat. He’s loving it here, and it shows: he looks tanned, happy and relaxed, much more so than he usually did in an England shirt. The weather’s great, the old town is charming, and everyone is beautifully dressed and rocking the Vincent Clerc-style sexy French accents.
What’s not to love?
Well, two things. One, I’d be expected to play for Toulon like I do for Wales, and probably about 30 times a season to boot. I don’t know if my body’s up to it. The Blues are used to the way I play for them, and they’re very understanding and accepting of it, but I don’t know whether Toulon would be so forgiving, especially with the money they’d be forking out.
Second, I’m a homeboy. The Mediterranean lifestyle looks idyllic, but at home in Rhiwbina I have everything I need: my entire family living within half a mile of each other, the woods where I can walk the dog and look out over Cardiff Bay, the Juboraj for a Friday-night curry. I’d miss all that. I’d really miss it.
I don’t say no to Toulon. I’d still prefer to stay in Wales. But if the WRU and the regions can’t sort themselves out, and I feel that staying put will be detrimental to my career, I’ll be off.
Saturday, 30 November. Once again we play Australia. Once again it’s a great match, full of tension and incidents. Once again it’s close: we’re within four points of them for the last 12 minutes.
And once again we lose.
I suffer another shoulder stinger. I’m out until the start of the Six Nations, two months away. Injury #12.
The Lions Raw DVD comes out: the official documentary of the Lions’ Australia tour, with lots of behind-the-scenes footage.
Rach’s parents, who from next summer will be my in-laws, are shocked to see me ranting and raving before the first Test, shouting at the boys in the changing-room. ‘If they’re into you, you f***ing pile ’em. Every single f***ing bastard collision. Get up off the floor, work f***ing hard for your team-mates.’
‘That’s not what Sam’s like,’ Rach’s mum says.
Ben laughs. ‘That’s exactly what Sam’s like.’
Friday, 24 January 2014. Toulon have asked me to make a decision by 10 pm. Derwyn’s passed that deadline on to the WRU, who are still trying to work out the mechanics of central contracts, and told them that if we don’t have an offer from them by that time then I’m signing for Toulon.
I want to stay in Wales. I want to sign a central contract – it would be the first central contract ever awarded in Wales, and I guess it would be fitting for the national captain to sign it – and I don’t want the WRU to suffer the negative publicity that my departure would bring them.
But if they can’t offer me anything, I can’t hang around waiting forever.
Derwyn and I are at a dinner. Lots of small talk and pressing the flesh, but all the time we’re waiting for our phones to vibrate in our pockets with an email from the WRU’s chief executive Roger Lewis.
Eight o’clock comes and goes.
Eight-thirty.
Nine.
Now and then I catch Derwyn’s eye and raise my eyebrows: You got anything? And each time he shakes his head.
At nine-thirty our phones buzz and we grab them simultaneously.
Dear Sam. We are delighted to be able to offer you a central contract with the WRU …
Derwyn and I high-five each other. It would have been easy for him, since he takes a percentage of my deals, to have pushed me towards Toulon and just gone for the big bucks. But he didn’t, and he never has. I remember the first time we met, back when I was in the Blues academy, and we talked about managing my career long-term, not just chasing the newest and shiniest thing on offer.
He’s been as good as his word, every step of the way. He laid out the advantages and disadvantages of going to Toulon, set up the trip there and the meetings so I could see the place for myself, but he’s always made it very clear that the final decision must be mine and mine alone. He’s been there for all the shit times as well as all the good ones. I’m very lucky to have him, not just as an agent but as a mate too.
And if I told him that, he’d roll his eyes, tut, and go, ‘Don’t be a soft cock.’
Saturday, 25 January. I sign the contract with Roger in front of reporters and photographers. The final details of the WRU’s agreement with the Blues haven’t quite been hammered out – the intention is that the WRU and the Blues split my wage bill 60/40 – but Roger assures us that it’ll all go through fine.
I take Ledley for a walk, and I can hardly go ten yards without someone congratulating me or beeping their car horn as they drive past. My Twitter feed is full of positive comments too, though perhaps inevitably there are a couple of people saying that Ospreys players would never have done this, calling me a traitor to the Blues, that kind of thing. It doesn’t bother me. Anyone who knows me knows how much I love the Blues.
Financially, my decision has cost me, as I would have earned double if I’d left for Toulon.
Of course, I’d have earned international appearance fees and sponsorship endorsements either way, so overall I’d have been well remunerated whether I’d gone to France or stayed in Wales, but if it was purely about the cash I’d have been off to Toulon. I’ve never made a single decision based on money, and I’m not going to start now.
Saturday, 1 February. A little short of match fitness after my injury, I’m on the bench against Italy at the Millennium. With 16 minutes to go, I come on for Lyds.
‘On for Wales, number 20, Sam Warburton,’ says the announcer.
The crowd roar louder than I’ve ever heard them before. If I doubted for one minute that I did the right thing in turning down Toulon, here’s the proof. They so appreciate that I’ve chosen to stay in Wales, and this is their way of showing that.
I have tears in my eyes as I run across the pitch to the lineout.
Saturday, 15 March. Last minute of the match against Scotland. We’ve absolutely annihilated them – 51–3, seven tries – but I’m so determined to keep going right until the end, Terminator-style, that I hit a ruck with only a few seconds left as hard as I’d hit one with only a few seconds gone.
Too hard, as it turns out. There’s a sudden spike of agony in my shoulder, and the physios come racing on. I’ve dislocated my shoulder and torn my labrum.
Injury #13. Three months out, which means no summer tour of South Africa. The damage is so bad that I won’t be able to lift jumpers in the lineout for another two years.
It’s funny how my attitude to injuries has changed. At the start of my career they seemed like the end of the world, as though even the slightest knock would undo all the years of training and playing. Now, a dozen injuries in, I’m much more sanguine about it all.
For a start, injury means rest, not just physically but mentally too. The mental side of building yourself towards a peak every Saturday, coming crashing down after a match and then gradually building again during the week is much harder than people think.
There’s always something you can do while you’re injured. You can get yourself fit in other ways, boosting parts of the body that aren’t affected by your injury. This bit has never been hard for me; I love training so much that I used to do my own pre-preseason, if that makes sense.
But no matter who you are, rehab is hard. You’re out of the team environment, and you feel that absence acutely. It’s not just that you’re not there; it’s that someone else is there in your place, wearing your shirt, making your tackles, hitting your rucks, winning your turnovers, and the longer you’re out the more chance they have of staking a permanent claim to your spot.
Then again, you know that it happens to everyone sooner or later, and more than once. What you’re going through now, someone else will be going through themselves soon enough. I remember seeing an interview with Drico back when I was 15 or so in which he said he’d never played 100 per cent fit. Bollocks, I thought at the time. That must be bollocks. He’s just saying that to make himself look hard.
Now I realise how true it is. The 2011 Six Nations was the nearest I’ve got to taking the field without any problems whatsoever. Other than that, there’s always something. I try not to take painkillers in training – pain is the body’s way of telling you something’s wrong, and when your body is your career then you need to listen – but sometimes in matches you have no choice if you want to get through them.
And here’s what you don’t see when you see me running around the pitch smashing into rucks like a mad thing. You don’t see me having to crawl up the stairs on all fours after a game, as I simply can’t walk up them. You don’t see the way I walk across the landing to the bathroom when I’ve just woken up, all stiff and gingerly as though I’m treading barefoot on broken glass. You don’t see the headaches that can last for days. And you don’t see that I have to sleep on my back every night; I can’t sleep on my shoulders because they’re too sore.
I could sleep on my front, I guess, but my nose gets in the way.
Sunday, 22 June. I’m at home, but over in Singapore some of the Blues boys are playing in the first ever World Cup Tens tournament. Owen Williams is one of them. He’s a young lad, 22 years of age, but he’s already played for Wales four times at outside centre, and he’s an absolute specimen: George North apart, probably the single best athlete I’ve ever played with.
The Blues are playing the Asia-Pacific Dragons for third place, a nothing match, and Owen’s hit in a nothing tackle. But he falls awkwardly, and when he hits the ground it’s as though he’s a hand puppet with the strings let go. His limbs just drop.
It’s not a bad injury. It’s a catastrophic one. He’s damaged his cervical vertebrae and spinal cord. He’s left paraplegic, with no feeling in his legs and torso and only a fraction of what he once had in his arms. It’s a week before he can even be flown home, where he’ll spend the best part of a year in hospital.
For everyone at the Blues, it’s the most horrendous thing. We all know that there but for the grace of God go any of us; a freak accident, a one-in-a-billion chance, an apparently innocuous moment that changes everything forever. You can take all the safety precautions you like, and one random act of chance makes them irrelevant.
I’m not especially close to Owen, but what’s happened to him really affects me. It’s there in the back of my mind the whole time. Practising on the scrum machine, doing tackling drills; like all the boys I leap up from those twice as fast as I did before, just in case.
At three in the morning, when the darkness is there in every way, done for life, thinking, this is forever … I can’t even bring myself to go there. The poor, poor lad.
Saturday, 5 July. Rach and I get married – a church service in Newport followed by a reception at the Celtic Manor resort, which hosted the Ryder Cup four years ago.
Rach looks absolutely beautiful. It’s a cliché, but like all clichés it’s one because it’s true: it’s the happiest day of my life. All the people I love are here, and everyone’s laughing and drinking and having a great time. We keep the day pretty much totally private – I tweet a handful of pictures, no more – and a couple of papers run some wedding photos of other Welsh rugby players by way of comparison.
I definitely couldn’t pull off the white suit look the way Andy Powell does, and Gareth Edwards has sideburns I can only dream of. Best of all, though, was Rupert Moon, whose wedding was attended by Lance Corporal William Windsor, the official goat of the Royal Welsh!
Saturday, 22 November. Owen comes to watch us play the All Blacks at the Millennium. The crowd stand and applaud him as one. His resilience and determination are an inspiration to everyone, players and fans alike.
George North is feeling down after the match, and it’s not just because we’ve lost again.
‘I’ve had another concussion,’ he says to Lyds and me. ‘I got hit in the head, and for half a second I didn’t know where I was or which way I was supposed to be playing.’
Lyds and I look at each other and burst out laughing.
‘Mate,’ Lyds says, ‘that happens to us literally every game.’
It does, too. I’ve lost count of the number of times I’ve taken a knock to the head, got up and not been sure which way I’m playing. Normally I just look to see what the guys wearing the same coloured jerseys as me are doing, and work it out from there. If there’s a lineout straight after the knock, I’ll tell the caller not to send any to the back as I can’t remember the call signs for a minute or two. If play’s still going through the phases, I just hit the next ruck or take up my position in the defensive line, as those are by now more muscle memory and instinct than actual mental recall.
Never go off unless you’re injured.
And a blow to the head, unless you’re actually unconscious, doesn’t count.
In years to come, I’ll look back and think how frightening it was that we knew so little. We appreciate how serious things like spinal injuries are, of course, but not head knocks. That’s one of the biggest differences I’ve seen from the start of my career to the end of it, the way in which head injuries are dealt with. The Mail on Sunday has started running a campaign to highlight the dangers of concussion, and slowly the message is filtering through to the game and the players.
Saturday, 29 November. Three minutes left. We’re leading South Africa 12–6. They’ve got a scrum on our five-metre line.
We set ourselves. We have to hold out. These are the times when we’ve lost so often to the southern hemisphere sides: right at the end, in the clutch, when we’ve done all the hard work but don’t quite have the nous, the bottle, the bloody-mindedness, call it what you like, to finish the job off.
We get the wheel on, disrupt them. Toby comes away with the ball. We clear our lines. All that matters now is that we play the rest of the game in their half. They can have the ball all they like, as long as we have the territory.
Willie le Roux has it. He’s one of the most dangerous broken-field runners in world rugby. Their half or ours, he can conjure something from nothing.
He knocks on.
One minute left. We have possession. We spill it. Not again. Please, not again. Wales have lost their last 16 games to South Africa. Wales haven’t beaten South Africa this century, this millennium even. Wales have suffered 22 successive defeats against New Zealand, South Africa and Australia.
The Boks run it from deep. We’re frantically covering. They work it down the left-hand side. Fast passes. Flat passes. Too flat, that last one, surely?
One whistle for the forward pass, and then two for full-time. We’ve won. It takes a moment to sink in. We’ve actually bloody won.
It’s been intense and ferocious, but it hasn’t been a great game: six penalties, no tries. I don’t care. It’s my first victory against one of the big three in 16 attempts, and that alone makes it one of the best days of my career, even though I’ve suffered another shoulder stinger. Injury #14.
Saturday, 10 January 2015. Cardiff Blues v Leinster, Pro 12. Eleven minutes gone. Leinster take it off the top of a lineout and send Ben Te’o hammering up the middle. He’s wearing a cast on his forearm, and as I go to tackle him he leads with that arm and clobbers me in the face. I’m knocked backwards, and as I get up I see that Josh Navidi’s made the tackle from behind, so I go in to jackal.
I can’t see a thing.
There’s blood running down inside my eye socket. I can’t even blink, as my eyelid’s split. The ref looks at me and his face goes white. Jeez, it must look bad. And that makes me panic a bit. If there are two things I’m scared of, it’s injuries to my teeth and my eyes. The rest of it I take as an occupational hazard, but those two really freak me out.
The medics take me off. One of them washes my eye in sterile solution and then stitches the cut. Because I can’t close my eye, I’ve no choice but to watch the needle all the way.
‘Don’t worry,’ he says, as though reading my mind. ‘I do this for a living.’
I do what I do for a living too, I think, but there have to be easier ways than this.
I ask for a tissue. The moment I blow my nose, there’s another sharp fork of pain and my eye swells up like a balloon.
‘Ah,’ says the medic. ‘That’s red flag for a fracture.’
Injury #15.
I make a mental note. Ben Te’o: I won’t forget this.
Saturday, 21 March. Last day of the Six Nations, and three teams are still in the mix for the championship: England, Ireland and us. We each have three wins out of four.
The matches are staggered, which makes sense from the TV point of view but is also unfair: the team that goes last will know exactly what it has to do to win the championship. Unfortunately, we’re first up at lunchtime in Rome. We stick a hatful of points on Italy, beating them 60–21.
Ireland are next, knowing they have to beat Scotland by 20 points at Murrayfield to overhaul us on points difference. At half-time they’re right on track, leading 20–10, but any hope we have that Scotland might be able to keep the gap down vanishes ten minutes later when Johnny Sexton converts a Jared Payne try to put Ireland 30–10 up. They end up winning 40–10, and that’s our chance gone.
England now need to beat France by 26 points to finish ahead of Ireland, and they so nearly do it in an insane match at Twickenham. It ends 55–35, with England scoring seven tries and France five, and at times it’s almost like watching a sevens match.
For the fans, it’s been brilliant – the most exciting last day in Six Nations history for many a year. But I can’t help feeling that the schedule robbed us of our chance. By winning so big so early, we forced Ireland and England to go out and play. If we’d played last, or even if we’d all played simultaneously, they’d have been much more conservative: we were only a point up on Italy at half-time. I know there’s no way round this, and the best way to avoid being in situations like this is simply to win all your matches and not need to worry about results elsewhere.
In any case, we’ve got bigger fish to fry.
The World Cup’s just around the corner, and I honestly feel we can do even better than we did last time round. We’re more experienced, we’re more battle-hardened, we’ve got a great nucleus of boys who’ve played together for the past few years and know each other’s games inside out.
The Group of Death looks even harder now than it did back when the draw was made in 2012. Australia, England and us are now ranked second, third and fourth in the world now. Three potential semi-finalists in one group, with only two to go through. And my determination is the same now as it was the day the draw was made: we’re going to be one of those two, whatever it takes.
Whatever it takes, part one. Wales training camp at altitude in the Swiss resort of Fiesch. Fast feet on a box while holding a water bag whose constantly shifting weight keeps unbalancing me and making me use my core. I go over on my ankle. The press are there, filming and interviewing us. I can’t let them know that I’m hurt.
The next drill is a 30-metre run. I whisper to the physios that I’ll do this, and then can they give me some different exercises from the others so as not to alert the reporters? The run’s agony, but I just about make it through, and then the physios tell me to lie on my back and do some leg exercises that don’t involve any weight bearing.
When the press have gone, the physios take a proper look. My ankle’s black and blue. Grade 2+ ligament tear. Injury #16.
And that’s not even the worst thing about the camp. We sleep much higher than we train, and we have to take a cable car between the two. It runs high above the treeline of dark green conifers, and since I’m terrified of heights I spend most of each trip sprawled out on the floor like a tarantula.
The boys are sympathetic, of course. In roughly the same way that Hannibal Lecter’s sympathetic.
Whatever it takes, part two. Wales training camp, Doha, high summer. ‘Hot’ doesn’t even begin to describe it. It’s murderous, a living thing, the kind of heat that reaches out and smacks you in the face the second you go outside. It’s mid-forties and 95 per cent humidity to boot: one giant steam room, all day long.
You know you’re in for a tough training session when you see an ambulance and paramedics waiting by the side of the pitch before you even begin.
The coaches flog us mercilessly. Training in these conditions will help us produce more red blood cells, which will in turn increase our oxygen-carrying capacity and allow us to keep going for longer in matches, but just as importantly they want to see whether we have the mental toughness to cope with such conditions.
Everyone suffers. Tomas Francis needs to be given oxygen and covered with soaking wet towels to bring his temperature down. The session ends with a drill where we have to run to halfway and back in 20 seconds, followed by 20 seconds rest, repeated five times.
Jamie can’t do it. They bring his cones back by five metres, then five metres more, and so on until he’s jogging 10 metres back and forth at a snail’s pace. But he never stops. He never gives up. That’s what they’re looking for. Just as in Spala four years ago, these are the experiences that we’ll draw on in the measureless depths of a hard match. I’ve never seen anyone with an oxygen mask on at half-time in the Millennium, put it that way.
Play hard. Train harder.
Whatever it takes, part three. Full-contact training back at the Arms Park. Jake Ball comes flying into a ruck and smacks me. He’s one of our very best cleanout players, and he gets me right on the shoulder where I’ve been done so often before. That evening, sharing with Lyds, I can’t lift my arm up to put a T-shirt on.
I go down to see the physios. They’re in with the coaches, and I don’t want the coaches to know just yet. I ask Prav if I can have a word. He gives me a quick assessment. Another month out, he says. Injury #17.
Morale is high as the tournament gets nearer. Andre, our chef, sets up bushtucker trials, offering a choice of delicacies like pig’s nose or a pint of mashed-up ear against the forfeit of more training. I’m a Welsh Rugby Player, Get Me Out of Here!
Our conditioning coach Paul Stridgeon – everyone calls him Bobby after Adam Sandler’s character in The Waterboy – awards the Bobby Cup every week to someone who’s done something good, on or off the pitch. Thierry Henry’s training at the Vale with the Welsh football team, so Bobby asks him if he’ll do a short video announcing the winner of this week’s Bobby Cup.
Thierry’s clearly a good lad, despite being a Gunner, as he says sure, he’d be delighted. We’re all in a team meeting when he comes on the screen. ‘Allo, boys,’ he says, sounding even more French than Vincent Clerc. ‘Ze winner of ze Bobby Cup ees …’ big 10-second pause … ‘Nicky Smith!’ Then he looks straight into the camera, winks and goes ‘va-va-voom.’
Nicky’s the source of general amusement anyway. Jamie clocked that Nicky’s terrible at spelling, so at each team meeting he gets Nicky to stand up while Jamie reads out a word for him to spell. The word appears on the screen behind Nicky, so we can see it but he can’t.
‘When you finally get one right,’ we tell him, ‘you’ve got to get Jamie back.’
Eventually Nicky does get one right, to huge applause.
‘Right,’ he tells Jamie. ‘You’ve been rinsing me long enough. Your turn.’
Up comes Jamie. He turns to face us. Rhys Webb’s already primed the video boys. They put up a picture of Jamie taken from above in a match. His hair’s thinning, which is even more obvious when his head’s wet and sweaty. We all piss ourselves laughing.
‘Since you’re a doctor,’ Nicky says, ‘I’m going to give you a medical term.’
‘Bring it on,’ Jamie says.
The word comes up on the screen as Nicky reads it out. ‘Jamie, can you spell “hair transplant”?’
Everyone’s creasing themselves, Jamie included. He takes it really well, and of course spells it perfectly.
These are the things that get you through hard training camps: suffer with your team-mates on the pitch, and laugh with them off it.
Wednesday, 23 September. We arrive at Oatlands Park in Surrey, where we’ll be based until we play England on Saturday. I’m sharing with Lyds, as usual.
‘Is it me, or is this place a bit creepy?’ I say as we’re unpacking.
‘It’s not you,’ Lyds replies. ‘It’s haunted.’
Lyds is quite receptive to this kind of stuff. He’s experienced paranormal activity in the old bit of his family’s farmhouse in mid-Wales.
‘You’re winding me up,’ I say.
‘Google it and find out.’
So I do. And guess what? Turns out that Oatlands Park is one of the five most haunted hotels in the south of England. Great.
I read all the stories I can find. The really haunted room, apparently, is the one right next to ours, where one of the physios is sleeping, but there’s still a weird energy in our room that I don’t like.
Later that night, I’m dropping off to sleep when …
… bang!
I’m sitting up in a flash, shitting myself. Lyds likes to sleep with the curtains open, so there’s a bit of natural light coming in, enough for me to see him half upright with his neck fully extended, as though he’s looking at something.
I’m too scared to move a muscle or say a word.
Gradually Lyds lies back down, and so do I. I lie awake for hours, and it’s only around three in the morning that I drift into an uneasy sleep.
Bang! Bang! Bang!
I’m out of bed again like a shot. It’s 6 am. The noises are coming from the door. I go over and open it.
It’s the drugs testers.
When they’ve taken our samples, I look for my phone. It’s nowhere to be seen. I don’t even dare joke that the ghost took it.
Eventually I find it on the floor, next to the skirting board. That bang I heard last night must have been the phone falling off the table onto the floor. But the phone was in the middle of the table and it wasn’t on vibrate, so how did it fall?
Thursday, 24 September. It’s 10.30 pm. I’m drifting off to sleep again when suddenly Lyds throws his sheets off and sits bolt upright, staring in front of him. I can’t see anything.
‘Lyds?’ I say.
He doesn’t answer.
‘Lyds,’ I say again. ‘Lyds.’ Louder. ‘Lyds, you’re freaking me out.’
He’s frozen for about 20 seconds, and then he slowly turns his head and looks at me.
‘There’s a man sitting on the end of my bed looking at me.’
I still can’t see anyone or anything. There’s no one in the room apart from us.
‘Mate,’ I say, trying to keep my voice steady, ‘are you asleep? Maybe you’re sleep-talking or something.’
‘I’m wide awake.’
‘I don’t see a thing.’
‘There’s a man sitting on my bed …’
‘I saw a Derren Brown thing about this once …’
‘… wearing old-fashioned gear …’
‘… about your brain being really active before sleep, and you probably saw a picture in the hotel earlier …’
‘… and he’s looking at me.’ Pause. ‘He’s gone.’
Friday, 25 September. We go down to breakfast. The first thing we do is weigh ourselves on electronic scales while answering questions on the attached iPads.
On a scale of one to five, where one is very bad and five is very good, how did you sleep?
One.
Why did you sleep so badly? Noise? Illness? Anxiety? Other.
Other.
Please elaborate.
Lyds saw a ghost.
The responses go straight to the conditioning team. You’ve never seen them move so fast. They’re over at our table almost before we’ve sat down.
‘What the hell’s going on?’
When we turn in tonight, I take a sleeping tablet. I don’t normally, but we’re playing England tomorrow and I can’t afford a third broken night’s sleep. It’s an evening match, kick-off 8.00 pm, so even if the pill does make me a bit lethargic first thing, it’ll have cleared long before then.
Saturday, 26 September. I’ve played in a World Cup semi-final. I’ve played in Grand Slam deciders. I’ve played in Lions Tests. And none of them have been as hyped as this game has. It might ‘only’ be a pool match in the World Cup, but we all know it’s much, much more than that.
We’re each coming off the back of a win in our opening matches: England against Fiji, us against Uruguay. A lot of the press attention has been focused on England’s selection of Sam Burgess at 12 – a rugby league great, certainly, but inexperienced and relatively untried at this level in union. This is only his second cap. He’ll be facing Jamie, and some boffins have worked out that the impact of those two running into each other at full speed is the same as a 45 mph car crash.
We go into our changing-room. It’s very hot, way more than it should be. It feels like a deliberate trick, something designed to make us lethargic; not from the England camp themselves, of course, but one of the Twickenham staff taking it upon themselves to try and mess with our heads. One of our management team goes off to sort it out.
Now the lights go off. This really is taking the piss. What’s more, it’s stupid. Whatever the person doing this is hoping to achieve, they’re only going to succeed in doing the exact opposite. The more they try to put us off our stride, the more they try to unsettle and wind us up, the more focused and determined we’re going to be.
I love playing at Twickenham anyway. Outside of the Millennium, it’s my favourite stadium to play in. When I hear people talking about it not having much of an atmosphere and being full of corporate types who don’t know one end of a rugby ball from another, I honestly think they must be talking about a totally different place. Sure, I only ever come here with Wales, and there’s always an extra spice to any Wales–England match, but every crowd I’ve ever played in front of here has been exactly what a rugby crowd should be: passionate, partisan, hostile, committed.
The atmosphere isn’t quite Millennium 2013, but it’s not far off. We come out into a narrow strip of light on halfway, with the rest of the stadium lights dimmed just for the moment. There’s not an empty seat in the house.
We’re really, really up for this one. World Cup schedules can be as hectic and unforgiving as Lions tours, packing too many games into too short a timeframe, but in both cases you forget all about that for nights like this one. Nothing masks pain and fatigue like the adrenaline of a huge occasion.
First blood to us on three minutes. Courtney Lawes pulls a maul down and Dan kicks the penalty. They’re level 10 minutes later, Farrell making a difficult kick – 45 metres out and on the angle – look easy.
Dan has a kick almost as hard, and makes it look almost as easy: 6–3. England coming at us, but we’re competing well and slowing the ball down effectively. Farrell goes back into the pocket and drops for goal from 40 metres out. It’s not the sweetest kick he’s ever struck, but it goes over and we’re back level.
Not much in this. Not much at all.
Tom Wood comes short off 9. Lyds goes so low he’s practically eating grass and chops Wood, who goes flying over the top of him and spins 180 degrees in the air. The England lads are all around Lyds as he gets up, four or five of them in his face, and I barge my way in between them to get to him. No way am I leaving my mate undefended here, not in the heart of enemy country. There are a dozen blokes involved now, pushing and shoving.
There’s a tug on my collar. I ignore it. Another, and again I ignore it. The third time it happens, hard enough to pull me off balance, I turn round to see what’s going on. It’s Brown, chopsing off at me. Scott Williams and Jamie are here now too, and more boys on both sides are piling in, and I’m laughing in Brown’s face.
‘What are you doing?’ I say. ‘You’d better leave quick before I catch you on your own later in the game.’ On the commentary, Shane Williams is trying not to laugh. ‘What’s Mike Brown doing there, starting on an openside?’ Brown then starts chopsing off at Gethin, who’d batter him even quicker than I would.
Lyds’s tackle looked much worse than it actually was. The replay clearly shows Lyds leading with his right arm, as he’s supposed to. Jérôme Garcès awards England the scrum, as they were in possession, and calls me and Chris Robshaw in. ‘The scuffle afterwards, it’s not necessary. I am in charge. We are in charge, the referees. I don’t need your help, OK? Keep focused on your game.’
England get the better of us at the scrum, and are awarded the penalty when we drop it. On the 22, bang in front. Farrell’s not going to miss this in a month of Sundays: 9–6 to England, the first time they’ve been ahead in the match.
They keep the pressure up. Lyds is pinged for holding on, Farrell finds touch just inside our 22, and from the lineout England work it across the field and through the phases. Anthony Watson comes off his wing and tries to feed Mike Brown. The pass goes to ground. England have numbers and recycle quickly for Youngs to put Johnny May over in the corner. Farrell adds the conversion, and in what seems a trice we’ve gone from three points up to ten points down.
If we go in like that at half-time, we’ll be looking down the barrel of a gun. We press and press, but England hold firm and come back at us. Two minutes until the break and we put it through the hands to Scott Williams, who cuts through the England defence into the 22 and forces Brown to concede the penalty at the ruck, right in front of the posts. Dan nails it.
It’s 16–9 to England at half-time. That kick felt worth more than three points.
Farrell and Dan trade penalties: 19–9, 19–12, 22–12, 22–15, 22–18. We’re inching back into this, little by little, whittling away at England’s buffer, making them worry about us rather than playing their own game. George gets away down the right and Liam takes it on.
Into the last quarter. Scott’s knee goes in a tackle and he’s stretchered off. Cuthie comes on and George shifts to 13. Suddenly it’s like a field hospital out there. Hallam Amos and Liam both have to go off too, replaced by Lloyd Williams and Rhys Priestland. Lloyd’s a scrum-half, but he’ll have to fill in on the wing for the last 14 minutes.
If we win from here, it’ll rank up there with the best comebacks ever.
England are stretching us, looking to attack a backline in which half the guys are playing out of position. We have to smother it by fair means or foul. Coming-in-at-the-side foul, in fact: 25–18 to England with ten to go.
We need something. Anything.
Through the hands we go again. George has it, but May wraps him up. We go left. Jamie feeds Lloyd with very little to work with down the touchline. Brown giving him the outside, Watson covering back with Robshaw. Toby points to the inside. Lloyd drops the ball onto his left foot and kicks through and across, a hit-and-hope grubber; there are white shirts all around and only one red one, Gareth Davies, hammering up the middle more in hope than expectation, because no cause is lost until you give up on it.
The ball bounces: once, twice, three, four, five times, inching closer to the posts. Richard Wrigglesworth, bandage round his head, is turning to follow it, and May’s there too with James Haskell, but Gareth’s the one who’s read it the best, Gareth’s the one scooping it off his toes on the five-metre line and diving over under the posts as Wrigglesworth desperately tries to stop him.
Unbelievable. Just unbelievable. A lucky bounce? Sure. But you make your own luck in this game.
Dan converts: 25–25.
Minds on. Minds on. Next job.
Six minutes to go. Brown catches a high one on halfway. I’m jackalling on him like a fiend and he holds on. Garcès whistles. Penalty.
Dan hasn’t missed all night. He’s not going to start now: 28–25 to us.
Three minutes left. England have a lineout on our 22. They go right. Watson tries to get those quick, dancing feet of his going, but we shut the door on him. England send it back inside. Farrell comes round on the loop. Brown takes it up into contact. Once more I’m on him like a flash.
This is mine, sunshine. This is my turnover.
Garcès blows.
‘Red 7, not releasing.’
I can’t believe my ears. That was a legitimate jackal all day long.
Don’t argue. The referee’s word is law.
It’s a tough ask, out near the touchline, but Farrell’s been kicking well all night. A draw wouldn’t be great, but it wouldn’t be a disaster either, especially from where we’ve been for the last quarter of an hour with a patched-up backline.
Robshaw and George Ford have a quick conversation. Ford turns the ball over in his hands and sets his body away from the posts.
They’re going for the corner. They’re going for the corner, and the lineout, and the drive and the try, and that is an insult to every single player in a red jersey on this pitch. We don’t think a draw’s good enough, that’s what England are saying. We don’t think you’ve got it in you to hold us out.
Right. Bring it on. Bring it the f*** on.
Ford drills it into touch on our five-metre line. We set ourselves for the lineout while the England forwards take their time, walking slowly upfield, knowing this is their big chance, and wanting, needing, to get it right.
I march up and down our line like a sergeant major at Rorke’s Drift. ‘No way they get this! Stand your ground. Stand your f***ing ground! No one comes through here.’
I can hardly hear myself above the roar of the crowd.
They throw to Robshaw at the front. The moment I see him go up, I’m thinking that’s a bonehead decision; it makes it way too easy for us to choke their maul off. They should be putting it to the middle or the back and trying to come through our midfield.
We don’t even contest the jump. The moment Robshaw’s feet touch the ground again we’re piling in, swarming, shoving, grappling, a red tide driving them into touch.
Have some of that. F***ing have some of that.
Our lineout. Gareth Davies clears to touch, still inside our 22. Parling taps their lineout ball back but it’s messy and Alun Wyn’s first there to grab it. Gareth goes for another clearance kick, England charge it down, but Garcès calls us back for an England knock-on off the lineout ball.
Thirty seconds left. Gareth checks the call with Dan. England disrupt the scrum, but Toby scoops it up anyway and takes the contact. We form the ruck. Gareth looks up at the clock.
Seven seconds.
Garcès motioning for England to stay onside.
Three seconds.
Gareth whips it back to Dan in the in-goal area. Dan turns, waiting the last second or two for the clock to go red, and then boots it over the deadball line.
We’ve done it.
Just as I’ve never experienced hype like the anticipation around this game, so I’ve never experienced a changing-room atmosphere like this one afterwards. The sheer joy, the adrenaline of defiance and triumph: it’s incredible. Beating England at the Millennium two years ago was amazing, but in some ways doing it at Twickenham has been even better – taking it to the enemy in the heart of their citadel, storming the ramparts of Fortress Twickenham. Two days ago it was Lyds who saw a ghost; now all the England boys look as if they’re doing the same.
We crowd into the changing-room, not just the players but everyone involved in this campaign – the non-playing squad members, the management, the backroom staff – and we belt out ‘Ar Lan y Môr’ as loud as we can, so loud that we know England will hear it through the walls.
Ar lan y môr mae cerrig gleision
Ar lan y môr mae blodau’r meibion
Ar lan y môr mae pob rinweddau
Ar lan y môr mae nghariad innau.
Beside the sea blue pebbles lying
Beside the sea gold flowers glowing
Beside the sea are all things fairest
Beside the sea is found my dearest.
Robshaw is being pilloried in the media for his decision to go for the corner with three minutes left. I feel for him, and not just because he’s a good bloke and my opposite number (both as captain and 7).
Was it the wrong decision? The obvious answer is yes, as it cost them at least a share of the match. Farrell had kicked six out of six from the tee plus a droppie, so he’d have been odds-on to nail that kick too and make it 28–28. But if Robshaw had gone for that he’d have been accused of bottling the chance of a win – a win that, with all the injuries we’d suffered, they perhaps felt should have been theirs anyway.
That’s not a wrong decision other than how the result played out. If they’d gone for the corner and worked a try, he’d have been hailed as a genius. Even if we’d managed to hold them up, they’d have still had a good chance of the three points; they could have kept on with the phases either until we’d infringed or they’d worked Farrell in for another drop.
For me, the wrong decision England made in that play was not whether to kick for the corner or the three; it was to call the ball to the front of the lineout. That gave us the chance to do exactly what we did, which was steamroller them into touch and win the lineout ourselves. They should have gone to the middle or the back and taken us on in midfield. That they didn’t do so wasn’t just down to the captain, but to others too: the lineout caller, the pack leader and so on.
As I said in the ‘Perspective’ section, the captain never acts alone.
Saturday, 10 October. We’re back at Twickenham for a match that few of the locals can be that thrilled about: us against Australia, knowing that we’re both going through to the quarters come what may. England lost to Australia a week ago, while we beat Fiji, which was physically the hardest game I’ve ever played in; not just because it’s always draining playing against such naturally strong and athletic men, but because it was our third match in 11 days and I was exhausted.
So all that’s left to be decided is who wins the group and what that means for the quarter-final draw. The winner tonight will face Scotland, who only just squeaked through against Samoa this afternoon (if they’d lost, their place in the knockouts would have gone to Japan, who kickstarted this tournament on its second day with their once-in-a-lifetime victory over South Africa). The loser will face the Springboks, who overcame that shock defeat to top the group anyway.
We want Scotland, of course. No disrespect, but they’ll be easier opponents. Not only are South Africa a better team, but we’ve beaten Scotland eight times in a row now, so we feel we have their number good and proper. I’ve never lost to them in my whole career so far. In contrast, our victory against South Africa last year was our first in 17 attempts. Win this match, get Scotland, and we’d be odds-on to at least match our semi-final run of four years ago.
We should do it. We should beat Australia. In the last quarter especially, we miss so many overlaps it’s embarrassing. Justin and I nullify Pocock and Hooper at the breakdown, starving them of turnover ball. We spend long periods in their 22.
But – same old story – we can’t quite close it out. That intensity we had against England just isn’t there. Maybe it would be too much to expect us to peak again the way we had for that match. Maybe there’s not quite the same do-or-die sword of Damocles hanging over you when you know you’re through even if you lose. Whatever it is, they win 15–9, with no tries on either side.
South Africa it is, then.
Saturday, 17 October. I’m going out for the warm-up when there’s a tap on my shoulder. It’s Schalk Burger, who’s playing blindside for the Springboks today.
He gestures to the ground, the crowd already beginning to fill up. ‘This is awesome, eh? Let’s just enjoy it.’ It’s typical not just of him but pretty much every South African I’ve ever played against. They’re hard as nails on the pitch – not dirty, just incredibly physical – but off it they’re the nicest people.
The match is a heavyweight slugfest, a proper old school Test: two very good sides going at it hammer and tongs, no quarter asked and none given. With six minutes to go, we’re clinging on 19–18, but they have a scrum near the touchline on our 22.
The scrum wheels left towards the blindside. Duane Vermeulen picks up from the base and drives. Lloyd clings on to his ankles, and with the scrum now at almost 90 degrees I can’t quite get to him, and Cuthie comes up off the blindside wing to help. Vermeulen waits until Cuthie’s on him before flipping a no-look ball out of the back of his hand to Fourie du Preez on the loop, and du Preez dives in at the corner for the winning try. Heartbreaker.
After the match, the Springbok coach Heyneke Meyer hugs me and tells me what a great game it was. We’re the first quarter-final, and in their own way they all turn out to be memorable: the All Blacks destroy France later in the evening, and the next day Argentina run it from everywhere to beat Ireland, and Scotland play out a rollercoaster thriller against Australia, which is only decided right at the end on a very contentious offside penalty – a decision that will have huge ramifications two years from now, though of course none of us know that yet.
We’re out, but we couldn’t have given anything more. And in all honesty even if we had won, I couldn’t have played the semi as I’m just so battered. I don’t have any one specific bad injury, just a series of grade 1s all over my body.
And I’m not the only one. Our injury list is so long that in a way I’m glad we didn’t make it through; we’d have had to send out a largely young and inexperienced team against an All Blacks side at the top of their game, and a heavy defeat would have left that team with mental scars that would have taken a long time to heal.
I’ve never been the kind of player to think that beating England is or should be the be-all and end-all of Welsh ambitions. But if that victory at Twickenham ended up as being the high water mark of this campaign – well, there are worse memories to have.
Saturday, 28 November. I do my ankle ligament colliding with Tips, of all people, in a match against the Ospreys. Two months out. Injury #18.
Sunday, 7 February 2016. We claw back a 13-point deficit against Ireland in the opening round of the Six Nations to draw 16–16. I’m playing opposite CJ Stander, but I don’t realise until the post-match dinner that this was his debut. When someone tells me, I go to get my shirt and give it to him. He offers his back, of course, but I say no, you must keep it: you only ever make your debut once.
Saturday, 12 March. I’m knocked unconscious while playing against England at Twickenham. It’s a complete accident – in fact, it’s Alun Wyn who clips me rather than one of the England players – but the medics are taking no chances. They put me in a neck brace and carry me off on a stretcher. I give a thumbs-up to the crowd to let them know I’m OK, but I only know this afterwards when I’m shown the footage: I have no awareness of it at the time.
When I come round in the medics’ room, I’m desperate to find my phone and let everyone know I’m OK. It’s all right, the medics say. We’ve already spoken to your wife and let her know you’re fine.
Injury #19.
We score two tries in the last six minutes, but we’ve left ourselves too much ground to make up. England hang on to win 25–21.
Sunday, 13 March. Dad is walking his dog when a woman stops him.
‘How on earth did we lose that yesterday?’ she says.
He mumbles something non-committal, hoping that will end the conversation, but she keeps going. ‘We should have beaten them, we should have …’
‘I don’t give a shit!’ Dad snaps. ‘When your son’s put in a neck brace and carried off on a stretcher, the result’s the last thing you care about, you know?’
Dad never snaps at people, never loses his temper like that. It’s a sign of how much he and Mum are worried about me; not just for the incident yesterday, but for all the ones that have come before and all the ones that might happen in the future.
Always play for Wales as though it’s your last game, Gats keeps saying. One day it will be.
‘How long are you going to keep playing for?’ Mum asks.
Saturday, 30 April. I sprain the ACJ in my right shoulder. The medics reckon I’ll just about make it back in time for the summer tour of New Zealand. Injury #20.
Thursday, 14 July. Rach gives birth to a beautiful baby girl, Anna Victoria Kennedy-Warburton. She weighs – of course – 7 lb.
She might have my number, but luckily she doesn’t have my nose.
Saturday, 1 October. I fracture my cheekbone in a clash of heads with Leinster’s Josh van der Flier and need surgery to have a plate inserted. Injury #21.
Saturday, 26 November. I sit out the autumn international against South Africa after getting a stinger in training earlier in the week. It’s a shame, because the WRU have made the match a bit special for us. They’ve asked each squad member to invite someone who made a difference to us in our early days: a teacher, a club coach, a family member, anyone without whom we might not have developed a love of rugby.
It’s a lovely idea, and shows the importance of rugby in our lives both and off the pitch. Dan Biggar and Sam Davies have both nominated their former geography teacher Dean Mason, who says that ‘rugby is not about the person who becomes an international, it’s about how rugby develops other skills too, raises self-esteem, improves personal and interpersonal skills. We want to develop the best rugby players we can but also the best citizens we can. As a teacher you want to try to inspire people to be the best they can be at whatever they are, and personally I’m more proud of Dan and Sam as fantastic young men and role models than of what they are achieving on the rugby field.’
I’ve asked Frank Rees, my old headmaster at Llanishen Fach who made me play rugby all those years ago because he saw how good I could be. Without him, who knows how different my life might have been?
I think of all the people here today, all these men and women who’ve given us so much, who one day saw a spark in a child and fanned that spark until it caught fire and spread and blossomed and consumed that child’s life.
And I think that this must surely be the holy grail of teaching. Not exam results or league tables, but being the one who actually makes a difference to a child’s life, who helps them achieve their potential or saves them from disaster. When the endless paperwork swamps you and the constant pressure gets you down, that must be the light in the darkness: the adult who knows that without what you did for them as a child, they wouldn’t be who and what they are today.
Monday, 26 December. It’s my 100th game for the Blues, and I get a box for the whole family to come and watch – including baby Anna, who sees her dad play for the first time. It’s an emotional day for me, notching up this milestone for the only professional club I’ve ever played for. Even though a combination of central contracts and injuries have meant that my appearances for the Blues are restricted, I hope the fans know how much this means to me. We beat the Dragons 27–16, which is a nice way to mark it.
Sunday, 5 February 2017. Our opening Six Nations game, against Italy. Alun Wyn is captain, a decision that I’m totally on board with. Over the past few months I’ve been talking to Rob Howley about it on and off, and we’ve both decided that I’d be better off without the captaincy. I just want to concentrate on my own game again.
And the reason it’s Rob I’ve been talking to rather than Gats is also the reason I want to concentrate on my own game. Gats is away on Lions duty again, and I want to give myself the best chance possible of making that plane.
Monday, 13 February. Our first analysis meeting after losing to England on Saturday, a match we should have won. A lot of the match reports are pointing the finger at Foxy, whose failure to find touch with a clearance kick allowed England to run the ball back at us and score what turned out to be the winning try.
I put my hand up. Yes, I said, Foxy shanked the kick; but why did he need to take that kick in the first place? That was because of a mistake I made a few minutes earlier. We had an attacking lineout in their half, and Jake Ball called a move that involved me lifting at the back. I misunderstood the call, and for some reason thought we didn’t have the option Jake was calling when in fact we did. It was my brain fart, not Jake’s. I didn’t lift the man when I should have done, which meant that the ball was overthrown, that England got possession and worked their way into the position where Foxy was forced to try to clear our lines in a hurry.
If I’d done my job, we’d have won that match.
The coaches know all this, of course, and if I didn’t own up they’d have presented me with the evidence in front of the whole team. What they wanted to see, and what I’ve done, is me being honest enough to take ownership of my mistake.
Friday, 7 April. The Blues are playing away in Ulster. The Six Nations is done and dusted, and though Wales didn’t do too well – we came fifth, having won two and lost three – I felt it was personally the best Six Nations I’d played since 2011. I’m on good form and not worried about being picked for the Lions. Even though I haven’t spoken to Gats in a while, I know enough about the way I’m playing, and the way he likes to think, to be as sure as I can be that I’m on that plane.
I’m walking back in from the warm-up with Rory Best who, like me, is often mentioned as a potential Lions captain. The squad’s due to be announced in 12 days’ time.
‘You heard anything?’ we ask each other pretty much simultaneously.
Neither of us have. I wonder who else is in the frame. Alun Wyn, possibly, and maybe also Johnny Sexton, though I know Gats prefers to have a forward as captain if possible.
Today’s match is a bit of a non-event for us: we can’t reach the play-offs, though Ulster still can. With the Lions in mind, it’s really important that I don’t get injured.
I get injured.
I’m standing up out of a ruck when I take a hit. There’s a shooting pain in my knee that I try to run off, but when I change direction I know it’s more than a tweak. The physio comes on.
‘It’s a grade 2 ligament strain,’ I tell him. I know my own body and its injury list so well by now that I can do my own diagnosis.
‘Off you come,’ he says. If this were a cup final with no summer tour ahead, I’d risk carrying on, but another nudge would turn it into a grade 3 and that would be my Lions tour over.
Six weeks out. I’ll still make the tour, but I’ll have to work hard to get up to match fitness in time for the Test matches. Injury #22.
Not everyone thinks I should be skipper. Under the headline LIONS STAND NO CHANCE OF UPSET IF WARBURTON IS GIVEN CAPTAINCY, Stuart Barnes writes in The Times that ‘the odds are against the Lions winning the series in New Zealand. They will grow even greater should Warburton once again be named their leader. He would make a magnificent midweek leader. But not the Test team. He doesn’t possess that extra ingredient [needed to beat New Zealand].’
Thursday, 13 April. I’m in the car with Rach. We pull into the Sainsbury’s car park. I clear my throat. ‘I don’t want to look like one of those lazy husbands who makes their wife do all the chores …’
‘… but you’d like to me to go in and do the shopping on my own.’ Rach finishes the sentence for me.
‘Please.’
She knows why I’m asking: because if I go in with her we’re going to have two dozen people ask me if I’ve heard about the Lions captaincy yet, and I just can’t be bothered with that. I’ve had it every day for about a month now. Perhaps I should have got a T-shirt made up.
NO, I HAVEN’T SPOKEN TO WARREN GATLAND.
NO, I DON’T KNOW IF I’M LIONS CAPTAIN.
NO, I WOULDN’T TELL YOU EVEN IF I DID KNOW.
But I do want the captaincy. I really want it. In 2013 I wasn’t really expecting it, and I doubted whether I was up to it. I’ve been through a lot since then. I’m older, harder, tougher. Forged. I want Gats to ring, and I want him to ask me, because at some deep level this is what I feel my career has been building to all along, the keeping of the promise I made to myself when I got back from Sydney four years ago.
Rach goes into the supermarket. I keep my head down so I don’t get buttonholed by someone walking past the car and seeing that I’m inside.
My phone rings. GATS. Here we go.
A bit of small talk: how was the Ulster game, how’s your injury, how’s the recovery coming along? Not bad, not bad, not bad to all three.
‘I was just wondering, Warby, do you want to be Lions captain again?’
‘Mate, definitely. Damn right I’ll be captain.’