do I take? The M3? Where’s that?
I asked John where I had to go and he told me to head to south-west London. Christ, where was that? I was given a map and told which motorways to take, and I was sent on my way.
Eventually, I got there. I arrived at this magnificent old hotel called the Petersham, grabbed my bag from the boot of the car and walked into the marble reception area. I didn’t know where to go, who to ask for or what to do. I hovered around, wondering who to approach when I saw Lawrence Dallaglio striding across the reception area towards me, and putting his hand out to shake mine. He welcomed me to the England hotel and he probably, to this day, has no idea how much that meant to me. I’d driven to a place I was unfamiliar with, late at night, to meet the best team of players in England, and to join them to play a level of rugby I wasn’t familiar with. That friendly gesture from Lawrence made me feel welcome. It was a great thing to do.
Things didn’t stay all that great though because when I got up to the room, still nursing my face from the punch I had received from Graham Rowntree when we had met across the scrum the previous Saturday, I discovered my room-mate was… the same bloody Rowntree! I looked at him, this bloke who had given me a cheap punch in the face, and thought, This is the last person in the world that I want to spend time with. Seriously, though, Rowntree is a brilliant bloke and he was a great team-mate. He was a good room-mate too, but it was funny to see him standing there, welcoming me to my room, while I was still sporting the bruises he’d given me the last time I’d seen him.
It was difficult to turn up at the England team hotel, and mix straight in with this group of players who’d been together for a while, especially since none of them were from Gloucester, but what helped was the feeling of camaraderie from the other players. It had taken me just thirty-four first-team games for Gloucester before I was asked to join the England squad and my first match in England colours happened just eighty-one days after my England A début, so there was a great deal of talk about me, a lot of interviews to give, and press attention to cope with. I didn’t even know whether I would be in the team to play France, or whether I’d just been brought in for cover at training.
I got through my first evening in the team hotel, and went out training with the players the next day. Bloody hell. I’ve always been a physical bloke, and I’d been playing a decent standard of rugby at Gloucester, and for England A, for a while, so I was fit and used to very hard rugby training, but - blimey - nothing like that! I knew that it would be a step up when I was called into the international squad, but it was rugby training on a whole different level. I just wasn’t prepared for it and, I’ll be honest, I almost died in the first scrummaging session. No, really, I did almost die. It was so bloody cold and we did so many scrums. Time and time again we were forced to reset the scrum and replay the moves. I couldn’t believe what was going on. I was 23 stone of bright red beetroot for about a week afterwards. I think it took me about a year to get over that session. The reality of international rugby hit me like a sledgehammer, leaving me determined to lose weight, sharpen up and get properly fit to compete in this environment. It’s interesting to look back now … when I first turned up for that England training session I was 130kg; by the next Five Nations I was 115kg!
Playing for England was going to be hard. I’d had a taste of how hard it would be when I’d been selected to play for England A, so I was under no illusions. When you played for England at the time you came up against the Leicester mafia and as a lone guy from Gloucester I felt outnumbered from the start, but I always felt that if I worked hard my work would be rewarded. The culture with England at the time was a real can-do one, thanks to Clive’s influence, and however out of sorts you felt, and however baffled by events, you knew that if you put in the effort and produced the goods Clive would be there to support you.
The game that I was drafted into the squad for was against France in Paris. I was told that I would be sitting on the bench. I was absolutely terrified. I spent the whole time hoping to God that I wouldn’t have to go on to the pitch. I know that might sound odd, but remember, these were the days when if you were on the bench nobody really communicated with you, so I had no idea what was going on out there. I didn’t even know what the lineout calls were. The idea of running onto the pitch in Paris to play against France in my first match for England, and not having a clue what anyone was doing or what their calls meant, was quite terrifying. I was happier just sitting out the match on the bench…
Things have changed a great deal during my time with England, and one of the things that has changed enormously is the relationship between the bench players and the first XV. You feel as if you’re very much part of the team when you’re on the bench now, but back then it was as if you didn’t exist. I suppose the crucial difference is that now when you’re on the bench there’s every chance you’re going to get on to the field, whereas in the past you only went on to the field if there was an injury to someone, so it was less likely that you would be involved in the game. Today, bench players are absolutely vital because they are the players you bring on at crucial times in the game. Why would you ever put on a player who didn’t even know the lineout calls? It seems ridiculous, looking back, but when I started, rugby was a very different game to the one played now. I’m not that old but it sometimes feels as if I played in two different sports - before and after professionalism had fully kicked in.
So, there I was, back in 1998, at a time when the England front five was very Leicester orientated, the only person in the squad from Gloucester, still recovering from the most terrifying training session I’d ever encountered, still bruised from when my now room-mate had punched me, sitting on the bench for England versus France with 80,000 people screaming at the pitch. I didn’t know any of the moves and I didn’t know the lineout calls. Please don’t let me on the pitch, please don’t let me on the pitch, I thought as play commenced. Happily, I didn’t have to go on. Even today I think it’s hard to come off the bench, with little warning, and give your best performance, especially if it’s your first game and you have no idea what to expect when you get out there. From my point of view, I know I’ve never prayed so hard for anything as I prayed for Clive Woodward not to send me on to the pitch on that day in Paris. We lost the match, unfortunately, but the good news was that I was selected to play against Wales at Twickenham the following weekend. Not on the bench - on the pitch.
I arrived at the Petersham Hotel a week before the game against Wales (it was slightly easier this time - at least I knew where the hotel was) and met up with the other players. We had a training session on the Monday which nearly killed me again, and once again I vowed to lose weight when I saw my scarlet face in the mirror. On the Tuesday there was a big press conference at the hotel. All the journalists had come to hear the announcement of the team, then interview the players. I’d been warned that, as the new boy, everyone would want to interview me, but I hadn’t realised just how excitable it would all become. I walked into the press room, after the team had been announced, and was immediately grabbed by journalists. It was fine, they just wanted to know how I felt and what I expected from the game, which Welsh players I was looking forward to coming up against… things like that. I have never had a problem with the press but I did find it hard when I first had to do it because it is one thing that you are not prepared for.
Another thing you’re not prepared for is all the attention you get. People calling me to see how I was, asking for tickets, giving me advice and suggesting popping in to see me after the match… I learnt very quickly that all the attention can be distracting and draining. If you’re not careful you can lose so much of your energy doing things other than rugby. I could have charged around trying to find tickets for people, replying to emails and doing every interview request made of me, but that would have used energy that I had to reserve for the match.
A lot of people asked me if I found it stressful in the lead up to the match. I don’t think that ‘stressful’ is the right word to describe how I felt, because I have always been quite good at separating myself from the anxieties surrounding a match. I had found it difficult in Paris because I hadn’t felt properly prepared, but usually I tell myself
