Wales captain: How to save
Lions lock Alun Wyn Jones a strong advocate for global rugby season, hates losing to anybody, wears ‘fruity’
Alun Wyn Jones is being interrogated. As part of the Ospreys in the Community scheme, the Wales captain is fielding a barrage of questions from a group of wide-eyed eight-year-olds from Central Primary School in Port Talbot. He looks unsteady perched on a chair designed to accommodate somebody a quarter his size and that is before the inquisition begins.
A couple of questions flummox him, particularly when he is asked whether he would allow his daughter to play rugby. He hesitates, clearly struggling with the mental leap of imagining Mali, who turns two this year, tearing around a rugby field. He offers a qualified yes. Then he is asked how he deals with defeat. Not well is the short answer.
The Q&A concludes and an autograph session starts as rugby jerseys of all shades and sizes, fluffy toys and hastily torn schoolbooks are thrust before Wales’ greatest lock who is about to embark on his third Lions tour. A full 30 minutes later, he retreats to the relative sanctuary of the headmistress’ office to talk to the Daily Telegraph.
Picking up where the Year 4s left off, I ask how far back he can trace his hatred of losing.
“I remember this one game especially when I was probably around their age,” Jones said. “I was selected on the bench for Swansea schoolboys under-11 against Pontypridd in the DC Thomas Cup.
“It is one of those things I have always remembered. We lost. I don’t know if we would have won if I had played but I do know I did not have the opportunity to influence it.
“The fact I still remember it now must say something about me. I don’t remember much of the detail of the game or the score, only the feeling afterwards. It was that anger of not being able to change things.”
That anger remains Jones’ defining quality. Compared with his Lions teammates, he is neither as athletic as Maro Itoje nor as destructive as Courtney Lawes or Iain Henderson. He does not possess the handling skills of a Brodie Retallick. But no other player in world rugby can shape a game according to his furious will alone.
Sean Holley, his first coach at the Ospreys, remembers clasping eyes on Jones for the first time when he was 17. Physically he was an unimpressive specimen. As Jones himself admits “I had enough puppy fat for three labradors.”
Yet Holley quickly realised the kid from Swansea had something special about him.
“I’m not saying he was this outstanding player back then but he had character, personality, intelligence, energy and exuberance,” Holley said. “To find all those qualities in someone so young is very rare.”
As Jones recalls: “My instinct back then was probably not 10m passes or kicking but pushing my heart out in the scrum, being effective in the maul and a bit of ballast elsewhere. I like to think I have added to those skills, but those core skills can often be under-rated.
“It is very easy to make athletes and it is very difficult to make rugby players with that rugby instinct. I would like to think I have got a bit of rugby instinct and have become more of a rugby athlete along the way.”
His other distinguishing feature in those days was a pair of white boots which led to the nickname “Alun Gwyn Boots” that still endures today.
“I can get real fruity in the boot department,” Jones confirms. “I still have them somewhere.”
Jones is a different man now. The birth of his daughter changed him. So, too, the death of his father, Tim, last year after a long fight with illness. He accepts he has mellowed a fraction.
“I think I probably have,” Jones said. “Not entirely, I hope. To a point, family does that and a couple of life experiences both positive and negative that have definitely altered my perception on rugby.
“Whereas my first 28-29 years, rugby was the entire focus, which was not that healthy, now you realise what is really important.”
Further perspective was provided during his rehabilitation from a shoulder injury sustained in Wales’ 20-18 defeat to France on March 18.
To speed up his recovery, Jones installed a mini altitude tent at his home — “that was a true test of my marriage” — and attending the South Wales Multiple Sclerosis Therapy Centre where he attended communal sessions in a pressurised chamber.
“There were people sat in there with various ailments, people who had MS, cancer,” Jones said. “There was a bit of Top Trumps and there was me with a bad shoulder.”
Jones returned to action nine days ago in Ospreys’ PRO12 semifinal defeat to Munster. Now his attention turns to the Lions and the challenge of facing the All Blacks which he makes no effort to play down.