Lions woe a motivator for North
GEORGE North has revealed the motivation that is keeping him going at Test level.
The 28-year-old winger has already achieved so much for Wales and the British and Irish Lions, with a remarkable 98 Test caps to his name.
Broken down, that’s an astounding 95 for Wales and a further three Test caps for the Lions, all won against Australia in 2013.
It’s only a matter of time before North reaches a century of caps — but it’s the fact he hasn’t already done so that is driving him on to achieve more in the international game.
Because, for North, the abiding memory of his travels with the Lions isn’t any of his match-winning salvos in 2013, but rather a tour-ending injury in a midweek game during the 2017 tour of New Zealand that ended any hopes of adding to his tally of Lions Test caps. “That still fuels me today, the feeling I had,” North told Brian O’Driscoll’s BT Sport series Lions Call. “I never want to feel like that again.”
The frustration caused by that 2017 tour, where North was up against his own fitness as well as the best wingers British and Irish rugby can offer, resulted in North coming back to Wales in order to further his career.
Within a few months a return had been announced — with North eventually joining the Ospreys the following year. And he hopes that coming home to play his club rugby in
Wales will help his Lions hopes.
“In a word, yes, I’d love to tour South Africa next summer,” he said.
“Obviously you’ve got to be playing your best rugby, but coming back to Wales and feeling like me again — and playing like me again towards the end of the Six Nations — I want to be in those (selection) conversations.
“I’ve been on two very different tours: 2013 was incredible; 2017, physically but also mentally, was a lot harder.”
Having been injured shortly before flying out to New Zealand in 2017, North spent the tour largely playing catch-up. After the first Test came too soon, he was given a chance to impress in a midweek fixtures against the Hurricanes. It didn’t go to plan. First of all, an early injury to centre Robbie Henshaw forced him to sacrifice his Test audition on the wing to cover midfield.
Yet despite that, he scored a welltaken try and things were looking up, right up until he ripped his hamstring. “My body just gave out,” he said. “There was nothing I could do. “Everything was hanging on. My lungs were on the floor and my hamstring tore towards the end of the first half.
“I thought to myself ‘it’s not too bad, I’ll plod on.’ Got to half-time, got strapped up, came back out for the second half and did a proper job of it.
“I thought, ‘Well if this is my last time in a Lions jersey I want to give it everything until I can’t walk,’ which sounds heroic but then when you tear your hamstring you can’t walk!”