Whenbilly met
‘You and your twin sister were there and one of you was really drunk! Sorry, it wasn’t you, Poppy’ hexclusive interview England’s No 8s talk loneliness, sibling rivalry and nights out at Saracens
Billy Vunipola hoots with laughter as he tries to recall how he first encountered fellow England and Saracens back row Poppy Cleall. “I think it was the postseason social at Sarries, Poppy?” he says. “You and your twin sister were there and one of you was really drunk! Sorry, it wasn’t you Poppy, it was your sister ...”
Cleall has been successfully keeping a straight face until now, but finally the effort proves too much: soon she is in fits of giggles and our three-way Zoom chat has to be put on hiatus until order is restored.
Vunipola and Cleall have the kind of easy patter that makes you think they have been friends for years. That is not quite the case, but their conversation here – the first joint newspaper interview with an England men’s and women’s player – flows freely and is laced with laughter.
The pair certainly have plenty in common – and not just that they play for the same club and country in the back row, and are both 28.
Both are also joined in their England camps by siblings who are props: Billy has Mako, his older brother, while Poppy has her identical twin Bryony – hence the confusion on that night out.
Vunipola enjoys firing questions at Cleall, but is particularly keen to know if Poppy and Bryony “hang out in England camp?” This is because despite their brotherly bond, he and Mako appear more connected on the field than off it.
“Sometimes I forget I play with my brother because we are very different people,” he says. “Sometimes I feel like he is my dad and it is not cool to hang out with your dad – there is a place and a time for that! We vibe off each other on the pitch very well, it is not something that we force, I guess it just happens because we are brothers.”
Cleall has a different take. “Bryony and I have grown up playing together – as twins we were in the exact same age group since we were six, and we have a very good connection on the pitch. She is in the training squad with us; we are as close on and off the pitch. As twins you have to be best mates.
“She always jokes that I say, ‘Stand six metres behind me’. I tell her stuff like if she is wearing the wrong socks, but that is all joking. We do actually hang out in the same friendship groups in camp. At the moment, it is early days for her in her England career [she has one cap to Poppy’s 43]. She is also trying to find her own friendship group as she settles in the squad.”
Vunipola comes back in. “It is more the age thing with us, he is only two years older but it seems like he is way older. And I feel like I am still 23, I act like a kid and he acts like an older person, I just kick it with the younger lads.
“Mako likes to spend a lot of time by himself, he is very quiet and I am probably the opposite in terms of being in a group. He likes to think about rugby all the time, I like to just think about rugby when I am playing. It is not a bad thing, we are just different people.”
Cleall, you sense, probably takes after Mako more than Billy. She admits that rugby is always on her mind and, as a student of the game, cites Vunipola’s play as a No8 as a blueprint for her. Vunipola laughs again, pointing ‘We probably annoyed the men with rugby chat while they wanted to get away from rugby’ out that he is enduring a dip in form. He cannot resist asking Cleall whether she has hopped on the “pick Sam Simmonds” bandwagon. “What do you think about him – don’t you reckon he should be in the squad?” he says. “I thought we might as well approach it, I didn’t want it to be awkward.”
Vunipola is enjoying himself, and his tongue is firmly planted in his cheek, but there is a serious side to him, too. He freely acknowledges that recent weeks have been trying, with his own form slumping and England’s Six Nations title defence snuffed out before it had even come to life.
“You can’t decide your self-worth in how you perform all the time,” he says. “Or who you are as a rugby player – you are one bad performance away from being torn down and made to feel insignificant.
“When people feel they haven’t been able to perform to the level that you want, they withdraw from the situation, whether it is in the post-match or when the boys are sitting around having a chat. You withdraw because you feel you didn’t contribute.”
Cleall empathises. “It can get extremely lonely and I have seen people completely withdraw from situations. You can see them go on that downward spiral, but as teammates you can see and try and help as much as you can.
“We have ways to cope, by meeting with