Everitt confirms Nel will retire as Edinburgh hold talks with Hill
Veteran prop to bow out after 12 years in capital, reveals coach
WP NEL will retire from rugby at the end of the season, with Sean Everitt confirming the veteran prop will bow out from his Edinburgh career. Nel has been an incredible servant to Edinburgh and Scotland since making the move to the capital in 2012 and made his 200th appearance for the club in last weekend’s defeat to Stormers.
It was a full-circle moment for the South African-born tighthead, who started his career in Cape Town with Western Province before moving to Scotland and going on to make 61 appearances for his adopted homeland.
Everitt is already beginning to look towards next season and confirmed the club have held talks with Northampton’s Paul Hill as a potential replacement for Nel when the 37-yearold hangs up his boots.
Hill, 29, has six caps for England and has played more than 130 times for Saints since joining them in 2015, but he is available in the summer when his contract expires with the English Premiership side.
When asked about Hill, Everitt said: “We’ve been looking at options at tighthead because of the retirement of WP Nel. We’ve also looked at replacements for Bill Mata who is going to be leaving us.
“We’ve had talks with quite a few players and we’re in negotiations with them but there’s nothing finite at this stage.”
Nel had not announced his retirement himself yet but Everitt confirmed: “Yes, you would have seen earlier in the Six Nations that he had retired from international rugby.
“He’s had a good innings and a long innings. We’d have loved for him to stay on for another year and he’s been toying with this decision for some time. He enjoys the club, he enjoys Edinburgh as a city but at the end of the day, at some stage someone will wake up in the morning and say ‘I think I’ve had enough’.
“So it looks like it could be his swansong. That hasn’t been cast in stone but we’ve got to be proactive in how we look for our players and if there are tightheads available we’ll certainly have a chat with them because we want to have the strongest available squad next year.”
There is still plenty to play for this season for Edinburgh with Everitt’s side chasing a play-off spot in the
URC and through to the last 16 of the Challenge Cup. Nel will play a big part in that and could make his 201st appearance for Edinburgh against Sharks this weekend. At his age, he would have the option of lowering his workload during sessions but Everitt was full of praise for how he is willing to get stuck in during games and training despite his advancing years.
He added: “He’s not retiring with immediate effect. I said earlier he enjoys what he’s doing and enjoying the game of rugby but he knows time is drawing near.
“He’s still getting around the field and playing as well as he has when he was 25. I’m sure he doesn’t feel that way on a Sunday but there’s never a Monday he shirks training. He trains every Monday and every Tuesday and every Thursday.
“Normally guys at his age get a reprieve from training on Mondays and Tuesdays because of their performance on Saturday and as long as he’s fit he wants to train but he has been chatting about it.”
Nel will be available for this weekend but Edinburgh will not have Grant Gilchrist or Ali Price available.
He’s still getting around the field and playing as well as he has when he was 25. I’m sure he doesn’t feel that way on a Sunday but there’s never a Monday he shirks training
Gilchrist misses out for personal reasons, while Price stayed in Scotland as his wife gave birth to a baby girl yesterday morning.
Price’s future remains up in the air after moving from Glasgow to Edinburgh on loan this season with reports in France suggesting Perpignan could make a move to sign him in the summer.
Everitt is keen to keep hold of him though and when asked if his young family could make him lean towards staying in Scotland, he joked: “I’ll certainly use it as motivation to keep him.
“The opportunity hasn’t passed. We see Ali as a vital cog in our team going forward and we’d love to keep him in Edinburgh. We are still in talks with Ali with regards to 24/25.”
Mark Bennett is also out of the game with a concussion, while Glen Young will be missing for up to six weeks after having surgery on an ankle.
Edinburgh sit sixth in the URC but the likes of Connacht and Benetton are only one point behind them and sit outside the play-off spots, so Everitt knows it is important to leave South Africa with something from this weekend’s game against Sharks.
He added: “They’ll be very disappointed with the season, particularly with the depth they’ve created in the squad at the moment. I can’t put a finger on what has transpired at the Sharks over the last 12 months if I can put it that way, but they put it together on Saturday.
“It’s very important. If you look at the log, the other results went our way. Not that we’re hoping other people lose, but it makes the log a little bit tighter. Had the other results gone against us we would have been in a bit of trouble but we’re still in the race.
“Any points at this stage will work for us and four points or five points would be the perfect scenario.”
RANGERS have hit out at “homophobic and disgraceful slurs” after their former player Joey Barton centred criticism of women’s football around 17-year-old Partick Thistle goalkeeper Ava Easdon.
The ex-England midfielder, who had a brief and unsuccessful spell in Scottish football in 2016, highlighted a goal Rangers scored against Thistle in Sunday’s Sky Sports Cup final and wrote on X: “I mean let’s just talk about the goalie! How is this nonsense on the box?”
Barton followed up his comments on Tuesday by hitting back at criticism from Easdon’s father and Rangers player Nicola Docherty and using homophobic comments to describe the women’s game.
A statement on Rangers’ website read: “Rangers FC has been made aware of discriminatory and misogynistic comments regarding the women’s game following Sunday’s Sky Sports Cup final.
“As a club, we stand together against these homophobic and disgraceful slurs in the strongest possible terms.
“We are unwavering in our desire to further the women’s game across the country which goes from strength to strength, and will support all players in challenging those who hold extremely outdated and foul views of women’s football.”
The goalkeeper’s father, seven-time world kickboxing champion Lex Easdon, had accused Barton of playing up to his “fan boys” on social media and wrote: “In 2024 and ‘grown’ men feel the need to belittle and bully a 17yr old school kid, who doesn’t get paid to play unlike some men who make the same mistake week after week and get paid hundreds of thousands of pounds.”
Scotland head coach Pedro
Martinez Losa offered his backing to Easdon.
“We have to have a strong opinion on supporting Ava, obviously,” he said. “A young player, who is 17 years old, who is competing excellently this season for her club.
“We are a sport in development and we all have to be aware of that and protect players.
“If we want players like her to develop and play in the national team, we have to create a safe environment where they are going to play and make mistakes. We have to understand that mistakes are a part of the evolution.
“The problem we have now is accelerating the progress and the evolution so there are other people involved, and we can’t control that.
“I just want to show my support from the head coach position of the national team. I want to show my support to a player who is playing exceptionally. She is very brave to compete in a final.
“She has been put in that position, she is dreaming of being a football player, as are many girls in the country. And, by the way, she is playing very well.”
When asked about Barton’s comments specifically, the Spaniard added: “I can’t control people’s opinion or who says what but I will show my support to Ava.”
Rangers hit out at former player Barton after jibes about women’s football