MY LIFE IN RUGBY

Winning the Top 14 title in my first season with Castres was an unbelievable experience. I remember us flying into town from Paris and looking down to see a mass of people, all clad in Castres colours, waiting to congratulate us.

To think that a lot of people tried to talk me out of going there when I made the decision to move my family over to France because it would be too quiet! My old mate from Worcester, Miles Benjamin had just won the Premiership with Leicester and he rang me to see what was going on. Apparently, Leicester was like a ghost town compared to where I was.

I’d put the supporters of Castres right up there with Gloucester’s; they are just as passionate and while Gloucester have the Shed, they have the Kop. The stands are tight to the pitch too, like Kingsholm, and the atmosphere was brilliant throughout my three years there. Some of the fans are now lifelong friends.

I must admit running out in front of the Shed was never a childhood dream of mine, it wasn’t until later that I got involved with rugby. The lack of Caribbean role models in the sport – my parents are from Jamaica – meant rugby wasn’t on my radar growing up. It was all football and basketball even though I lived on the outskirts of the city in a place called Tuffley, and later found out that Derrick Morgan, the Gloucester winger, was also my cousin.

It was only aged 16 that Dave Pointon, the former Gloucester player and coach of my school St Peter’s finally persuaded me to play. And when it became clear I was quite good and joined the Gloucester setup, my parents said I could choose my own path. Up until then, our religious beliefs - Church of God (7th Day) – prevented me from playing on Saturdays.

I made a try-scoring debut up at Leeds around Christmas time, but it wasn’t until the following season, 2002/3, that I made a proper breakthrough. I became the youngest scorer in a Cup final when we beat Northampton to lift the Powergen Cup. We also won the Challenge Cup and finished top of the league, twice. It was a great time to be involved with the club. The team was exceptionally tight, and we had a great leader in Andy Deacon, a Gloucester man through and through.

My performances for Gloucester earned me a call up to the England squad and I was all set to make my debut but a late injury to Jonny Wilkinson meant they needed to bring a kicker in, so Tim Stimpson came in and I went out. Phil Larder once recommended me to Martin Johnson when we were working together at Worcester, but he lost his job after the 2011 World Cup and that was that.

That said, I don’t have any regrets. Rugby has been very good to me. As well as my six seasons at Gloucester, I had five enjoyable years with Worcester, where the late John Brain, god bless his soul, coached me. John is probably the best coach I played for, his knowledge of the game was without parallel. I enjoyed playing with Miles there. People said he was the powerhouse and I was the speedster. It’s a mystery how he never got to play for England.

Neck surgery, followed by a bad groin injury, ruined my third and last season at Castres and ultimately finished my playing career, although I am still involved in rugby with Jamaica who have just qualified for the Sevens World Cup in San Francisco next year.

The dedication of the island-based players is a real eye-opener, some of them walk five hours to get to training. It is truly humbling and makes me thankful for everything that I have had.