Broken but now bowed, the Dragons fight back
Had someone devised a table for the League of Broken Bones, the Dragons would almost certainly have finished last season top of the pile. According to their medical records, a total of 27 players underwent a total of 32 operations during the course of a campaign when the punishment on the pitch extended to those suffering on the touchlines.
Long months without a PRO14 win had the cumulative effect of inflicting wounds on fans groaning beneath the sheer weight of recurring defeat.
Sport’s perverse capacity for never failing to kick a man, or woman, when they’re down ensured that by the time they had negotiated the first month of last season, the Dragons had a casualty list that stretched to the equivalent of virtually two complete XV’s.
A total of 29 players had been left in various states of disrepair, an alarming number even allowing for the brutality of their trade. That left them with a minority of fit players, 25 in total from a squad of 54. While injuries are an occupational hazard for every club in the business and therefore a lame excuse for poor results, there could be no denying that the battered Dragons had been left seriously short of puff too often for their good.
Nobody felt the collective pain of losing matches more than Bernard Jackman, not least because his job depends on losing as few a possible. As head coach, the former Ireland hooker has taken pre-emptive steps to improve the durability of a squad reinforced fore and aft by introducing an ‘injury prevention strategy’.
“We have done a huge amount of work in the summer to make players more robust and make them more resistant to injury,’’ Jackman says. “We have brought in an expert in mobility and done a lot of wrestling and martial arts work.
“It’s all been designed to give the players the strength and the power to ride the big collisions. We had 19 players operated on last season and three (Tavis Knoyle, Nic Cudd, James Thomas) were out for the whole season.
“The only positive from last season was that we introduced a lot of young players. No fewer than 21 made their debuts and we used 64 in total. Even Leinster, with their vast resources, only used 55. The Dragons needed to be rebuilt.’’
The foundations have been consolidated by the signing of several internationals headed by Ross Moriarty, a capture made possible thanks to Dragons’ chairman David Buttress upping the ante after the Lion had rejected a dual contract from the Welsh Rugby Union whose ownership of the region rescued them from oblivion.
Home matches against Treviso next Saturday and the Southern Kings the following week offer the Dragons the prospect of a flying start even if Moriarty has to sit out the opener thanks to a ban for being sent off against Argentina in Santa Fe ten weeks ago.
There are other reasons for optimism beyond the arrival of Moriarty, Richard Hibbard, Rhodri Williams, Aaron Jarvis, Ryan Bevington and the Samoan lock Brandon Nansen from Stade Francais. Cory Hill’s decision to stay at Rodney Parade is the most optimistic reason of all.
Of all those capped by Wales during the last 12 months, none has made more of an impression than the Dragons’ second row, another in the phalanx of warriors to roll off the most productive assembly line in the game, the one Pon- typridd run at Sardis Road. Wales made Hill their captain for both winning summer Tests in Argentina.
Despite flourishing as an international second row, the 26-year-old from Maesycoed is keeping both feet firmly on the ground as a Dragon for at least two more seasons having signed a new contract.
“Cory has shown real loyalty and our negotiations with him were pretty easy,’’ Jackman says. “He could see a change taking place and wanted to stay. Cory’s is a great success story – let go by the Blues, went to Moseley, came back to Wales with the Dragons and became an international in his own right.’’
Hill heads up what Jackman calls “a leadership group full of hunger and passion, players who know what winning is all about”. The Rodney Parade faithful will roll up next Saturday in urgent need of reward for patience above and beyond the call of duty.
“The Dragons casualty list stretched to the equivalent of two complete XV’s”