MY LIFE IN RUGBY

Swansea was my club for 13 years (19821993, making 179 appearances) and I coached them for four years after that as well. The year I was captain (1992) we won the Western Mail Trophy, as the highest scoring team in any division of the Heineken Leagues, and we were also losing finalists in the Welsh Cup twice. Sadly, rivals Llanelli denied us the double second time around when they beat us 16-7 at the Arms Park.

Mike Ruddock had just come on board as coach and we had a good period of success, including a win over Australia. A 10,000 crowd packed into St Helens that day, and you could see people watching from their balconies overlooking the ground. Australia were world champions at the time so obviously they were a big draw.

The pitch at St Helens was always in superb nick and suited our fast-paced style; we always felt we had the pace and mobility to outrun the opposition, and we’d go wide on first phase more times than not. But the conditions dictated that we had to play a different game that day, which, with the likes of Richard Moriarty and Paul Arnold in the side, we were quite capable of.

I was fortunate to play alongside club captain David Richards when I first broke into the senior team in my late teens while I was still a student at South Glamorgan Institute. We were both quite similar in that we were fast on our feet and elusive, whereas Scott Gibbs was a good foil for me later on in my career; he always gave you goforward or freed up space for others by visually tying in defenders.

Those days, the links between the club and local community were really strong and it was great to be a part of that. It was also really good to go over the bridge and play the likes of Bristol, Gloucester, Bath, Leicester and Moseley, who were a top team at the time.

All seven of my Wales caps (1985-1987) came while I was at Swansea, including two at the first Rugby World Cup. I think seven us went to New Zealand and Australia from the club. My main memory of the World Cup was how intense it was with the five-day turnarounds. We didn’t really get to see much of either country until spending ten days on the Gold Coast leading up to the 3rd place play-off against Australia. I got to play in two matches, starting against Tonga, when Glen Webbe scored a hat-trick, and then coming off the bench against Canada.

I’d missed out on playing Tonga the summer before, not that it was a game anyone would’ve particularly wanted to play in; it was brutal. I’d done my hamstring three days into the tour and was sat on the sidelines while all hell broke loose on the pitch. Quite a few of our players were knocked unconscious and I spent most of the game as a medical escort, chauffeuring our injured players to and from hospital. It’s probably a good job the video tape of that match disappeared.

Later that year, I played against USA, but a calf injury cut short my involvement and Tony Clement came into the side and did really well. I was out for about the next two months and never managed to get back in.

As a coach, I was much more successful in terms of silverware won, winning two Cups with Swansea and the League alongside Mike. A couple of years after regional rugby came in, I got the DoR role with the Ospreys, overseeing operations with Lyn Jones and Sean Holley in charge of the team. I did go on to do some hands-on coaching with Aberavon and Dings Crusaders in Bristol which was really enjoyable. But for the last decade I’ve been working full-time as sports academy coaching co-ordinator at Pembrokeshire College.