Ludlam wants to build on World Cup buzz
AFTER a rollercoaster year in which he went from fighting for a new club contract to representing England at the World Cup, battling flanker Lewis Ludlam is ready to lead Northampton’s charge for silverware.
Ludlam celebrates his 24th birthday today in the knowledge he has an outstanding future ahead of him after achieving great things for club and country in 2019 – and there is no doubting his drive for selfimprovement as Saints ramp up their bid for glory.
“One year ago, I was just hoping to play for the club and win a new contract – then you go from that to actually being disappointed not to be playing in a World Cup final,” Ludlam, who featured in four of England’s six World Cup matches, told The Rugby Paper.
“It’s obviously been a bit of a rollercoaster, but I’m grateful for the opportunity I was given by Eddie Jones to play on such a big stage. It was a dream come true, one that probably came earlier than expected, but what an experience.”
What did Ludlam take most from his World Cup experiences? “How to play under pressure and how to take the pressure off myself,” he replies. “That’s been the biggest learning for me over the last year, with Chris Boyd coming in at Northampton and telling me to just go out and express myself.
“If I’m not over-thinking things, that’s when I play my best rugby, so I just tried to take that into the England camps and then into the World Cup in some real high-pressure games.
“I try to be instinctive because you can’t second guess yourself, especially in my position where if you miss a beat or are just half a second too late, you miss out. It’s about relaxing, being natural in my game and having the confidence to rip in.”
Ludlam, below, accepts that having performed in the World Cup, he must now redouble his efforts at club level. He added: “I guess there’s external pressure more than anything now. For me, it’s about being a better player than I was last week.
“There was pressure before the World Cup where I’d see messages from people saying ‘you shouldn’t be involved’ or
‘he hasn’t achieved anything for his club yet’, so there’s always that pressure, but I just try to block it out or use it as fuel, which is a good thing. “The good thing about the Saints game plan is it allows us all to express ourselves. We play with some structure, but that structure allows us to play what’s in front of us.” With Saints on top of the Premiership and in the middle of back-toback Champions Cup matches against Leinster, Ludlam is not prepared to hide his club’s ambitions of adding to last season’s Premiership Cup success.
“It’s a very exciting place to be,” he said. “It’s much easier to come back into a winning team – and we’ve got a young, really vibrant squad to go with it.
“Quite a few of us have played together since we were 15 or 16, so to go out with these boys knowing we’ve got a chance to achieve something special is a really pleasing thing.”