Celebrating >> Llandovery
Brendan Gallagher continues his series looking at rugby’s great schools
IT says much of the contribution of Llandovery College to Welsh rugby that an institution currently producing the likes of Alun Wyn Jones, George North and Wales Women’s captain Carys Phillips were also involved in the first recorded game of rugby in Wales when they played St David’s College Lampeter at the neutral venue of Caio in 1866.
Despite diligent research by historians the result of the match has yet to be established, only that it took place although under the scoring systems that existed there is a strong possibility that it was a draw. The Llandovery College Journal referred to the game some 15 years later mentioning that many of the students, unable to afford a horse and cart, walked the nine miles to Caio to support their team and, of course, walked the nine miles back that evening.
All this was some 15 years before the Welsh Rugby Union was established in 1881 and since then the College has produced a steady flow of outstanding players to span the decades and indeed centuries. They have also established a reputation for developing a certain kind of player, individuals who play with panache and West Walian style.
Up front they have also produced some mighty unyielding forwards as well – the aforementioned AW Jones, Rhys Stephens, Peter Rogers, Andy Powell, Craig Quinnell, Nathan Thomas, Rhdori Jones and the former Wales captain Gywn Jones.
An early prototype of that calibre of forward was Charles Nicholl, an athletic hard case forward who won 15 caps in five years and helped Wales to their first Four Nations championship and Triple Crown in 1893.
Nicholl won four rugby Blues at Cambridge while a student at Queens College and an athletic Blue for throwing the weight and was by all accounts a bit of a party animal. In the official history of the WRU he was described as “the most distinguished member of the least distinguished College fond of smoking and a connoisseur of exhilarating beverages in which strength rather than delicacy of bouquet is the predominant feature”.
Llandovery was also a rugby crucible of sorts for Carwyn James although, even though he ranked second only to Cliff Morgan among contemporary Welsh fly-halves, he was not hired for his rugby prowess.
The school felt it was getting away from one of its mission statements – to impart a love of the Welsh language and culture on its students – so James was head hunted to become the head of their Welsh Department. As part or that remit Tuesday nights became Welsh night with Welsh speaking luminaries from the world of sport, art, literature and acting being invited to address the students while at one stage James also introduced Welsh folk dancing onto the curriculum.
While at Llandovery, using their facilities to get very fit, he was a star turn for Llanelli and won his two Welsh caps while, after retiring – and having his Saturday’s free – he became the regular First XV coach. That proved a great success and less than three years after leaving the school he was coaching the Lions to their 1971 series win over New Zealand.
Until 2013 the match that always loomed largest was the annual battle with Christ College Brecon, one of the oldest continuous fixtures in the UK dating back to 1879 which took place every October half-term.
For a century or more it had been the fiercest of rivalries, but with Llandovery getting stronger and stronger from the start of the Millennium and offering ‘rugby scholarships’ to outstanding prospects – George North won a Carwyn James scholarship to attend the school – the gap between the schools started to grow too large, physically as much as anything, and they mutually decided to discontinue the game at U18 level.
Much tradition was lost with the fixture. On the eve of the game First XV players were awarded special match day socks and required to put them on there and then and wear them until after the match ended the following day while there was the strange tradition of the Brecon Monkey, a stuffed toy monkey dressed in splendid rugby gear, which the schools ended up competing for.
The story goes that a past warden of Llandovery College had a pet monkey which was kidnapped by pupils from Christ College who killed it and buried it in a coffin in their grounds. Llandovery College pupils exhumed the body and returned the monkey to its rightful resting place in their college grounds.
Since then, the College mascot has been a stuffed monkey which is kept under lock and key in a glass case in the main entrance hall. It was released once a year, during the week of the Brecon match, into the safekeeping of the First XV captain who was expected to return it straight after the game. Brecon had to bring a small coffin which, in the case of them winning, they used to transport the toy monkey home. Boys will be boys.
Raids across the border have always been part of the Llandovery DNA both at Sevens and Fifteens with Carwyn James in particular looking to strengthen the Fifteens fixture list during his time in charge. Regulars at Rosslyn Park, they won the Open title in 1952 under the coaching of TP Williams, in 1970 when Goronwy Morgan was in charge and in 1992 when Iestyn Thomas – who had learned his rugby under Carwyn James – masterminded an outstanding season.