‘Horse’ is hot to trot after injury-hit start at The Rec

BATH signing Will Muir hopes to be able to demonstrate his thoroughbred status once the 2020/21 Premiership season kicks off on November 20.

Nicknamed ‘The Horse’ by his former England Sevens team-mates for his long-striding running style, Muir arrived at The Rec in mid-August but was prevented from making his debut after the season restarted due to back-toback injuries.

But the 24-year-old Yorkshireman is nearing the end of his recovery and is eager to show he can follow in the footsteps of another Sevens convert, Ruaridh McConnochie, and make a big impact at The Rec.

Winger Muir, right, said: “When I joined Bath, I was coming back from a hamstring injury that I’d been rehabbing over lockdown but after a couple of weeks of integrating and getting up to speed, I tore something in my quad in one of the training sessions.

“That kept me on the sidelines for a few weeks and I’m only starting to get back into it, which has been frustrating.

“Everything off the pitch has been good with the lads, the city and everything else, now I just want to get things sorted on the pitch. I’ve done a lot of analysis and reviews but there is nothing like getting involved and doing it for real. I just want to get stuck in now.

“I played 15s at (Northumbria) university and straight after that I did a few training sessions and played the odd A League game with the Falcons before having two years with England Sevens. But 15s and Sevens is a whole different game, and it is going to take some time for me to acclimatise.”

Powerfully-built, Muir – 6ft 2in and 14st 11lb – effectively replaced McConnochie in the England Sevens setup two years ago when the latter started his successful transition to 15s with Bath.

And he could cover him again if Eddie

Jones does a selection U-turn and hands McConnochie a third England cap at some point in the future. “When I first went to Sevens, it was when Ruaridh was just leaving so I guess Simon (Amor, England Sevens head coach) was looking for someone with a similar build and similar attributes. “He’s the most inform player in the Premiership, he can’t stop scoring, and he goes out of his way to help me with the fundamental stuff.”

The university route is one that more young pros are going down to give them something to fall back on if professional rugby doesn’t work out.

Muir studied mechanical engineering at Northumbria and recently paid a visit to the McLaren headquarters in Woking.

While blown away by the place where F1 dreams are made, Muir is determined to put himself in pole position for a good year at Bath.