Ioan Lloyd: I’ve learned from the very best
IOAN Lloyd was starstruck during his first few weeks in Wales camp but says working with Leigh Halfpenny and Liam Williams has improved his game no end.
Lloyd, 19, is fresh off the back of his first international campaign and relished the chance to play against Georgia and Italy.
The Bristol playmaker, equally at home at fly-half and full-back, is now targeting a place in Wales’ Six Nations squad next year.
“It was so surreal going into training and working with Leigh,” Lloyd said. “It’s been amazing and hasn’t sunk in yet. It’s all a blur as it has all happened so fast.
“I’ve learnt a lot from Liam and Leigh in training. They’ve been massive in my development in terms of just seeing how much work they put into the finer details of their games.
“The work both put in with regards to their positional play, dealing with high balls and their defence is impressive. I’ve taken a lot from those two during this campaign.”
Lloyd has been a revelation for Bristol since making his Premiership debut last September and has not looked out of place at such a high level. Now he is working on ways to take his game to the next level.
He said: “At the start of camp I went in and set some goals for the future. I’ve had some chats with ( Wales coaches) Wayne Pivac and Stephen Jones and mapped out what I need to work on to kick on into the future.
“I’d love to make the Six Nations squad, but it’s important I don’t get ahead of myself and keep working hard for Bristol. We’ve got a great squad and there is a lot we want to achieve this season.
“I’ve always enjoyed goal kicking and it was great to have been given the goal kicking duties against Worcester. Hopefully, I can get more of an opportunity to take on that responsibility in the future, but for now I’m just thankful to be in the team.”
The former Ysgol Glantaf and Clifton College pupil is fortunate to be under the expert tutelage of Bristol boss Pat Lam.
Lam has made no secret of his admiration of Lloyd’s talents even going so far as to predict his protégée will wear the Wales No.10 shirt at the 2023 World Cup.
Lloyd admits he wouldn’t have achieved what he has without Lam’s guidance.
“Pat has been massive for my career,” he said. “He’s made everything I’ve achieved over the last 18 months possible. It’s surreal how fast everything has happened and I definitely couldn’t have imagined it.”