George is ready for his club trial
Kyran Bracken reports on his progress of transforming Wanstead scrum-half George Hardy, 28, into a professional inside 12 months
We are reaching the crucial stages for George in his training where we can begin to think about seeking a trial for him in the next two months.
The principles this month have remained the same – breaking down old habits and re-training George’s neurological traits.
It is so important to get your body and mind ready for any circumstance in rugby if you want to be a dangerous back, and with the speed George possesses he certainly should be considered that. Not just with his passing but his physical speed, also.
In a discussion I had with Olympic sprinter Jamie Baulch many moons ago he told me one way he would coax his body into achieving more speed was to train running downhill. As funny as the image that may conjure up, the method effectively gets your legs to adapt to a speed your body would not usually be capable of sustaining.
Those same principles apply when it comes to passing from a scrum-half ’s perspective. And through repeating these methods, you can see the change occurring in George month after month, week after week, session after session.
We worked as a group on the weekend sessions with George and my three boys running through drills, and me giving them some encouragement or giving a pointer on technique. In the car home, the boys said to me how they are seeing themselves George getting better.
With the Championship kicking off last weekend, the time is approaching for him to go on trial in the coming weeks because injuries will happen and clubs will never want to be short of scrum-half stock.
What will matter is how up to speed he is with the nuances of a team’s tactics and how ready he is for the pressure that comes with having a No.6 wanting to nail you at the base of a ruck.
We knew this was all part of the process, building his skills for in-game application.
When it comes to trials, some people don’t even make it past the first week because they would do the training but then think ‘holy s***, I can’t do this’.
From the outset, I have believed in George’s capabilities and think he’ll be a fit for the topend of the English rugby system.
I think professional rugby has moved on from the kind of trials there were in my day.
Now some players could be with a club for onwards of two to three months and it would be good to get George to a club before the end of the season or for the start of next season that will go into 2022 at Championship level, or possibly National League One.
There is certainly an opportunity for George, a chance for him to be looked at properly and for him to train with members of a squad to see if they would be a good fit. It would not just be one session and then a decision made on that basis.
“Pressure comes with having a No.6 wanting to nail you at a ruck”