If we had Battle of Gnoll now we’d all be in jail!
I’M nearly 25 years married now and a lot of what I achieved in the game couldn’t have been achieved without the support of my lovely wife, Diane. When I was selected to play for the British and Irish Lions in 1997, for example, the tour clashed with our wedding date but she didn’t mind me postponing it until after we got back from South Africa – she had no choice! When you’re a Welsh boy and you’ve got a chance to play for the Lions, nothing else matters. I returned home on the Tuesday, got married on the Saturday and joined up with Richmond the following Monday.
I was only third or fourth choice hooker in Wales and only had one cap to my name when everyone was speculating who’d make the Lions squad so neither Diane or I envisaged there would be an issue over my availability at the altar!
But my agent, Mike Burton, said there were rumours that I was going to get in and that Fran Cotton was flying out to France to watch me play for Wales A. Everything went well that night and he came up to me afterwards and shook my hand and said, ‘well done’. I thought he was just being polite but the letter with the Lions crest embossed on it came and I opened it up and it said I’d been selected. I just couldn’t believe what was happening. You couldn’t put it into words. It was just really humbling. I am sure the whole of Llandovery knew I had the letter because the postmen were all talking! It’s a small little town and everyone knows everyone.
Unfortunately I never played in the Tests in South Africa despite being on the bench in all three, but it was still a trip with loads of good memories. Earning the respect of Martin Johnson was one of them. Because I wasn’t a really well-known player, he kept his distance at first. But when I had my first start against Western Province and proved myself that day, he bought me a lot of beers and told me how well I’d played. Moments like that made me feel a huge part of the tour. He was a proper captain, he was one of the boys but not one of the boys, an in-between man, someone to act as a link between the players and the coaches.
Ian McGeechan and Jim Telfer were such clever coaches. We were in training camp for about a week and we were doing bits of everything and I was thinking ‘what’s our game plan here’? But on the last day they brought it all together and it all made sense. It was good cop, bad cop with those two. Telfer was a big man for rucking and he used to hold a stick out which you had to go under to make sure you were entering the ruck low enough. If you hit it, he would smash you with it! He was some man.
My rugby career had taken off after I’d moved to Neath. I’d played a couple of games for the first team at Llandovery and was in the Wales age group sides coming up and all these clubs were promising me the world – this was in the days of boot money – when Brian Thomas of Neath rang me up on a Sunday night, and said, ‘if you ever want to play for Neath, be down the club at half past six on Tuesday night’. I did and the rest is history.
Players who lived on the edge went to Neath. That ability to look after yourself served us in good stead when we played South Africa in what is known as The Battle of the Gnoll. That was probably the most violent game I played in. You had to join in to look after yourself. Yeah, ok, it went over the top, people running 50 yards to get involved in things. If it happened now, you would be in jail.
To be surrounded by such big characters as a 19-year-old was brilliant. Gareth Llewellyn was there at the time, as was Brian Williams. He was a freak of nature, 13 stone dripping wet but able to lift 150kilos.
The first training session, the boys told me where to sit in the changing room, and it was next to Brian’s spot. He came in and said, ‘do you speak Welsh?’ and I said, ‘about 75 per cent’ and he proceeded to ask me a load of questions about where I was from etc. He must have liked what I said because he took me under his wing and really looked after me. I was his ‘apprentice’. He always had the beer kitty and I had to go to the bar for the beers. Trouble was, by the time I’d got back to my seat to drink mine, he’d have finished his and I’d have to get another round.
With Wales, I won 24 caps and possibly could have won more but moving to England seemed to count against me. The first cap is the one you always remember. Mine was against France at the old Cardiff Arms Park and I scored after just 40 seconds from a pick-and-go in the middle of the pitch. Kingsley Jones always says it was him who pushed me over the line.
Going to Richmond was a no-brainer with the money they were offering (£130,000-a-year). I was only on peanuts at Neath, about £10,000-a-year. When I handed Diane the fax with what Richmond were offering to pay me, she looked at the money and said, ‘I think we are moving to London, aren’t we?’.
Moving to London was a big change in life. I enjoyed my time at Richmond but it didn’t help me with my Wales career and it was the same at Bristol when I went there after Richmond had gone bust.
Bob Dwyer was there at first and things went well but in the second year under Dean Ryan, who’d taken over from Bob, things didn’t really go to plan. It didn’t matter how well I played, I couldn’t get a game.
In 2001, I returned to Wales to rejoin Neath (they bought me back for a lot less than they sold me for five years earlier) before becoming part of the first Ospreys squad. When I took over captaincy of Ospreys from Scott Gibbs and my son was born, I said I wanted to put Wales on the backburner and not spend so much time away.
Mike Ruddock rang me on numerous occasions asking me to reconsider my decision but not only did I have duty to my young family but also to the Ospreys.
Leading the team to the Celtic League title in 2005 and being the first player to 100 caps were two more proud moments in my career. When I lifted the trophy at the Gnoll in 2005, it brought tears to my eyes because I realised that I had made the right decision turning my back on Wales. There were more than 10,000 in there and the place was rocking. It reminded me of the old Neath days with people banging the boards. We won the league one more time in 2007 before I called it a day.
When I look back, I was probably playing ten years ahead of my time. I liked to play a looser game, I was more like a frustrated back than a forward, although I never shied away from the confrontational stuff.
My strengths were my mobility, and maybe that’s what Fran Cotton liked about me. I always liked to offload, I would try not to die in contact. If I could get my hands free, I would and put other people into spaces.
I think rugby has gone boring now, in Wales anyway. I don’t watch as much. I like watching the Top 14 in France and the English League, but the PRO14 – or whatever it’s called now – is sh*t. For me, if you want to develop as a Welsh player, you have to prove yourself across the border.
“If you want to develop as a Welsh player, you have to prove yourself across the border”