Precocious Tshiunza targets Six Nations
MOST teenagers might feel a bit intimidated if they received a call from their national head coach asking them to join the squad with only an hour of senior rugby under their belt.
But Christ Tshiunza is not built like most teenagers.
The Exeter Chiefs lock relished his opportunity to play for Wales despite most of his career to that point having come at age grade and university level.
The powerful 19-year-old made his Test debut as a replacement in Wales’ uncomfortable win over Fiji this autumn while he was quietly impressive off the bench in victory against Australia.
Not content with that, the giant Tshiunza is now ready to kick on.
“I was just genuinely so happy to be there,” said Tshiunza. “There was not a single ounce of nervousness. I didn’t have it in me to feel any other emotion other than I was just so happy to be there. I ran out with a smile on my face and for the whole Fiji game I was playing with a smile on my face.
“On the day of the Fiji game I woke up to a little slip under my door from Gareth Williams, the assistant coach. It was a very kind letter. I knew him from Wales U20’s and we were quite close. The note just said I’ve got no pressure and just to relax and enjoy the day.
“Waking up to that and knowing that the coach just wants me to relax was good. I just pinned my ears back and went for it.”
Growing up in Cardiff, Tshiunza looked up to the likes of Alun Wyn Jones and fellow Whitchurch High School product Sam Warburton along with many members of the current Wales squad.
When he initially reported for training at Wales’ Vale of Glamorgan base, it was a surreal feel few ing for him to rub shoulders with players he had previously admired from afar. But Tshiunza insists any pre-conceived awkwardness didn’t transpire and he was made to feel at home from the moment he set foot in the Wales camp.
“I got along very well with Liam Williams, he looked after me, Dillon Lewis too and of course I knew Tomas Francis and Alex Cuthbert from Exeter,” Tshiunza said. “And Adam Beard helped me get up to speed.
“They were really good boys. I really liked the environment – it was really enjoyable. “There were a characters I thought would be more serious than they were which made me relax a bit. Going into that environment, in the back of my head I was thinking it would be really serious. But seeing boys like Nick Tompkins for example be a jokey person made me relax.”
To date, head coach Wayne Pivac has largely used his Wales tenure to blood young talent in order to build the required strength in depth to compete at the World Cup in 2023.
Tshiunza has joined the likes of Ben Carter, Taine Basham and James Botham as young forwards who have won their first caps in the Pivac era and he insists the faith Pivac has shown in him and other youngsters has given him the confidence to target a place in the forthcoming Six Nations, and 2023 World Cup squads.
“I was given a few rugbyspecific things to work on, but I think the main message was that this wasn’t just a one-off,” Tshiunza said. “I can’t just come back to Exeter and slack off saying ‘I’ve played two games for Wales, that’s it now’. The Six Nations is a genuine goal for me.”