FROM VATUKOULA TO T14 RUGBY
“A humble guy who always teams up with the underdogs”
FROM the dusty grounds, perched on a hill of Korowere in Vatukoula to the city of love, John Augustine Dyer has turned a new leaf in his rugby career after securing a place with Racing 92 in France.
The humble yet resolute son of retired gold miner – Tom Dyer, and grandson of Macuata chief, the late Adi Senimili Dyer, Johnny, as he is commonly known in the gold mine area has added to the list of rugby products from Vatukoula.
Others include Sireli Bobo, the Kenatale brothers and Leone Nakarawa, who played at the same grounds at Theodore Park, the main gate and Korowere.
For Johhny, his dad described him as a humble guy who always loved to team up with the underdogs.
Recalling Johnny’s childhood days in Vatukoula, Tom said his son didn’t start playing with expensive rugby ball brands such as Kooga, Gilbert or Mitre.
He started playing with crumbled empty plastic bottles of cooking oil or juice bottles and considered himself Jonah Lomu, as a boy who idolised the late All Blacks wing.
“Johnny is a gifted rugby player because he was good at rugby from his childhood days even before he started primary school,” Tom said.
“Every school day, he would wait for his older brother and friends to come back from school, get them together and divide them into teams. He would always tell them that he is Jonah Lomu.
“He is a passionate rugby player but he loved to be with the unknown teams or the underdogs and bigger rugby clubs around the country have contacted him but Johnny preferred to be with the Vatukoula team.”
The Australian born, 27- yearold father of two and a Corrections officer who hails from Manuduitagi Estate in Macuata, also captained the under-11 Ba Province rugby team in the Milo Kaji rugby tournament.
He was also the player of this match that was held at Ratu Cakobau Park in Nausori in 2002 and was also the last match his dad watched.
“After doing his Year 12 at Tavua College, he wanted to work and didn’t want to pursue tertiary education because he told me he wanted to play rugby and pursue his rugby dreams,” Tom said.
“So I told him: ‘if you want to play rugby then go ahead but I won’t watch you play until you wear the coconut tree on your jersey’. I left that challenge with him and he has achieved it and we are so proud of him.”
When Johnny worked at the gold mines, he was the best jumbo operator and at 16 years of age, he played for the Vatukoula rugby team as a flanker.
“That time Vatukoula was still in the minor (FRU category) and when it moved up to the major category, he remained there until he started representing the nation in different teams,” his dad said.
“In 2015, he was chosen for the national team at the 2015 Rugby World Cup but as a non-travelling reserve and this year again. However, he kept the faith and never gave up so after 2015, he went to New Zealand to play for a few rugby clubs.
“A few clubs in Australia and NZ contacted him as well a few years ago but he negotiated for his rugby friends and asked the club executives to sign up his friends, whom he vouched for.”
His mum Cathy described him as: “Johnny is that kind of person, others first and him last,” she said.
“I remember when he was in rugby camps at Vatukoula and on Friday evenings he would bring his friends home to eat.
“So dinner is ready and we’re about to say our family evening prayers when he’ll enter the house but straight to the kitchen to carry our pot of food outside to feed his friends.
“When that happens, we know we have no choice but to drink tea and bread. We just give God the glory because all this has been made possible by him,” mum Cathy said.
Johnny played for the Fiji in the win over the Barbarians last month.