In harrowing extracts from his new book, rugby legend Mike Ross recalls the day his mother sat holding his brother, Andrew, after he died by suicide
Mike Ross recalls banishing the doubts in order to save his career
IT WAS the game that might have killed off my whole career. That same afternoon in Cardiff ’s Millennium Stadium I survived the first half. In the second half I was one of Leinster’s heroes. I went from zero to hero in my personal journey in the game. It was May 21, 2011. It was 5.30pm when we kicked off against Northampton Saints in the Heineken Cup final. More to my liking! I had a good lie-in, and everything I wanted to eat. I’d filled my head with my rock music. I needed it all, and more. My opponent was Soane Tonga‘uiha.
Yes, him! As monsters of human beings go, Soane Tonga‘uiha was the total package, not that that worried me in advance of the game. Big men, bad men, absolutely crazy looking dudes, I’d really seen them all by then and the important thing was, I wasn’t meeting them in some dark alley. It wasn’t a fist fight. Or a wrestling match, or some snarly mixed martial arts contest in the UFC. It was a scrum. Soane Tonga‘uiha…and me. 147 kilograms…and 124 kilograms.
23 stones and one pound… and 19 stones and seven pounds.
6 feet and 5 inches… and 6 feet and 2 inches.
Most rugby journalists were of the opinion that Tonga‘uiha could probably wreck a fast moving train all on his own. Same jury would consider unleashing a search party to pick up the bits and pieces of yours truly if I sought to deal with the same train. The man was Tongan-born. In Franklin’s Gardens they called him ‘Tiny.’
All through the 2010-11 season the Saints’ pack was handing out severe punishment to every single team they met, and Tonga‘uiha became pretty damned good on the other side of the scrum. They were destroying every other team. Their loosehead was lifting people out of his way and depositing them on the side of the road.
In the run-up to the final he was definitely occupying a lot of my thoughts.
If anyone had told me at some point before the final that the Saints and ourselves would have the sum total of 18 scrums in the game, then I might have started to worry. As it was, my opponent was taking up enough of my mental space. There’s no doubt he was the biggest loosehead I ever faced.
And, if we were not on a rugby pitch, he could break me into two pieces. If it was a bar fight, I doubt that I would come out of it looking particularly well.
Before the game, we’d consulted with the match referee Romain Poite and it seemed to be agreed that the Saints would not be allowed to try their hand at any arrowhead against us.
With Poite, however, we might as well have been consulting with the dressing-room door. He was the worst referee we could have had for that final. Poite sees what he sees, and for the first 30 minutes of the game Poite saw nothing wrong. In the next 10 minutes before half-time our pack started turning the corner.
At half-time, we were like men who had been helicoptered out of a life and death situation and had a brief reprieve before being returned to a jungle or a ravine or a war zone. We took our deep breaths. Me? Everyone was looking at me. Leo Cullen was asking me what the hell was happening? Actually, Leo had been asking the same question a few times out on the field as the Saints’ pack, and Tonga‘uiha in particular, had been manhandling us and driving us in every direction of their choice. It was not exactly like that, but I could not explain to Leo at half- time. I told him to give me a minute. I needed to think. In the sanctuary of the dressing room I quickly came to the realisation that I had been thinking through the whole situation far too much. I had made the decision from the very first scrum to go after the monster, before he came after me!
As a result, I had separated that bit from Straussy [Richardt Strauss].
I had tried to hit and chase Tonga‘uiha. A lot of their scrums started with him powering into me, and I thought it would be to my advantage to get him on the back foot. But that had given Dylan Hartley, their hooker the time to isolate me from Straussy.
It was the first huge final I had ever played in as a professional. Of course I was guilty of overthinking. It was the Heineken Cup final, a game I had dreamed about all of my life. I wanted it so badly and I thought… If I can get across the mark quickly… get him on the back foot? … we’ll be off!
I ended up too far ahead of Straussy.
Greg Feek told us at half-time, and showed us on his iPad, that the two of us needed to stay closer. Feeky warned me and Straussy… ‘Don’t let Hartley through between you two!’
Joe [Schmidt] was also being typically Joe and telling the whole team that there was very little that was going wrong. Joe liked to keep his words on the money, his messages easy to get into our thick, sweaty, near panicky skulls.
‘Just hold onto the ball!’ Joe kept repeating himself ‘Hold onto the…BALL… ‘HOLD ONTO THE BALL… just do that! ‘Don’t give them the ball… ‘Hold onto it!’ Right up to the last precious seconds, reminding us, as though our skulls were suddenly clad in the thickest of steel. ‘Just hold onto the ball… ‘HOLD ONTO… ‘THE BALL!’ My career was hanging by a thread.
As we walked back onto the pitch I understood that, the same as everyone watching. They led 22-6. They had crossed our try line in the seventh, 31st and 39th minutes. Dawson, Foden and Hartley had enjoyed those honours, while two penalties from Johnny Sexton in the 14th and 38th minutes had kept us barely alive.
There were 10 scrums in that first half. Eight more would follow. I had listened to Joe at half-time, but it was a voice in the distance. My own voice, in my head, was
charging around the place. This can’t be happening. We’ve been in holes before… how’d we get out? We have to work a way out of this! How?
We were trailing by 16 points at half-time.
People were looking at me getting beaten up. They figured I was getting murdered, that I was dead meat.
We were all close to dead meat, but people were looking at me more than anyone else in the scrum.
They had heard all about my ability to lock the Leinster and Ireland scrum and, now, they were looking at me getting… mangled, destroyed. With most people not knowing what the scrum is really all about, people must have been confused at half-time.
They must have been looking at me, thinking... Mike Ross... con job!
If we had lost that final it would have been an opinion that I would have shared. l Dark Arts: Mike Ross, An Autobiography is published by Hero Books and is available in all good book shops (€20.00).