43 SAM WARBURTON RETIRES
This was both big news and sad news. Big because it highlighted how brutal and dicult professional rugby has become for the athletes.
Warburton was a tough openside, a great player and he was forced to give the game up at age 29 because his body was eectively broken.
He’d come back from multiple injuries during his career but he couldn’t find a way back to the playing field after he’d captained the Lions to an historic series draw with the All Blacks.
So it was sad news indeed that such a fine young man had to give up the game he loved, just a year out from a World Cup.