GRAN GAVE ME VALUES THAT SERVED ME SO WELL, SAYS GRAY
She was a role model and the rock of our family
THE road winds back to Cambuslang. It always does for Jonny Gray. It is where the Scottish lock learned the game that now drives his substantial bulk.
It was a time, too, when he became aware that the wisdom of a grandmother can inform a life both on the pitch and in the greater expanse of the sidelines.
Only 15 years ago, Gray was a primary three pupil who, at seven years of age, had never touched a rugby ball.
‘I was staying in King’s Park and the dad of my best friend at the time played for Cambuslang,’ says Gray.
‘We were playing outside and he took us down to the club with another of our friends. He went upstairs and we went outside and started kicking and throwing the ball. I had never seen a rugby ball before but I was immediately hooked. The following week I was playing mini-rugby.’
Gray is now co-captain of a Glasgow Warriors team that has won the Guinness Pro12 and is now in the knockout stages of the Champions Cup.
He has also earned 29 caps for Scotland, most of them alongside his brother, Richie, who was encouraged by the enthusiasm of his younger sibling to take up the oval ball game, too.
But both Gray brothers owe a personal debt to family. They were brought up in a non-rugby home where dad, Douglas, was a football man.
‘I feel very lucky about a lot of things and particularly about the people I had around me, the family I have had. My gran especially was very supportive,’ he adds.
Jean Walker passed away in 2011 just as Richie was breaking through and Jonny was showing signs that he would join his brother at the elite level of the sport.
‘She was just a great role model,’ he says. ‘The family did not know anything about rugby but she became a fan because of Richie and me. Anything we did, she was very supportive. She always told us that if we wanted to do anything well, we would have to work very hard for it.’ Both Jonny’s parents worked, so he spent a lot of time with her. ‘She was incredible. The rock of the family, very motivating,’ he continues.
‘I still remember her vividly. She would not tell us anything about rugby, of course, but would talk about life in a wider sense. It was about what we had to do, the values you had to have, the morals you had to stick with, to treat others with respect. She was a very special woman.’
Gray is, similarly, an extraordinary young man. His sporting prowess is exceptional for someone of his relatively tender years.
His belligerence and confidence on the pitch, though, are not replicated off it. He is modest to an exceptional degree, uncomfortable with questions about how good he is or what he may achieve in the future.
This diffidence is marked by his introduction to this dishevelled hack with a gentle: ‘Hello, I’m Jonny.’
This is unusual. Sports stars normally expect to be recognised. But Gray takes his genuine humility into extended conversation. This is an 18-stone, international lock who blushes when asked when he knew he was a good player.
This is a character marked for leadership in the unforgiving trenches of professional rugby.
He deflects any hint that he may have special traits that have been recognised by Scotland’s Vern Cotter and Glasgow’s Gregor Townsend, coaches who make big decisions only after exhaustive deliberations.
But surely there was a moment when he thought he had a chance in this game?
He blushes, pauses and finally answers: ‘That is a hard question. Growing up, this is something I never thought I would be able to do, to be in this environment. This is something very special.
‘When Richie played at Glasgow (he is now at Toulouse), people were saying to me: “It will happen to you one day”. But I sort of laughed it off. I never thought it was true.’
And what of the captaincy of the Warriors placed on him by Townsend and the responsibility to call line-outs slipped on to his shoulders by Cotter? What does he think those coaches see in him?
He performs a sidestep worthy of Townsend in his playing days. He speaks about work, about everyone being in it together, about the coaches laying down templates for everyone to follow.
When pressed on the captaincy, he admits: ‘Yes, the trust is great. There is a lot of trust but that exists within the group at Glasgow and Scotland.’
He also points out that he is surrounded by experienced players at Glasgow such as Josh Strauss, Ryan Wilson and Rob Harley, who have experience of captaincy. He praises his co-captain Henry Pyrgos ‘a player with great knowledge and ability, a very good speaker.’
But does he feel any added burden, any apprehension, by being captain and calling the line-outs for club and country?
‘No, not nerves. I feel pride,’ he declares. ‘I love Glasgow, it is where I come from, it is where my family and friends come from, it is where I first played.
‘It is very, very special. It’s what pushes you harder. You want to make everyone proud, you want to do it for the jersey.
‘It can be pretty emotional. You want to do it for your family, for the people who supported you, for gran, for the coaches and for your team-mates.’
This is said with a quiet strength that dispels any unworthy notion of Gray playing a card of false modesty.
He may not give the answers one expects, and can avoid any that put him on any pedestal — but nobody can doubt the 22-year-old lock’s sincerity.
This extends his expressions of gratitude to those who have guided his journey from Cambuslang, to the national side and, perhaps, even to the British & Irish Lions.
Gray backs these words with action — often returning to the club to chat and to coach youngsters. He names his heroes quickly: ‘Martin Johnson, Al Kellock, Jonah Lomu. And Richie, of course.’
Kellock, the former Glasgow captain, mentored the young Gray.
‘I remember doing line-out sessions with Al when I first came in,’ he reveals.
‘I could not win a ball and he would sit down with me and tell me that I should have done this or called that.
‘Ever since Cambuslang, I’ve had people around me who I’ve been able to call on. I would not be here without them.’
Mike Blair, the former Scotland scrum-half and now Glasgow coach, works with him regularly after training, and Townsend is always
You want to do it for the jersey and make everyone proud
there to give advice. However, his brother, five years older, is the embodiment of two Jonny Gray passions: family and rugby.
‘The role models I have had have shown me how hard I had to work,’ he says.
‘I saw it first-hand with Richie. I saw what he had to do with his diet, his extras after training, his analysis. Even now he is working hard at his game.
‘I knew in my first training session with the guys at Glasgow that I had far to go. I still have lots to improve on.’
This attitude is reinforced when, with the now customary blush, Gray rejects any thought that he has targeted a place in the Lions squad to tour New Zealand this summer as one of his season’s targets.
‘Definitely not,’ he insists. ‘I want to enjoy where I am and improve what I am doing.’
He stretches to his full height to head to physio treatment. He came to lunch and this interview, after a squad training session which was followed by ‘some extras’ with Richie.
‘There were no excuses for me growing up,’ he admits. ‘I knew I had to work just watching Richie and we still stay on together after training, doing all sorts of stuff, line-outs, holding tackle bags whatever.’
Sitting in the Oriam centre at Heriot-Watt University, he is surrounded by the best of Scottish rugby union tucking into lunch, but the overtime with Richie is an unnecessary reminder of where both of them came from.
‘The coaches at Cambuslang wanted to make it fun,’ he recalls.
‘It was fun to learn. When the coaching finished, we would go and have our lunch then go back out and play again.
‘We just did what kids usually do, ran about and banged into each other.’
Gray is back in Cambuslang for a moment. In truth, he never left.