It was an honour to reach the 400-mark MY
IF I am being honest I never grew up dreaming of playing for Pontypridd, not even once let alone 401 times (one of only seven players to do so in the club’s 150year history). My family were all big Cardiff supporters, so as a child I went to watch them quite a bit and also Bridgend, where I was born and brought up, in Pencoed. Pontypridd was never really on my radar as they were rivals of both teams, but when I was in the Celtic Warriors academy I got to know the Pontypridd players and I quickly fell in love with the place and the supporters, who are the best there is in Wales in my opinion. Needless to say, I am very happy with the way things have worked out.
Pencoed Comp had a good rugby reputation – Gareth Cooper went there and Sam Costelow and also Tommy Reffell out of the current crop of Wales internationals. My P.E teacher was Simon King, who was also my first head coach at Pontypridd. I was devastated when the Warriors disbanded because we had a great set of boys, a really strong academy and we all had to go our separate ways. It was a mad time really. I got offers from Bridgend RFC, the Ospreys and Cardiff academies and
Pontypridd and it was because of the connection with Simon that I chose to go there. Even now when I see him down my local club Tondu RFC, it is strange not to call him ‘Sir’!
Simon and Dale McIntosh, ‘The Chief ’, were the two biggest influences on my career; I owe a huge debt to both of them. Dale was the first person to make me captain at Ponty and if he’d have told me to run through a brick wall, I would have run through a brick wall for him: the whole squad would have said the same. He knew how to put a squad together, how to push our buttons. We were all young and looked up to him, we still do now, and he was very good for the environment being Ponty through and through. He was brilliant off the pitch but away from it as well, he’s always been willing to offer you guidance and he loved a beer so the social side was brilliant.
While the Chief has a well-deserved ‘hard man’ reputation, I was never an enforcer, or the type of old-school second-row that my Gramp would talk to me about. Flying into rucks and doing all the hard, dirty work … I was never that way inclined; I was a centre/ full-back until I was 18 and I just loved getting my hands on the ball. If you look at any of my clips for Pontypridd nine times out of 10 I’ll be carrying the ball on the edge making breaks and trying things like a chip and chase. Being a ball-player, it was music to my ears when Mark Hammett arrived at Cardiff Blues from the Hurricanes and said he wanted one second-row and one flanker to be in the wide, 15-metre channel. I’d loved the New Zealand style of playing since I was a kid.
My big thing as a player was to make sure you had no regrets, that you could walk off the pitch not thinking ‘if only I’d done this or that’. That’s what I say to the boys now that I’m a coach – make sure you give everything, enjoy yourself and don’t hold back. I was fortunate to lead the team to several League titles and Welsh Cup wins, doing the Double-Double back-to-back and playing in two British & Irish Cup semi-finals, sadly losing to Bristol and the Leinster (on try count) in both. Our supporters, the ‘Valley Commandoes’, travelled in huge numbers wherever we went, so that was a brilliant time and it led to me signing for the Blues.
It was mid-October time when the move came about. Blues had some injuries to the second row – Lou Reed and Bradley Davies was injured – and Dale had just gone up to coach as well, so they asked me if I fancied coming on board and offered me a twoand-half-year contract. I had to go away and think about it and obviously speak to my parents and wife because it was a big deal. Every kid in Wales wants to play professional rugby and I recognised it was a massive opportunity and after consulting with my family, it didn’t take long for me to decide to go for it. I was 27/28 at the time and it was probably a case of now or never really. I was working for the Military Preparation College at the time, as the head of the sports academy, so I had to give that up to go full in as a professional, Gethin Jenkins, Matthew Rees, Sam Warburton … quality players like that were there so I thought it would be brilliant to learn from them and hopefully pick up some games.
My first game was a Heineken Cup game against Glasgow. I’d only trained twice! Then I think it was the January after I signed that we had Toulon away. I remember running onto the pitch at Nice in front of a packed-out stadium of 40,000, the ‘Pilou Pilou’ chant was ringing out and they had stars like Jonny Wilkinson and Matt Giteau playing for them and I thought, ‘blimey, not long ago I was playing Carmarthen in front of 200 people, and now I’m here.’ It was incredible.
I was already a capped international at that time – for Cyprus – and the birthright transfer rule wasn’t in place so even though I’d played for Wales at U19 and U21 level there was never a chance of me achieving senior honours because the birthright transfer ruling wasn’t in place at the time. I was eligible for Cyprus because my grandfather on my dad’s side is Greek-Cypriot.
I enjoyed playing for them but it was hard for me to make myself available most of the time, what with me having a full-time job with the school. And obviously when I was at Cardiff, they took priority, so my four caps were spread out over 10 years. I made my debut against Luxembourg in 2011 and my last appearance was a few years ago against Croatia.
This will be my last season of playing with everything that has gone on. I became interim head coach of Ponty when all the coaching staff left following the club’s decision not to enter the new Elite Domestic Competition (EDC) and I’m delighted that the club have asked me to stay on in the role next season. We’ll have trips to places like Merthyr, Narberth and Brecon so I think it’ll be a good, tough league, and I don’t think it’ll be a bad thing for our supporters because we’ll have more home games. Some boys have chosen to leave because they have aspirations of playing in the
EDC, but that’s fine and I’m sure we’ll still be able to put a good team out.
Whether I have played my last game or not, I will look back on my career with nothing but pride, and I hope that I have made my family proud, too, because that’s always been my reason for playing. They have been with me by my side throughout this journey, and I can probably count on the fingers of one hand the number of games they have missed since my debut against Caerphilly in 2004. They’ve had to put up with my moods after a loss and the moaning when I can hardly walk after a game. I will always be so grateful for the sacrifices they’ve had to make along the way in order for me to reach the 400-game milestone, and to all the coaches, backroom staff, and as I said earlier, the supporters. There is nothing better than hearing the ‘Ole, Ole’ chant ringing out. It’s even better than the Pilou, Pilou!
“My four caps for Cyprus were spread out over ten years”