Jonny: My Autobiography (25 page)

If someone offered me the chance to fast forward five hours now, I’d snap it up. If you could tell me I get through the game OK, I’d take it. I’d miss the whole playing experience just to be sitting back here, knowing it had gone well enough to appease my fears and I’d survived the ordeal.

By the time we get to the game, I’ve expended so much mental energy, I tell myself again I really need a break. This time after the game, I’ll definitely ask for a fortnight off.

But the moment I’m on the pitch, my anxiety lifts and the instinctive, competitive spirit kicks in, and all the training and hard work starts to pay off. We beat South Africa 29–9. I kick seven penalties.

This is how international rugby is for me now. And I never ask for that fortnight off.

If there is an answer to Newcastle’s Heineken Cup campaign, it probably comes in the form of Epi Taone – Tongan, massive, brought over by Inga. He is lethal. He is our Lomu. We play him on the wing or in the back row. He
is as fast as any of our wingers and bigger than any of our forwards, yet he can step, he can pass, anything. All we need to do is keep him under control and he is an absolute dream.

We play Toulouse at home and Epi just blows them away. On receiving one kick-off, we work the ball back from the ruck, I throw a miss-pass to Epi as he appears late into the line, running from out to in, and Toulouse don’t see him coming. He shrugs one tackler, steps another and is clear. He then hands off Xavier Garbajosa, and Garbajosa’s quick so he gets back for another go and Epi hands him off again. He goes 85 metres and we score straight from the move. We beat Toulouse 42–9.

But that is a rare glimmer of joy. We play Leinster back at home, or rather at Headingley, because Kingston Park is frozen, and it’s a tight, physical game. Clive Woodward is watching from the stands.

At 10–10 their scrum half breaks blind, close to the try line. I’m one of two defenders against three attackers. I try to read the move, take a gamble and commit myself, but the scrum half darts through the gap inside me.

I have to leave the pitch because of a four-inch gash to the back of my head. In the physio’s room, Sparks has to hold the sides of the cut together so that the doctor can put in ten stitches to hold it.

After 20 minutes, I get back on to the pitch for the close of the game. We are still seven points behind, but we are dominant and pressing, and finally, with a minute or two to go, Tom May works an opening on the right, which puts Inga over for the try. The conversion ties the game but I miss it. We get one more shot but Brian O’Driscoll smashes me into touch as I go for the corner.

Afterwards the disappointment is intense. I feel responsible. I’ve let down my teammates, who have worked so hard and deserved more. I feel totally
responsible for the try we conceded. I stay on the field with Sparks. I feel so angry I cannot leave.

Clive comes over, I think to say hard luck, but I am totally absorbed in myself and somewhat rude. I don’t even look up and Sparks has to cover for me. He explains that I’ve got a bad head. But Clive won’t be surprised. He’s seen me like this before.

To work it out of my system, I’m out kicking the next morning. I take 10 balls and hit 50 kicks from the spot where I missed. It’s not great training but it does a holding job on my demons for a few hours.

That night I struggle to sleep. It’s always that way after a disappointing game. On the second night, when I’m not so tired, I’m not buzzing from the game and my mind is clearer, I lie awake, picturing the action and thinking about what I could have done better. It can take hours to process everything. Images endlessly float round my mind. At 5am, I finally drop off and escape the torture.

I sit down to reassess and, on A3 paper, under the title ‘From Here On In’, I write out in long hand where I stand:

Goals

About Newcastle Falcons, I write:

We are in the particularly fragile position of possessing the strength, spirit and ability to win things and become legends in the game – but not realising it. The time we have left as a team to recognise this fact and succeed this year is short and running out fast … We must recognise the advantaged position we are in and make a commitment … There must be a general consensus that to underperform due to lack of drive and preparation is not acceptable … Every time I think of kicking the ball out on the full from a kick-off, or missing touch from a penalty, I feel sick in my stomach from knowing my hard work throughout last week, last year and my life has not been repaid or worth it … To walk into the club after a game and to be approached by fans wanting autographs is a real character test, for if my mistakes and ill performances were to be from lack of hard work or preparation, I would not be able to accept the pen to sign … To feel like I am not progressing in my dream to learn and develop and be the best hurts me as much as it hurts to wonder if the confidence that the players like Inga and Gary have in me ever wavers when I underperform … To know that, come May, we will be saying goodbye to Inga and Pat scares me because I know we have a choice on how we say goodbye to them and I want so badly to be able to say it with medals in their hands.

Sometimes, though, all the hard hours do pay off. The start of the 2002 Six Nations is one of those times.

We play Scotland and win 29–3. A fortnight later against Ireland it feels even better. For 60 minutes, we are flying. We are able to run with the ball, play what is in front of us and everything seems to make sense. I get the chance to run and take people on and vary my game.

And I say thank you, Blackie. Days like this show that everything we do is worth it.

We score six tries against Ireland, and Austin displays his skills. He works best as an opportunist, a floating decision-maker, and I feel his presence. He tells me put it over the top. So, without needing to look, I chip the ball in behind them. He collects it and comes up just short of scoring. He is an outstanding reader of the game.

But then we play France, and they have a plan that works. They send a flyer out on me, just to try
to stop the ball from ever going outside. They try to shut me down and take me out of the game. Even if I pass the ball, they hit me to the deck and hold me down while the game moves on.

Serge Betsen, their number seven, sticks to me the whole game. Usually, if a guy flies out of the line like this, it’s brilliant because it means that they are defending individually and you’ve got opportunities elsewhere. But when Betsen goes, the reaction of everyone else in their team is so urgent. They come out so fast it’s like their lives depend on it.

For me, that is a challenge, one that fires every competitive instinct. But I can’t lose my head. I can’t go and smash someone or just sort this out myself. Instead, I have Clive in my head – build the score, direct the game.

But we can’t build anything because, at home in front of their passionate fans, they are too good at preventing us from doing so. They play very, very well, and it’s actually in attack where they really win the contest. They exploit a couple of minor lapses of concentration in our defence and score two good tries. Five points behind, we cannot claw our way back.

It hurts. It always does when you want something that badly, but there is no fast-acting cure for the pain. It goes down as another lesson – you can go in with the greatest game plan but if it’s not effective, you’ve got a very small window to adapt. So we work on our on-field communication, how to stop the rot. We focus on how to evaluate and change tack, and we set about understanding how to do this under the most severe pressure, when the noise and panic around you are at their height.

If there are any immediate smiles to be found on this day, they come from Henry Paul, another of my heroes from rugby league, who has made his debut and has a first-cap song to sing. We ask him to sing the ‘Paul Brothers Rap’, which he wrote with his equally famous rugby-playing brother, Robbie. He responds by giving it to us there and then outside the function room where we are due to have our post-match meal. Brilliant.

Then we get a song from Jason, who is over a year into his England career but has still never sung. When you respect a guy that much, it doesn’t feel right to abuse him in such a way. Jason is alone in having the freedom to choose when he would like to perform for the boys. The way he delivers ‘Saturday Night at the Movies’, I don’t know why he kept us waiting.

Just once in my career have I consciously moved out of the way of a tackle – and that was to help Inga. The only problem is I’m not strong enough.

We are playing Leeds and Inga annihilates Japie Mulder, the Springbok centre, with a massive hit. But in knocking him flying, Inga gets his head caught slightly on the wrong side, takes a blow to the face and thumps down hard on to the wet, sandy ground.

Leeds recycle the ball and come round the corner straight into my channel, but I’ve still got an eye on Inga and, instead of making the tackle, I move over to where he is because he hasn’t moved. He’s been knocked unconscious, he’s face down in a puddle and I think he’s drowning.

I hook my fingers underneath him and try to roll him, but the guy is
just so heavy, it’s impossible. I can’t shift him. I can see he’s looking at me out of the side of his eye, he can’t move. It takes Pat Lam to come over and together the two of us just about manage to roll him.

But Inga, being Inga, recovers quite fast. The call from the medics is you need to go off. The response from Inga is no, I’m fine.

I think it’s a pride thing. He now wants to set the record straight.

Boy am I going to miss this man when he’s gone. I will always remember his spirit, his phenomenal presence on the rugby field and the hand of friendship he extended to me. And I will also remember the day when he was introduced at a rugby dinner as ‘the greatest name in rugby history’ and ‘a household name we will never, ever forget’ by an MC who then asked the audience to give ‘a round of applause to Egoo Toogamooloo’.