Stade vs Toulouse

It’s been a tough start to a long week. Normally you find yourself playing three games in a week at the tail end of the season because of replayed matches or conflicts but in France this kind of packed schedule is normal in week three of the season.

It's always difficult to know exactly how to prepare for these games as you can't obviously ask your first choice in-form picks to play all three games. Back in the day that might have been possible but not in the modern game. In our first game against Toulouse the team really fronted up in the first 50 mins and played some great rugby. We had a few young guys starting their first big games for Stade, Alexandre Flanquart in the second row being one. We had prepared all week to catch Toulouse unawares as from the moment we announced our team it was met with criticism and more than a little derision. To win games like this it is of course down to what you do on the training field but more importantly in some respects what you do in the video analysis room. The little details and a bit more focus on the cerebral side of the game plan can beat a team even when seven of your internationals aren’t starting. When we were leading just before half timeI bet Toulouse couldn't believe this so called team of espoirs (‘hopefuls’) was beating the mighty Top 14 champions.

But Toulouse’s ultimate class and composure won in the end which was disappointing for Stade after fighting so hard. We have to take the positives out of this game but more importantly work on those areas that let us down, the scrum being one. I am sitting in Toulouse airport writing this feeling pretty battered and bruised. The first 80mins of the season always goes down like a poo flavoured lollypop for your body.

Castres on Wednesday is our next stop

Ben Kay’s Cooking Challenge

It’s not every day you get a phone call from a World Cup winning rugby player to ask if you would like to cook four dishes with a top Michelin starred Italian chef. Well, I received that call the other day from Ben Kay who is producing a book for Variety linking 21 top rugby players and me, to 21 world class chefs with the idea of creating a set of dishes for a cook book. Of course I leapt at the chance. Those who follow me on Twitter know that I am slowly getting into cooking and attempting to spice up the rather protein heavy meals Ollie and I cook in Paris.

The chef I was paired up with was a very energetic, extremely nice and very successful guy called Francesco Mazzei from l'Anima restaurant which specialises in fish done the Italian way (he’s won ‘Best London Italian Restaurant’ several times). So on a rainy Wednesday morning I made my way through the rubbish London traffic with my brother or PA/assistant/driver as he is known to east London to L'Anima.

What strikes you when you first walk into the kitchen is how amazingly clean and efficient everything is. I was met by Francesco straightaway who was a legend from the get-go. Having watched too much Kitchen Nightmares and The F Word I thought all chefs would be crashing around, swearing and making chaos. But he wasn’t like that at all, in fact he was a complete pro and even took time after we had cooked to show me how to chop and prepare things properly. He answered any question I had, which, true to form, was a lot.

The dishes we made together were lobster and tomato pasta (which is really simple when you break it down), langoustines and pasta and to finish, peaches in a Prosecco and lavender sauce. I was shown the end result then we went through the whole process which was awesome. A kitchen is so much like a rugby team with everyone doing their roles and a captain leading from the front. Francesco was great to work with and a real professional and you could see how much his team respected him, one stern look and things got done at lightning speed. I was a bit nervous about cutting into a live lobster as they are all legs and claws and very much alive, but never one to back down I dived straight in. One of the little tricks I learnt was just before you think your pasta is ready you should drain it but leave a little water in the pan, then put the pasta in with your sauce and continue to cook it so it soaks up all the flavour.

The end result was an incredible taste explosion that I ate in quick time, along with everything else that was left unattended. The day has ruined my cooking exploits forever though because I don't have any copper-bottomed pans, sharp knifes or famous chefs in my kitchen to help with my culinary exploits. So I am afraid Ollie, it’s back to Twitter videos and Jamie Olivier dishes.

Out Of Breath

The team arrived back from Tigne in the French Alps yesterday evening at 12.00am after a week at our pre-season camp, which included a game against Lyon. The Alps are amazing and the views breathtaking. ‘Breathtaking’ is unfortunately the operative word when you’re playing there though. Nothing does wonders for your confidence like arriving for a week packed with fitness drills and you walk up one flight of stairs and you end up wheezing like Dot Cotton. Altitude training is not fun at all. You have the same amount of training as normal but it’s five times harder because you can never catch your breath. A simple weights session has you out of breath and a short repeat running and tackling drill makes you feel like a lie down in an oxygen tent wouldn’t be such a bad idea.

The international players weren’t included in the match against Lyon, which was actually a blessing as playing at altitude, combined with pouring rain and a cold wind is not a great introduction back into competitive rugby. The game wasn’t great but a lot of the stuff we had worked on hard during the past two weeks (six for the non-internationals) started to show through when we were able to hang onto the ball. Pre-season camps have their merits, one of which is to bring the squad together and get everyone pulling in the same direction. You forge a bond through all training hard and living under each other’s noses for a week. If you don’t like hard work the squad quickly makes you realise that you need to pull in. Camp also gets a lot of the important meetings out the way, because as a player apart from seeing fitness test on the programme seeing loads of meetings is worse. We are supposed to be men of action, not words.

Pre-season In Tigne

At pre-season camp in Tigne there's usually an afternoon off which you look forward to filling with catching up with TV and movies on the Mac - anything that involves lying on your bed and not moving until food time sounds like a good idea. Well this dream is always shattered when you see the words "activity" on the programme. Last year in Tigne it was rock climbing which is pretty dangerous and not very restful but good fun all the same. This year white-water rafting was the order of the day. I was so shattered though that the thought of paddling up and down a river filled me with dread.

We arrived at the rapids and were told to change into our very fetching Stade Francais budgie smugglers. What is it about Europeans and their desire to wear Speedos or those mini shorts? - what happened to a pair of board shorts? So looking like a touring all-men’s team from Brighton we had to change into wetsuits, helmets and life jackets. We were split into teams, and for a change all the Anglo Saxons were put in a boat together. It’s amazing how soreness is forgotten and the competitive urge quickly takes you over. We wanted to win, even though I am still not sure it was technically supposed to be a race.

Needless to say there was a lot of repelling of boarders and boarding parties dispatched to other dinghies while we meandered down the rapids. With split second timing Noel Oelschig (our fiery scrum half with ‘small angry man syndrome’) was thrown from our boat onto the French boat. It was amazing to behold, he took out two of the French boys until Pascal Pape got hold of him and well let’s say we had to fish him out of the rapids 100 meters down-stream.

Our boat crew worked well together, with Ollie Phillips and Noel at the front, Hugo Southwell and myself in the middle and Brian Liebenberg and Rayno Gerber powering from the rear. Or so we thought. It was only after I lost the feeling in my shoulders and Hugo’s backed spasmed that we realised that the two south Africans at the back weren’t paddling at all and were in fact reclining and enjoying the ride. Needless to say they were both sharpened up. Rayno was particularly useless when it came to paddling and in fact every time we went over a big rock he dived into the middle of the boat just in case he fell in the water. After an hour of that we threw him in anyway in what turned out to be the fiercest part of the river. Oops.

You will be glad to hear that I fell in too, but it didn’t seem too bad at first. You have to go down the river with your legs out in front of you and arms folded in case you snag a foot on a rock and get stuck, then it’s game over. All was going well until I saw a massive rock approaching and I tried to swerve out of the way but to no avail. My left buttock hit it so hard my left leg went numb and I swallowed half the river. That’s when the fun ended, and I even uttered the choked words, “Help me! Get me out!” like a scared little girl!

Back To The Day Job

Internationals over, holiday over, partying over, normal life over. Well from that description you might guess I am feeling a little shocked to see the fun over and the work begin so quickly. After the tour to Australia and the short two and half-week holiday I had in America with a few former reprobates from my Wasps days I found myself back in Paris and fully into training. It seems every time that I leave Paris for any prolonged time the coach at the club changes. I’m assured this is nothing to do with me but I'm not so sure. Well I am ninety eight per cent sure it's nothing to do with me but does make me wary of leaving in case I find my entry back to France blocked. What I can say is the Stade I left is not the Stade I have come back to. The changes have been fast and dramatic, from training location to facilities and most importantly the key personnel. Having seen what's going on all the players including myself are excited and pleased with what has happened. You have many coaches in your career that can be described as good at what they do but very few really inspire you to play your guts out for them. I can tell you after two weeks Michael Cheika and his team achieve that.

I am writing this blog on a Eurostar returning home for the weekend (to be waited on hand and foot by my mother if the truth be told, I haven’t really got the energy to even start cooking for myself post our pre-season camp) after two weeks of full on training and one day off under the new regime at Stade Francais. As part of the group of internationals at Stade we have been eased in with some respect to the training squad. I was a little worried after the first day when we had a pretty tough fitness test, but for the most part the training has been short, intense and very competitive. The season starts in just two weeks, which is hard to believe, so trying to find the balance of doing weights, skills and fitness during pre-season is quite tricky when you don’t get the six weeks that most Premiership players get. With the break being so short however you don’t loose nearly as much stamina as you would think. In fact you look back and think, ‘why didn’t I take more rest?’ because during the first game of the season you will be blowing anyway. So those times I thought it would be a good idea to train with a hangover during my Las Vegas holiday, literally scaring people as I died on a treadmill, could have been avoided.

I like to set some short-term goals before every season starts. The focus for me in terms of fitness this season is more power, more speed, and to become a dominant line-out forward and to keep increasing my skill levels across the board. In terms of playing it's to gain a place in the starting line up of Stade, and with all the back row fit at the moment the competition is going to be right up there with that of an international team. Of course I want to get myself back in the England starting line up too, after my disappointment of playing only 13 minutes on tour but the route back is simple: get in the starting team for Stade, Stade play well, an opportunity comes up with the national team and I have to take it when that chance comes.

Update From Oz

The summer tour is well and truly underway after Tuesday, the first mid-week clash against the Australian Baa-Baas. It ended in a close draw with both sides going full bore from the very first whistle. The secret to a good tour is to keeping everyone together and not allowing the midweek team to drift apart from the Test team. A tour is an attritional battle where everyone has to support one another through success, failure, selection and non-selection. All those not involved in Tuesday’s game were in the stands supporting the team, trying to out shout the Aussie fans (and there were some good, civil, verbal exchanges between the boys and some particularly vocal Australian fans over some of the ref’s decisions). Things almost boiled over when at half-time the non-playing boys got hungry and descended on what they thought was a free buffet only to discover it was meant for the press after the game. We were quickly ushered out but not before leaving only empty plates and salad garnish. Oops.

Saturday is the first game for those lucky enough to be in the Test 22. It’s being played at an AFl stadium where, due to the nature of Aussie Rules, the spectators sit quite far away from the pitch. This may remove some of the atmosphere but certainly won’t affect the team’s desire to get the result we want. Training has gone well and been tough, as you would expect. We have all trained together as a 44 right up to the day before a match to make sure that the competitive element is very high. Apparently this is the Australian winter over here but you wouldn’t believe it from some of the weather we have been having. There is no question over players’ motivation to play for England but towards the end of a very long season training can sometimes be hard to get excited about, but out here with the weather and the way things have been structured our sessions are still sharp and to the point.

There is a good feeling about this game; it’s going to be a very competitive and physical affair. The wallabies have apparently been fighting in training in preparation for this match. This is nothing new and happens on a regular basis at club and country level. It does just highlight how keen both sides are to get a win. England have an opportunity to win in Australia, a place where, let’s not forget, no Northern Hemisphere team has won since 2003.

When we first arrived in Perth there is always the issue of jet-leg and players getting injuries from spending so much time cooped up on a plane. You can’t have one day off then go straight into a full contact session so we had some time-off to ease into things. This as I mentioned earlier involved going to an Aussie Rules game, Geelong vs. the Eagles, and it was something I had never seen before. I’ll say one thing though, those boys are incredibly fit what with the size of the pitch and the amount of running they do. Understanding the rules took a while to get to grips with but in typical fashion we cheered on regardless. As a change of career path I’m not sure I have a future in AFl.

The one problem with touring is that you go to these amazing places but don’t often see more than a hotel room, training ground and inside of a bus. You have to remember we are here to do a job and to get the results that this England team deserve. I am on the bench for the first Test and really looking forward to getting out there. It’s important in my mind to play each game as though it’s my last for your country. This never rang more true then when I attended the RPA awards this year and was lucky enough to see and hear Andy Ripley be inducted into the Hall Of Fame. Andy was one of the most athletic No. 8s ever to play the game and has now sadly passed away from cancer. Seeing him was a very moving experience and reminded me how your chances to play for England go quicker than you think.

In Limbo

Limbo. The dictionary defines it as “ a half-way house”, "another being", “a situation where one does not know what will happen or when something will happen”; it's also a perfect description of exactly where quite a number of rugby players find themselves at the end of the season.

The domestic rugby season has finished, yet if you’re lucky England training or an International tour loom on the horizon. Yet whilst in limbo, between these two states - you are on holiday, but you’re not on holiday, if you know what I mean. You can’t afford to let your fitness or standards slide, yet there aren’t any games or official training in the next few weeks on which to focus and help you through. If you haven’t qualified for any Championship play-offs, Heineken cup or Challenge cup finals, you are finished for about 3 weeks before you have meet up for International training.

Instead the invitations for summer parties, festivals and trips away with the boys start arriving with alarming regularity into your inbox, as fellow teammates and friends who aren’t in limbo, start to plan for a summer of relaxation and fun. What does one do?

Well, I operate the policy of if you do the crime, i.e. go to a music festival or summer party and have a few lemonades, you have to do the time.

This is harder than it sounds. You have spent all season playing and training with a lot of intensity, and then suddenly that dips into a lull. But take it easy and before you know it you’re 0-60 down again playing a test against a southern hemisphere team.

Although if you suffer from fits of panic about your general fitness and skills, which I do on a regular basis, this can be real challenge during limbo. In truth I do not really ever stop training. If you see a big blonde bloke and a dark haired short stocky chap running up and down your local park, passing a ball by the side of a road or lifting weight in an Esporta gym at random times throughout the day or evening, that would be myself and partner in crime England prop, Paul Doran Jones.

Paul is one of my closest friends; despite the fact he plays for Gloucester, wears tweed twinned with Barbour jackets and is a mate of HRH “Big” Mike T.

Paul’s known as “The man of no fixed abode” who lives out the back of a blue Vauxhall Astra, or the Porta-loo as it has been aptly named it. Nothing to do with Vauxhall I should add. It’s the kind of car that should always be on the move, in case anyone thinks it has been dumped and it is especially the type of car you always need to park around the corner, in case any women of interest happen along.

The other day I took pity on him and leant him my car for the day as he had a hot date. Breathtakingly he managed to get two parking tickets and a Congestion Charge all in the space of two hours. I can’t afford him - so it's back to the Porta-loo I’m afraid - bird or no bird!

England training started with a bang last week, it was great to be back with the guys. There is such a wealth of talent in the team and such a good atmosphere that I am really excited about playing again, whether that is in the midweek team or the test side. Australia is a hostile environment. But not as hostile as it once was, not because Australia aren’t a great side, which they are. In fact in truth, I think Australia is going to be the toughest they have been for a long while.

The reason I say not as hostile is because normally a touring side in Oz always face a real onslaught from the press - deliberate negativity, mind games, nit picking, any ploy you choose to name, the Aussie Press will come out with it just to try and rile the touring side.

Well unfortunately or possibly for the sake of the upcoming tour, fortunately, we have experienced all of this recently on home soil and have quite some considerable time. Therefore to be honest whatever they throw at us and it will be lots, trust me, it should be like water off a duck's back.

Of course collectively and individually player’s aren’t impervious to public criticism whatever they may suggest or say, but with the passing of time and the gaining of experience they do become much more hardened and resolute. They thrive on deriving a collective inner-strength and confidence from being within a tight knit squad.

I know certain elements of the media just believe this is a pre-rehearsed mantra, which we are all instructed to trot-out when the occasions demands but please take it from me and not from some journo who thinks he is in the “know”, this is exactly what England players are doing and feeling. We have the confidence and belief and know this is what will win us these games. The game plan, structure and talent are there. We are making progress – obviously not as fast as some or indeed all would like, but nevertheless progress is being made and sooner rather than later, it will all fall into place. Then you can tell everyone you heard it here first!

It's Going To Be A Hell Of A Battle

Let’s just say it’s been an interesting time since the last time I wrote a blog. We’ve played three games, winning two and it pains me to say losing one against Ireland. One of the great things about rugby is that normally you get to go out the following weekend and set the record straight but in the RBS 6 Nations there are these down weeks which mean the anger, disappointment and frustration fester for an extended period after a loss. In some ways I suppose it’s a good thing because that desire to work harder and correct your mistakes grows even stronger. Oh and lets not forget it’s an opportunity to do some hideous fitness work. You cannot put into words the sinking feeling on a Wednesday morning when after a particularly frank video analysis session you catch sight of weighted sleds, tackle-pads, cones and power bags being laid out on the training field. It’s power endurance time, followed by handling and contact skills thrown in for good measure. So the motto of the story is “don’t lose next time”.

I am not going to go add any more than has already been said about the situation that arose between me and Stade (and which I’m looking forward to properly putting to rest when I get back to Paris after the next two games) but I have done my best to not allow the obvious distraction, the loss against Ireland, training, fitness, oh and a rather attractive stomach bug I went down with last week to interfere with my preparation for what is shaping up to be another grand game against Scotland.

After watching the videos and all the analysis I am at a complete loss as to how Scotland are 0-3 in their games. They’re playing some great rugby with a particularly dynamic backrow. If they had got that extra five percent right they could well have won all of their games. They are a team to be respected; it’s going to be a hell of a battle. Sometimes as a player you can sense when a game is going to take you to a place of intense physical discomfort and this is one of those games. My childhood memories of England teams going up to Murrayfield seem to be mostly about Scotland teams ruining Grand Slam and championship hopes. This can’t be repeated.

PS. It’s great to see Joe “Mega Head” Worsley back in the starting line-up after working so hard to come back from injury.

15 Angry Men In Green

“Chaotic, disruptive, physical” could easily be one of my school reports from Wellington, but it’s also an accurate way to describe the Italian team we faced on that warm Sunday in Rome. No matter how much stick the Italians get from the press about their ability this is never an easy place to come and play. We scraped out a win that has put us two from two. It definitely wasn’t pretty and the Italians are masters of imposing themselves on their opposition and making them play their way. But we won and I definitely think that we showed flashes of what this England team can do.

I’m writing this in my Mum and Dad’s kitchen with my mad dog desperately trying to get my attention for some grub, pondering what to do with a couple of days off after three days of intense training in the fallow week between games. So far today I have written this blog, done a bodyweight leg training session and scarfed down about five pancakes so it hasn’t been the most exciting day ever, but after playing 28 games straight it’s important I grab this rare chance to rest my body properly.

But even though my body is taking it easy my mind is racing. The Ireland game is almost upon us and right now I’m so focused on it that it feels like I’m in this odd vacuum where nothing we’ve achieved in the past has any relevance and nothing in the future has any importance. All that matters is the 15 angry men in green who are coming to our home aiming to ruin our day.

Frank At Twickenham

Wales at Twickenham for the Century Match was incredibly exciting. Throw in a new set of special shirts, 85,000 fans, two princes and the small pressure of moving forward from our defeat against New Zealand you have the ingredients for one hell of a day. I ran out of the tunnel to the intense roar of the crowd with that amazing feeling welling up in my stomach that I always get before any England match (it’s an overwhelming feeling of nerves and excitement and adrenalin and expectation all mixed together). Nick “minty” Easter put it so eloquently as we ran out of the tunnel: “Days like this are why we play rugby”. Enough said. We got the win and I even managed a couple of cheeky tries. A lot of people have asked me about the strange little victory jiggle thing I did after the first score so it’s worth explaining that a long time ago I promised Tom Rees that if I ever managed to score for England I would pull out my ‘Frank The Tank’ impression from the movie Old School. I kept my word after I snuck over the line after some great work from the forwards. It was a good start to the competition and really galvanised the squad. You can talk and work all you want, but a win seals the deal.

Pink News

For most professional sportsmen and women time seems to move at a different speed to everyone else – months and years seem to speed by in the blink of an eye. And being the most disorganised man in the world doesn’t help. 2010 started with two games in five days for Stade which is a pretty intense way to kick into a new year and there really hasn’t been a let-up since then. I’d like to say there has been some respite from life in the Top 14 and Heineken Cup but it's like I've been on a high-speed conveyor belt.

Losing to Edinburgh in the H-Cup was hard to swallow. It was without a shadow of a doubt the most physical game I have played in for about a year and the toughest we’ve had in our fetching pink shirts. (By the way, I can’t believe I still get stick for Stade’s kit, surely you can all see by now that PINK IS BEAUTIFUL?). Playing at Murrayfield for domestic games is not as great as you might think. The mass of empty seats can swallow up a small crowd and did you know that they pump bagpipe music into the away changing room before the game? That’s the Scottish version of mind-games. It’s not exactly Guantanamo Bay, but still… I have yet to play a full international there and I suspect the atmosphere is very different indeed.

Luckily we managed to scrape into the quarter-finals with an easy away game against Toulouse. The kind of long-standing, bitter rivalry between Stade and Toulouse means we won’t be sharing jokes over espressos and pain au chocolates any time soon. The competition between Wasps and Leicester was once aptly summoned up by Shaun Edwards as “a street fight with some rules thrown in". It’s pretty much the same when Stade’s pink shirts meet the black of Toulouse.

Straight after Edinburgh game I was on a plane to London to meet up with the England boys. I only mention this as I was charged 90 quid for an extra bag on what was effectively an empty plane. They must take more than Horlicks to sleep at night. After 80 mins and a hurt knee I wasn’t all love and smiles. A day later it was off to Portugal to begin the 2010 RBS 6 Nations campaign.

Back in the pink

Being back at Stade after five weeks with Team England has been a bit of a shock to the system and losing to arch-enemies Toulon by one point hasn’t helped. Stade De France hasn’t yet turned into the fortress we were all hoping for either which only adds to the pressure we’re all feeling so it was lucky that we turned around this minor losing streak with a good home victory against Bayonne.

Our H-Cup didn’t get off to a great start at Ravenhill. It was the most disappointing game I’ve played in a pink shirt and I’m sure most of my team mates feel the same about their own performances. Ulster were incredibly passionate and Ian Humphreys controlled the game like riot police in Copenhagen. We never settled into a rhythm and their back-row really showed us up. Plenty has been written about the fall-put from the game and I’m not going to add fuel to the fire here. But the beauty of the H-Cup is that you get to play the same opposition the following week so we’ve been really building up to this game. Rugby doesn’t get much bigger than this and from the moment we stepped onto the freezing cold training pitch in the shadow of the Parc De Princes we were all totally focused on the weekend. I’ve never been to Brussels before and I’d desperately like my first time there to be a winning one.

Exploring Paris

I get asked a lot what I do when I’m not training or playing and the truth is “not very much” because proper rest is absolutely key to rugby players. But having got back to France after the Autumn Internationals I wondered whether I’d tried as hard as I could to embrace my new home city and so decided to put some of my downtime to better use by joining my follically-challenged house-mate and 10th Dan in Parisian tourism Ollie Philips in exploring the city’s hidden nooks and crannies. And anyway, every time someone comes to stay with us in Paris it means a sightseeing trip, meaning I’m sick of the Eiffel Tower and the Arc De Triomphe so it would be good to get some new places to take people. And you know it’s time to find somewhere new to visit when you’re on first-name terms with the guys who work in the ticket booths. Recent new video-cam conquests have included the Sacre Coeur and the Mairie and even a beautiful carol concert (that we soon discovered to our embarrassment wasn’t a singalong). And the massive Christmas fair that runs from the bottom of the Champs-Elysées to the Louvre is something I’ll definitely be taking visiting pals to next year.

One of my favourite things about Stade is the camaraderie between the players. Everything from the way that everyone shakes hands with everyone else every single morning to the shared meals helps to build a real sense of team unity and the guys grab any chance to sit down together and talk rubbish over some decent grub (and that’s not counting the weekly President’s Lunches with club owner Max – and if there is a more passionate supporter of any club on earth I’m yet to meet him). Back home I was always trying to be the the centre of attention but my up-hill struggle with French means that I’m being forced into a backseat listening role. I’m always keen to try one of the boys’ recommendations on French speciality food... unless the tip comes from Sylvain Marconnet. He recently insisted I try something called 'andouille'. “It’s a kind of sausage,” he told me. “Don’t worry, you will love it!” Unfortunately it turned out to be some kind of exhumed animal intestine and now when people say something ‘tastes like crap’ I know exactly what they mean. Hot crap.

Stade vs Bath

“Eurggh! We hate the English food! You guys don’t even know what nice food is!” So grumbled the French Stade players to the English contingent as we touched down at Bristol airport. I half-heartedly tried to put them straight but to be honest they do have a point. Right across France – even at suspect looking places – the food is better than at home. I had to draw the line at, “All you have in England is the fish and the chips” though, pointing out the regal power of a traditional full English which the French guys then all tried and loved, leaving me feeling I’d done my bit for international culinary relations.

But when we pulled up to the Hilton Bath City, I knew that I was going to have an uphill struggle to convince the French the food wasn’t that bad. What didn’t help was an over-enthusiastic Benjamin Kaiser telling me that the Stade doctor had asked his help in picking the team’s menu for the evening dinner. He said that he remembered from being in England before that “that crumbles are nice” so he’d told the doc to order crumbles and God knows what else.

There’s a rugby myth that French teams don’t travel well and don’t really care about away wins but I can assure this really isn’t the case at Stade. This was a massive game for us against a good Bath side that weren’t far off taking us to the cleaners.

The game itself was a bit of a wake up call for us. Bath were physical and showed us up in a lot of areas. We didn’t really deserve to win, but it’s a good sign for us as a team that we played hard right up until the death. I was bricking it in the last few minutes of the game after I gave away what I thought was a harsh penalty for blocking at the kick off. I could hear the “Haskell sinks Stade” headlines writing themselves. Luckily I pulled it back by winning the last penalty.

Ollie Philips had a big impact when he came on, showing his class with a great chip and turnover as well as a cheeky in and out which saw him round the fullback to score a try that put Stade back in the mix. Julian Dupuy was another massive thorn in Bath’s side. He’s the most relaxed man I’ve ever met. Absolutely nothing seems to faze him.

This was a good trip for Stade, which saw a lot of the French boys practicing their English. “In bath there are ze nice buildings” was repeated ad nauseam.

PS. The Hilton let me down with the grub. Dried old beef and suspect curry. The crumbles really were great though...

All You Can Eat

Novotel, Holiday Inn, Mercure ¬– I’ve got enough experience of these chains to start my own Haskell Hotels Guide. So with this in mind you might think that the night before a home game in Paris I’d be tucked up in my own bed. But it’s another difference about playing over here that the team all stay in a hotel together the night before a home game. Stade stay in a Mercure out in the sticks, which isn’t as bad as you’d imagine because there’s so many of us that we practically take the whole thing over.

The way it normally works is I finish Friday training and drive home for a bit of food and a chill out (I usually try to fit in watching a movie) and then later in the evening get over to the hotel for a team dinner. Another obvious benefit of being in France is that wherever you go the food is always great. So even in a chain like Mercure you can expect steak, quiche, salad and a helping of tarte de pomme with frommage blanc to finish off. It’s also ‘All You Can Eat’, which is a bonus when you eat like a horse. The only catch with this French team routine is the dreaded ‘muscular reve’ at 9.30am on the Saturday morning. It was a bit of shock to the system because in England I’d never normally get out of bed on game day till 10.30am but it’s being pushed into trying new things like this that have made this move to France so successful for me.

H-Cup (as the Heineken Cup is called out here because of alcohol advertising restrictions) is a big deal for Stade because the team have never won it. You can sense that for the older players especially it’s a bit of a chink in the club’s armour. I get the impression that everyone at Stade feels that no matter how successful they’ve been in the past, that they need to win the Heineken Cup to be regarded as a genuinely great club.

The Edinburgh game started our challenge and the first half was packed with some of the best rugby we’ve played for a while and our winger Julien Arias was absolutely on fire. The second half wasn’t so great though and we have to learn to take that initial intensity through a whole game because at this level you just can’t take your foot off the gas. I have no doubt that that lesson is going to be drummed into us in training this week. The game against Edinburgh was a good enough start but the levels have to rise again next week with our away game at Bath.

Playing in front of Martin Johnson...

I got a Twitter message just before I was packing to leave for my early team run on the day of the game against Brive. “Good luck for tonight Big Man!” it read. “I hear Martin Johnson is now coming to watch you as well as John Wells and Graham Rowntree.” ‘Great!’ I thought, ‘No pressure, then!’ But instead of getting overcome with nerves I stayed strangely calm. Sure, having Martin Johnson here added an extra dimension to the already very physical game but perhaps it’s something about being out here in Paris or the nature of the team I play for but things that would have thrown me in the past don’t have the same effect anymore.

I turned up at eleven for the very light team run to find Andy Goode and Shaun Perry practicing their kicking. But even though they’re good mates of mine I’m not a huge fan of meeting up with guys I know before a game knowing that we’ll be knocking seven bells out of each other in a few hours time. I managed some brief banter with Goodey, obviously recommending he cut his legendary hair (and he rightly told me where I could go with that idea...)!

The game itself was a monster. Brive have a big, tough pack who gave me a series of ‘welcome presents’ for my trouble any time I found myself on the wrong side. In the end we came out convincing 44-16 winners but it was hard graft all the way through. I scored my third try of the season so far and made a real nuisance of myself around the breakdown so I was relatively pleased with my game and felt I’d made good account of myself in front of the England coaches. From a personal point of view getting to finally start a match with Sergio was a pretty big deal. It was the chance to play and to learn from Sergio and the other great back row players at Stade that lead to me coming here.

Wine, leg hair and Toulouse

Before the Toulouse game I turned up to training on Wednesday morning as normal to see two of the senior players carrying a trestle table and three more following up behind with swollen bags of shopping. I wandered over to say ‘bonjour’, ‘ca va?’, ‘tu vas bien?’ to all the guys as you do first thing everyday but couldn’t understand why the table had been set up, bottles of red wine had been produced, along with some saucisson, foie gras and some little glass jars containing stuff I still don’t know the name of. I looked at my watch and was sure it said 11.30am but I gave it a shake just to make sure. Yep, it was still the morning. And before I could think anymore, a quarter full plastic cup of red wine was thrust into my left hand and a piece of French bread with foie gras into the other. I obviously looked startled and a little out my depth as the rest of the players gathered round and wolfed down all the food and wine within minutes. I turned to one of the senior players and said, “I’m sure we have training in an hour and half and at the weekend we take on Toulouse in our biggest game of the season.” He looked at me as if I was from outer space. “This is called a degustation,” he explained. “And all of the stuff was very expensive and you worry too much.”

“Sod it,” I thought, “When in Rome… or Paris” and jumped straight in. I think that was the precise moment I finally made my full conversion to being a Parisian.

As you’d expect the Toulouse game was a massive affair. My only previous experience of Toulouse was watching as a wide-eyed academy player for Wasps when they once played them in the Heineken Cup final. If that day was anything to go by these guys would be good and I couldn’t wait to get involved. I always share with Juan Leguizamon on away games, which is a good thing as he doesn’t snore and is pretty tidy. We usually spend most of our down time on our laptops watching films but this time I ended up watching him shave off all of his leg hair. It’s not my first choice of pre-game viewing, but as any connoisseur of the Novotel chain of hotels will attest, the rooms aren’t that big so it was pretty much unavoidable viewing.

A 9-9 all draw didn’t really reflect the nature of the game. It was an intensely physical affair played out in front of 45,000 fans in the baking sun. Being on the bench for these massive games is not a great place to be because if the score is really close you are petrified of coming on and having a detrimental effect on your team’s performance. As soon as I got the nod that I was about to go on though all those feelings disappeared and I loved every minute out there, even when I got moved into the second row, which as anyone who knows me will tell you, I normally try to avoid at all costs.

Stade vs Castres

You play a batch of games under a coach at a new club and slowly start to feel settled, then – bang! – it’s all change on the management front and as a player you’re back to square one. All of a sudden you’re filled with nerves, excitement and a desire to prove to the new bosses you can start well. Our first game after the new regime had taken the reigns was against Castres. It was like the start of the season all over again but this time I had that tingle of butterflies in my stomach that this really might the start of something special.

The game itself didn’t disappoint and we finished very convincing winners at 44-18 which was great for the club and especially for the new coaches. We still gifted the opposition far too many free shots at goal, which is something we will have to eradicate pretty quickly if we seriously want to win this league. It was a small step forward for the team but the last week has brought the squad a lot tighter together.

Castres were a strong side and feature one of the biggest packs in world rugby. There were a number of penalties exchanges at the start of the game which allowed Stade’s first try through a nice hit and spin close to the line by Sylvain Marconnet, our iconic prop. Throughout the game our number nine Noel Oelschig turned fly-half kicked like a machine and kept the score board ticking over. Tom Palmer played another great game, as did centres Guillaume Bousses and fan’s favourite Mathieu Bastareaud .

I even managed to get over the line for a try, which I then celebrated with an odd little impromptu dance which is no doubt going to get me a lot of banter.

Relief at the win and excitement about our next steps forward came flooding over me as we made our way back to the changing rooms. The Stade changing room is an amazing place to be when you win, but hell on earth when you lose. Long may the winning continue.

RCUK7s Report

After the big changes at Stade in the week I was quite worried about leaving Paris just in case I came back and found the club had moved without telling me! I had to take the chance to nip back to London though because it was the second annual RCUK Charity Sevens and as it is organised by my company, I really had to be there. Last year we raised a lot of money for children’s charity Demelza House so the pressure was really on this year to raise the bar.

The day was a great success with some amazing sevens being played. The team from Human Capital were outright winners in the end. It was a bit of a one-sided final and Nick Easter’s team came home with the silverware, leaving Dom Waldouck’s second-place crew to lick their wounds.

The mixed touch tournament was another huge success with a lot of teams turning out to perform. I was slightly surprised to hear that two players had managed to break their collarbones playing touch, which is a pretty unusual feat in itself as its meant to be non-contact! Each participant got a very nice glass tankard which came in useful as the day flowed into the gala dinner.

There was a good turn out of rugby stars at the event (Ugo Monye, Joe Worsley, both Armitage brothers, Nick Easter, Topsy Ojo and even “the landlord” George Skivington all turned up) who helped coach the teams and sign autographs.

Special thanks must go to my father who again created an amazing event that was bigger and more professional than ever. The footprint is there for us to keep this event going and keep raising lots of money for charity.

Three Into Seven Doesn’t Go

Towards the end of the season you can normally count on the fact you may have to play more than one game in a week and it’s always pretty tough. Little did I expect to be playing three games in a week and only two weeks into my first season at Stade? We won the first game at home (which was doubly amazing because it was our first home game of the season). However, the less said about the Wednesday and Sunday games the better. Montauban and Biarritz aren’t an easy one-two combination to deal with at the best of times even with a full week’s recovery between the games, let alone both in a four day period. We narrowly lost both of these by just a couple of points which is very hard to stomach as the tries we conceded were down to individual errors or the unlucky bounce of a ball. You just can’t coach against these things. Losing feels ten times worse when we know we should have won these games and actually scored more tries than our opposition.

To make matters worse during the week I caught a horrible cold and ended up like the Fast Show farmer with the hawking cough. I came back to England on the Monday after the Biarritz game and when I got back the following day I found myself at a very different club. Both our coaches had gone and their replacements had already been appointed. Just as you settle in there is always a cat ready to be thrown amongst the pigeons or in this case, me. (That doesn’t quite make sense, but you know what I mean!)

Watch this space..

My First Stade Home Game

Life is always better when you win. Especially when it’s a win for your new club. Stade vs. Montpellier was literally a game of two halves (excuse me for the rubbish football analogy), with Stade comprehensively winning the last 15 minutes and stealing some much-needed points from our first home game.

This was the first time I felt a real twinge of nerves, and also a feeling of pride, running out on our home pitch for Stade. It’s one thing to play in Toulon or Bayonne but they were away-games and there is always something special about your first home game.

The game itself was again a scrappy affair from our side; we created so many opportunities but found different ways to stop ourselves scoring. I have never played in a team with guys who have the talent to score almost at will, yet also in the same breath, make mistakes which can allow the opposition to score against the run of play. I include myself very much in this as even though I had a solid game I got handed off like a schoolgirl at one point (which is never a good look). Off to the training paddock I go to stop that happening again.

We allowed Montpellier to take a lead on the score board pretty early on when they very skillfully capitalised on our mistakes, but through some patient play and great skill from Mark Gasnier, Geoffroy Messina and Guillaume Bousses we ended up 43-26 winners. I have to mention Tom Palmer who has been playing really well so far this season and even managed to score two tries in this game only for the video ref to disallow them which is never a nice thing to happen. I know at least one was definitely a try… but of course I would say that.

The Stade home fans created a great atmosphere with drums, flags and loud cheering which never waned even when we must have caused most of them almost constant heart failure heartache by allowing Montpellier to stay so close in the game. This is a tough week with another game on Wednesday and Biarritz on Sunday.

Meeting The Faithful

The programme for Thursday read as follows: President’s Lunch (where all the players have lunch together after training with owner Max) weights, training and then all new players are to presented to the fans of Stade Francais.

This turned out to be a very interesting case of affairs and a great way for the club’s most fervent fans to see the new players before we take to the home turf on Saturday. When training finished all the new boys were quickly ushered into the changing rooms and in groups of three donned the very smart various Stade strips. Ollie Phillips had the pleasure of the pink and Tom Palmer and myself got the “eclectic mix”, which is the new shirt. The rest of the players sat on the grass in front of a full grand stand of Stade fans as the newbies waited in the tunnel to be called out onto the pitch. We were the second group called up to some very classy backing music and I couldn’t resist a little Usain Bolt-style salute as we walked out. (I know how stupid I probably looked but it was all down to nerves, or so I will claim). It was then that I realised that we were going to have to make a speech. Those of you who know me understand that it’s normally very difficult to get me to stop talking not start, but today everything was to be conducted in French. I have no idea what I actually said but I tried my best, and thankfully I still have a contract and no one appears to have been too greatly offended. It was great to see such passionate fans coming down and supporting the team and the club in their own time. I can’t wait to hear the wall of noise they create at the weekend.

My First Try For Stade

This week we found ourselves surrounded by the beauty of the south of France for the second week running for Stade vs. Bayonne (not in Bayonne itself but at the Estadio Anoeta in San Sebastian just over the border in Spain). And interestingly, fact fans, this was the first Top 14 game ever played away from French domestic soil. For these Friday evening games we travel down on the Thursday, have a team run then spend the Friday daytime waiting for the 8.35pm kick off. This is the same for most teams, whichever country you play in, but what made this particular wait a little more bearable was being in a location where there is actually something to see, and my computer’s hard-drive being stocked with new films.

For this game we actually stayed right on the sea front in the centre of Biarritz, which was an amazing location. Even more so for Sylvain Marconnet our legendary prop who co-incidentally enough owned a homemade ice-cream stall right opposite the hotel. So when in his broken English he suggested I try the local ice-cream because it was part of the history of Biarritz I of course sidled down and 5 Euros later had myself a nice cold snack. It was only the next day after we’d realised that half the team had enjoyed one of his ice creams did someone tell me he owned the stall and that the lovely lady behind the counter was his wife. I bet he couldn’t believe his luck!

Down to business: another big stadium, another amazing atmosphere. Playing in front of 38 thousand people in only your second game of the season is very special. Unfortunately the game from both sides was rife with mistakes and individual errors which was disappointing to say the least and we lost 38-24. I was involved in Bayonne’s first try after chasing a kick which their full-back gathered only for him to run it straight back. I assumed this would be time for a straightforward tackle only to find myself blocked by a trio of Bayonne players who the referee seemed completely unable to see. It’s at times like this I wish I knew how to dive like footballers. It wasn’t the start the team or I wanted.

I felt a little better about the situation when I crossed the line ten minutes later after some good play by Juan Manuel Leguizamon, Pierre Rabadan and Tom Palmer. The game was very tit for tat in the scoring stakes. We had a lot of possession from some good line-out and scrum work, Tom Palmer and Pascal Pape working well together. However we didn’t utilise this and allowed a good counter-attacking team to capitalise on our mistakes.

A lot of our play was positive and showed some great steps forward, but the bottom line is you can’t allow a team to score four tries against you. This week will be tough as we prepare for our first home game against Montpellier who have just come off a very good win over Perpignan.

Stade vs. Toulon

You know it is going to be a good game when, just before you leave the hotel (that’s a mere fifty yards from the stadium) for the pre-match build-up, the coach decides to play you a recording of the opposition fans chanting so it isn’t such a shock when we actually run out. Toulon is known to have some of the best and most vocally aggressive supporters in the Top 14 and perhaps even club rugby worldwide. I can tell you they did not disappoint. But it’s just like when I have faced the Haka – instead of intimidating me it actually fires me up. I absolutely love it. When we ran out on to the pitch Tom Palmer turned to me and shouted, “This is a bit more like it!” Well, he used a few more expletives, but you get the idea. It is odd to think that by the beginning of September I will have already played two games and will have kicked off the Top 14 with our first competitive game away to Toulon. It was a bit disappointing not to get a win when I felt we played 90 percent of the rugby but a 22-22 draw away is acceptable at this stage. I wasn’t particularly nervous before kick-off. More than anything I was excited to actually get out there in our pink kit and play our hearts out for Stade. The furore of me making the decision to move to France and dealing with all the resulting fall-out has been a long and often difficult process, especially when all I wanted to do what I do was get out and play.

On the whole the game wasn’t that bad from a Stade point of view. A lot of things that we had worked on started to take shape. The line-out functioned well as did our defence. Obviously discipline was an issue (I know, I know! I got yellow carded, but as a tackler you can compete from the ball from anywhere but the ref said I came in from the wrong side so I’m a bit in the dark about that one). My first and only offence was met with a card but that’s life. I thought some of the Stade players really stood out like Juan Leguizamon, who is amazing under a highball, and Noel Oelschig for once again kicking like a legend.

The question everyone keeps asking me is what are the major differences between the Premiership and the Top 14. It’s very difficult to give an answer after only three games, but I have to say whatever differences there are seem very small. There is less structure out here than perhaps I am used to but that is a trade-off with allowing guys a bit more freedom to play (which is perhaps why French rugby is more expansive than the English game). There is also a small difference in the intensity levels during the games: Premiership games stay pretty constant but French games seem to ebb and flow more. Having said that it’s also some of the most bruising rugby you will ever play.

We have another away game this week to Bayonne.

Back In The England Fold - Temporarily...

I paid my first visit to England in about a month last week. It was very short but sweet nonetheless. I wasn’t back on home turf for any personal reasons but to take part in the England Elite training and testing week. I was obviously very pleased to be involved having been left out of the squad initially. The feeling of being some sort of competition winner being “allowed” to come and train with the England boys briefly surfaced in my head but because we had our first game of the season against Toulon coming up me and Tom Palmer could only make a short stop. We still managed to have a good Tuesday morning session on the Twickenham pitch which, whether you are playing a match or just training, is still a very cool and special place to be. It was great to see all the guys from the different clubs and to have some banter in English for a change. I still didn’t get any laughs, but what the hell, I’ll keep trying! Seeing Simon Shaw, Joe Worsley and the other Wasps was good as I hadn’t seen them since they went on the Lions tour. I did manage to sneak in a cheeky weights session with Tweety our ex-marine conditioner (though I didn’t feel so cheeky the next day when my arms almost fell off).

Getting that brief taste of the England set-up made me want to get back to Stade and keep working so I can pull on that white jersey again. Oh, and I really missed the fromage blanc!

Two Weeks In

Well, it’s been two weeks now since I started my French adventure, two weeks since I drove from the warm embrace of England to pastures new. I am writing this blog 2000 metres above sea-level in a lovely French ski resort called Tigne. Being 2000 metres up may sound nothing, but trust me you get a wheeze walking up two steps. Having never been skiing (which is shocking news to all those who have me down as a middle class snob) this is apparently the place to go. It’s a little difficult to believe though, as there isn’t a flake of snow in sight (unless you crane your neck and peer far up the mountain).

But on the upside every morning you are greeted by breathtaking views and amazing weather. As you would expect from a side like Stade Français there’s been a lot of hard work and everyone is extremely professional, but thankfully it has also been a lot of fun, which is unusual as most pre-season sessions are very dull indeed. But don’t get me wrong - this is no holiday camp - we’re training like nutters up here with hardcore rugby and fitness drills every morning followed by a two hour lunch break then weights with perhaps more fitness sessions thrown in at the end of the day for good measure. This is all topped off with a language lesson to get me up to speed on all the French rugby terminology that I need to know because even though it’s an international squad all training and business at Stade is conducted in French. As it should be.

The Stade players have continued to really welcome all us new foreign players, whether by inviting us to a game of cards after dinner or just involving us in the general banter around the camp. One thing that is always key when away on these kinds of pre-season camps is the food, which perhaps unsurprisingly bearing in mind where we are, has been amazing. I’m now so ‘continental’ I always finish off with a bowl of fromage blanc and honey. Not my usual pudding, but when in France...

My First Match For Stade

The term “Pre-season friendly” is an interesting concept. The only two certainties about such games are that firstly they won’t be friendly and furthermore that after five minutes you will be blowing air out of your arse (excuse the expression but it really does best sum up how you feel). It’s made far worse by the altitude that we are playing at. Our first such friendly of the season was against Grenoble, who we played yesterday. The majority of Stade’s internationals were not allowed to play in this game so the team was a varied mix of guys from across the entire squad.

Running out onto the pitch I felt just like I did as an academy player again on my first day at Wasps. I was filled with a mixture of nervousness and excitement, all the while desperately trying to remind myself that the season is a marathon not a sprint and not to overdo it.

The game was split into three halves of 30 minutes with a lot of rotation of players in these different sections. I ended up playing 60 minutes at 7, which was good but tough. The game was particularly scrappy between set pieces which is to be expected at this early stage in season preparations. Stade just edged out a win at the end of the match (at 24-21). Grenoble were a tough side with a lot of new players. It’s always difficult to get a gauge of where you are at as a player because we’d spent the last two weeks training as if we didn’t have a game. I got a pleasant welcome to French rugby by being eye gouged the very first time I competed for the ball and then again on the last play of the game. Luckily it wasn’t too bad.

All in all it was a positive first step in what’s bound to be a very long and tough season. I felt extremely honoured to play my first game for Stade and the guys I played with were pure class. I am already learning.

My Fronch Cod Be Butter

I thought my understanding of French was coming along pretty well, but then today I came to the conclusion that I am still some way off being mistaken for a local. When one of the boys told me that I should go on what I thought he had said was a fun mountain walk but in reality turned out to be an insanely difficult mountain climbing adventure I realised that I had got the verb for “walk” and “hang off the side of a cliff by a crampon” mixed up. Silly me.

It was genuinely the most terrifying thing I have ever done. We literally climbed a mountain this afternoon. We tip-toed across suspect wooden planks hundreds of feet up and even hung off a sheer rock face by a single handle. Pictures speak louder than words so I’ve included some snaps at the bottom of this blog. I was amazed by some of the courage of the boys, especially Momo (that’s hooker Mathieu Blin’s nickname) who is terrified of heights and was visibly shaking. I made it to the top but not with clean underwear.

My First Week In Paris

The smell of French home cooking fills the air (as brother Edward, the chef of the house, cooks up a culinary masterpiece) and for the first time in four days I have actually got a minute to sit down and write about my French experience so far. The condensed version is this: I’m absolutely loving the whole thing. Before I left for France, there were obviously mixed emotions swirling around in my head but out of everything I was feeling before I got on the Eurostar the only element that remains is pure excitement

The Stade team are some of the nicest people I have ever met and everyone is being extremely friendly, which helps when you’re a stranger in a strange land. There appears to be a tradition of shaking everyone’s hands when you arrive in the morning so the ice is immediately broken and you get to meet everyone again and again. That doesn’t mean that I’ve got everyone’s names down pat but I am trying my best. The training has been really good as well as very tough at times. It’s all so full on that Ollie Phillips (my new house-mate, along with Edward) and I spend most of the time trying to get some rest and actually find the time to have a sit down on our new sofas that adorn the living room of our maison. We wake up at 7.45am, leave at 8.15am to be at training for 9am. Which is held at the Stade Jean Bouin. The last time I was here was when I was 15 supporting Wasps vs. Stade in the Heineken Cup. We have two and a half hours of training in the morning (including some hideously hard fitness work), then two hours for lunch before weights in the afternoon. My day culminates with an hour off then a three hour French lesson. Now you can see why sitting down is such a privilege.

We have this weekend off so hopefully I will get to see some more of Paris.

My Awesome New Gadget

As I have taken to Paris with only my brother, my new flatmate and assorted junk (but minus my friends and family) I thought it might be a good idea to keep a record of my new life both in this blog and on film for Haskell family posterity. I also thought it might be nice to show you guys some of the footage of what I get up to over here on the video section of this site (which my team in London are working on right now to bring properly up to date). Hopefully the footage will dispel any rumours that I’ve come to Paris for a holiday! Hence I decided to treat myself to a new toy and after a bit of internet research and some digging around got myself a very slick Sony Handycam (the “TG7” to give it its full title) and I’m slightly obsessed with it right now. Like most men I pretend to know more than I do about technology - especially something as feature-packed and fiendishly clever as this camera - and I am yet to get around to reading the manual, but the LCD touch screen with its “so simple a forward could figure it out” menu system means that I have yet to miss any key moments. Or should I say Edward hasn’t, yet. I haven’t got around to editing any of the videos yet but what the camera has is a “highlight playback” feature which creates mini-movies without the need for any human editing skills. Which is good news for me as I haven’t got any! All you have to do is touch the screen and shots are selected automatically from the recorded footage and stitched together. Have a look at it on www.sony.co.uk. It’s very cool. I told you I was a bit obsessed with it...

Let’s hope when I do post some video I do it justice rather than it all looking like something that failed to make the cut for You’ve Been Framed.

Not Faking It

Gulping down five different sports nutrition drinks (including a chocolate milkshake) and scoffing two types of protein and recovery bars in ten minutes is not my normal mid-morning re-fuelling regime but today was my first photoshoot for my new sponsor Lucozade Sport. I had to have photos taken with each of the products, and because I didn’t want to fake it and pretend to drink them I actually downed them all. And although I love the sheer scope of products in the new range I think that even the guys at GSK who make it wouldn’t normally advise ingesting the entire lot in one session! The shoot was good fun and luckily wasn’t too much hard work. I am off to Margot’s now for training then Shootfighters later. No rest for the wicked.

Check Out My Gravel Pit!

I like to describe myself as an onion, in that I have many layers. Well, I would describe myself like that if I was a complete sad-act but it is still true that there is more to me than meets the eye. For instance, I have been driving a digger every day for the last week in-between MMA training and Margot Wells. A friend of mine has a farm and I told him (well, to be accurate I bored him to death with the fact) that I love driving heavy machines and that if I could one day afford it I would buy myself a JCB. It’s a long story, but when I was younger I actually went on a five-day course and got my commercial machine licence. The friend in question - Eddie Rixon - turned around and said that he had some digging work this week and if I was that keen I should get down to his farm and get stuck in. I couldn’t say yes quick enough and today as I sit with my cup of tea and copy of The Sun (obligatory for all workmen) I have finished my week’s work. Eddie’s father gave me eight out of ten for my efforts, which, let’s be honest, is the best score I’ve been given by anyone for some time!

I Can’t Stop Tweeting

I am slightly worried that I have developed an addiction. It’s not drugs or alcohol, thankfully, but the dreaded Twitter. I really love it and have this desire to get as many people to sign up to my Tweets at @jameshaskell as I can. I don’t seem to be able to stop boring people to death with my thoughts and actions. This being said my website is being up-dated so hopefully we’ll be including a Twitter thread directly on my site which will mean no one can escape.

Get involved with Twitter and try not to get yourself in trouble, eh?

Where’s All My Stuff, Man?

Ok. I’m sitting on the floor of my empty house and am as stiff as a board after having endured the worst nights sleep ever in a French hotel (as my place is still devoid of any furniture). I thought the hotel breakfast would make up for lack of sleep but sadly this was not the case.

So now the waiting game for the removal men to arrive begins. I can see a major international incident occurring as no doubt when it arrives the lorry won’t be able to park, I’ll end up offending a local traffic warden with my rubbish French or there will be no tools to assemble any of my furniture. I know it’s not a positive outlook but none of you are yet to experience the Curse Of The Haskells.

Moving, Finally

Wow, my flat in Fulham is completely bare and looking as suspect as it did when my brother convinced me to rent it seven months ago. The removal men have been and gone, their lorry laden with all the stuff ready for my new life in France. I have found a home and seem to have picked up two roommates on my travels. One is my brother Edward (or the “leech” as he is known to our friends). My parents suggested he come, but I think they are just passing the buck for looking after him. The other roommate is Ollie Philips from Newcastle (or Benjamin Button as we call him because he looks so old at 25 he must be ageing in reverse).

I write this on the Eurostar to Paris. Today’s the day we move all my furniture into the French house ready for my permanent departure on the 18th of July. I have been having regular French lessons with Edward. My comprehension is actually quite good but the conversational French needs some work though. Edward, on the other hand, is dominating. He now walks around in a beret and has a small cane and cravat.

I am filled with emotion about this move. I am so excited and desperate to get involved and earn my place in the Stade side. Speaking to the coaches has added to that excitement as the way Stade want to play and the work ethic they have is exactly along my lines. But at the same time, I feel some sadness at leaving Wasps and my friends behind. I’ve never lived abroad before so this is a first on many fronts. This is all in the best interests of my rugby and no one ever got anywhere without making sacrifices to reach their goals.

Down And Out

This is the first time since I made my national debut that I haven’t been included in the England EPS squad, and I can tell you right now it’s not something I ever want to experience again. It’s an awful feeling. I had an inkling this would happen since my performances of late have not been up to scratch, for various reasons, and then there’s the fallout from my decision to move to France to consider too.

Effectively, the decision to leave me out of the squad says I am at the bottom of the pile, which is not a place I am familiar with or want to remain. It’s another challenge that I will embrace and work at as hard as I possibly can. My first task is to fight my way into one of the best back-rows in the world at Stade and then worry about the other stuff afterwards. This disappointment has refocused my mind and the hard work has already started. An England place means everything to me, as does earning the respect of my new club.

Lions Watching

Obviously I am gutted not to have gone on the Lions trip, but this being said I am a rugby fan first and foremost so I tried by hardest not to miss any of the games. This was tricky as I have been continuing to train with Margot Wells and the London Shootfighters so I ended up missing quite a few. From what I can gather from the guys on the tour (like Joe Worsley, Crofty and Tim Payne) this was the best ever tour any of them have ever been on. The banter levels exceeded anything every seen or heard before. The coaches really got the recipe right off the field, which I think you can see translated onto the pitch. Shaun and Gats are the masters of creating the right atmosphere to work in.

In my opinion the Lions could have won all three games but the results just go to show the class of the South Africans. The fact that they could keep fighting in the way did and then to go and eek out wins in the end was incredible. The Lions is the most special thing a rugby player can ever experience and lots of guys stood up and fully embraced that challenge. When the next tour comes around the Aussies better be ready.

Summer Tour 2009

The summer tour this year was very different from normal tours as we had a home game at Old Trafford and an away game in Salta, Argentina. The norm is a three-week tour away from home, but this was something new for a lot of players and I have to say it turned out to be an excellent new way of doing things.

It’s very difficult sometimes as a player to have finished your domestic season say at the beginning of May, then have four weeks holiday, before dusting off your boots again and taking on a very physical, tough, touring side.

Our first game was against arguably one of the best Baa-Baas sides to have ever taken the field. The game was very fast and the quality of rugby was very high. I found myself on the bench and only managed to get on for the last 10 mins but I had a decent impact, which was pleasing. Baa-Baas games are always a no-win situation for England. If you win everyone says, “Well, you only beat a team that only has one training session before the Test and then spends the rest of the week attending dinners and social functions”. But if we lose then “England are poor” or “We need to sharpen up”.

Playing at old Trafford was an awesome experience; especially since most of the boys all claim to have had “trials” for various Premiership teams at some point in their youth. I can assure you that the closest I ever got to a “trial” was when I took a free kick and knocked a woman sitting near the corner flag clean off her seat. In the first Test England produced some of the best rugby we have played for a while. I was very lucky to get a start as Chris Robshaw had played well against the Baa-Baas. Delon Armitage was very dominant and showed a real turn of pace on a number of occasions. Winning at Old Trafford is a great memory, and was much needed after the season I have had.

Argentina at home was a totally different kettle of fish, especially playing in a town like Salta, which is very small but extremely passionate. It only has 750,000 residents. In this game, Argentina changed their tactics and played a lot more confrontational rugby, that to be honest, we had all expected during the first Test in Manchester. England started badly but clawed it back to only lose by two points. The crowd went absolutely mental and started jumping around when the home team scored and they did not stop screaming for 80 mins. It was amazing to behold and the passion of the crowd for the game really reminded us why we play rugby. Matt Banahan displayed sheer quality throughout the game. He is a massive find for England. I played well when I finally came on for the last 30 minutes of the game. I still have a lot to work on.

But on the whole the summer tour was a positive experience. England under Martin Johnson and co have started to really build something special which the players all believe in. The results are really starting to come. Argentina is a great place to visit, and even though there is such a startling division of wealth across the country it was still a beautiful and amazing place to play rugby.

Life Sucks

"Some things in life are bad, they can really make you mad, other things just make you swear and curse. When you're chewing on life's gristle, don't grumble, give a whistle. And this'll help things turn out for the best. Always look on the bright side of life."

This song is very apt at summing up the situation we are in at Wasps at the moment, and myself personally. Yesterday was very tough, you cannot fault the effort and desire of the Wasp’s team, but in the words of Shaun Edwards you don’t have the accuracy in key areas at key times you won't win.

The feeling of desperation and bitter disappointment came flooding over me as well as the rest of the Wasps team when the final whistle went. None of us want to be the second ever team in Wasps history not to qualify for the Heineken cup, none of us want to hear the reason we have not been performing is because Lawrence isn’t here, or Fraser.

Danny Cipriani and our backs yesterday performed really well and Danny looked to be well on his way back to the awesome form he showed last season before his ankle injury. Joe Simpson (aka ‘Whisper’ due to his suspect wispy hair) showed what a quality player he is and how dangerous he can be in attack.

I have to and want to finish on a high with Wasps, by playing with every fiber I have in my body stretched as far as breaking point before this season ends.

Back Into The Fold

Now the Six Nations is over it is business as usual at Wasps. With the recent EPS agreement in operation for the first year it has been a bit of a shock how long we have been away from our clubs, nine weeks in total. Getting back to Wasps has been great (obviously I didn’t mange to avoid the banter) but the atmosphere has been great and the guys are working really hard to finish this season on a positive note.

I am really pleased to be playing against Sarries as the Six Nations didn’t necessarily pan out as I’d hoped. So with this new challenge of trying to qualify for the Heineken Cup next year it’s important I finish on a highlight and as a team we play to our true potential.

Well and truly in it

Who knew that taking a dog for a walk in Wiltshire could be so eventful? It does serve as a lesson: don’t plough your beautiful Range Rover with low-profile, pretty boy tyres into a muddy bog that would put the Somme to shame and then get stuck. That’s what happened to me the other day when I decided to take Aero for a ramble. I was with my girlfriend’s brother who leapt out of the car to see how stuck we were, only to sink into the bog in his smart brown shoes. (As an aside, when driving to my girlfriend’s house in Wiltshire, I heard a story on the radio about a policeman who had rescued a girl from a car that had come off the road and crashed into a canal. I had thought to myself that I would have loved to meet this policeman, as you never see these heroes in person, but only ever hear about them on the radio or see them mentioned in the papers.) Anyway, back to the bogged-down car. We both tried to use our best survival knowledge to get it out, but all this seemed to entail was ramming sticks under the wheels and getting covered in mud. Finally we decided to bite the bullet, walk to a local farm and get a tractor to pull us out. Not as easy as you think at 6pm in the evening.

Luckily, we found a kind farmer who was on his way to church, but said his son would help. My girlfriend’s brother kindly mentioned to the farmer that I was an England rugby player, as if somehow this would oil the proceedings and we wouldn’t be spending a night in the car. I expected the usual reaction I get when people find out this information: total indifference and, rightly, a ‘who cares’ attitude. However the farmer said his son was a rugby fan and proceeded to shout this newly acquired information to him. His son came out a couple of seconds later looking a little flustered from being disturbed from his shower and still attempting to get dressed, he looked me up and down with an expression that seemed to say, “Yes, this is James Haskell.”

A little embarrassed, I thanked him for coming to my rescue and offered to pay him for his trouble. As we walked to the tractor that was going to save my landlocked car, I asked the son if he did this kind of thing full time. He said that he was a policeman and that perhaps just for today I should be asking for his autograph. Incredibly It turned out that he was the very policeman who had saved that female motorist’s life that morning in the freezing canal. He had gone back to his parent’s farm to get away from the overwhelming press attention. Now he would have a new anecdote: one about spending his evenings dragging out stupid England rugby player’s cars from muddy bogs. The farmer and his hero son were really kind in rescuing me and if it wasn’t for them I might still be there now. Thank you, to the pair of you.

Penalties and paintball

I came down for breakfast the other morning and picked up The Times. On the back page it read ‘England players rewarded for poor display with luxury break in 5-star hotel’. “Well,” I thought, “it’s news to me, but count me in!” Then I thought, “Hold on, when has a team, especially one I’ve been involved with, ever been rewarded for two defeats with a five star break?” The answer is never.

Sure enough it was a nice a hotel, set in idyllic grounds, but there was no hint of players lounging around in towelling robes, sipping cocktails and getting massaged. The reality was a three-hour review meeting where every inch of our attack and defence was covered. Not to mention an honest review of our poor discipline with a top referee present to make things crystal clear. Oh, and God forbid I forget the absolutely savage fitness session we were put through on Thursday as a punishment for giving away penalties.

But I can’t lie and say we didn’t have a little fun in the paintball field. Getting to shoot the coaches at close range with high-velocity paint is always top on my list – even if my mask steamed up so much I couldn’t see as Steve Borthwick shot me in the neck and Mike Ford shot me in the arse.

History repeats itself in Ireland

I have to say that England vs Ireland at Croke Park was a game I had been looking forward to for a long time. Croke Park itself is a very imposing stadium that can hold a vast number of screaming, passionate fans. Yet on the day the game was a big let down from both sides. It should have been fast-paced, should have had people on the edge of their seats.

The match was especially disappointing from England’s point of view as, yet again, we gave away too many penalties – 18 in total – which cost us the game. That’s before mentioning the actual rugby we played. I was guilty for a penalty that could have been easily avoided, which only added to my personal disappointment at losing another game in an England strip. Probably eight of those penalties were needless, which really sticks in the craw. It’s very difficult as a team (I include the coaching staff into this statement) to say that you accept your discipline is poor or that we get refereed harshly, then go out and make the same errors again. I don’t have the answer, but what I do know is we have to be accountable and get this out of our game immediately. We have the players and team to become a force in world rugby, but we keeping getting stuck in the blocks. After the game the players were obviously filled with disappointment and in an introspective mood. I thought Mike Tindall, even though he was sin-binned, had a good game, along with Phil Vickery who is putting people to shame with his incredible work rate.

Flutey drives me up the wall

This week has been tough. A lot of training and hard work in the England camp, but quite a welcome break from the media storm surrounding my move to Stade Francais. The week started well with Wasps getting a win at home against Northampton – I went to the game at Adams Park as, even though playing for England is always the top priority, you miss playing for your club. I have to say that after four weeks of sharing a room with Riki Flutey I’ve come to the conclusion he is completely insane. He’s a good friend, but totally mental. All he does is sing to himself the whole time and complain that I’m not tidy. He also has the annoying habit of doing stupid things when he knows I’m looking at him.

A Wasps Family History

The following is a blog written by James’ father Jonathan, recounting some of his favourite Wasps anecdotes

The Haskell family were supporters of Wasps well before James joined their academy, let alone signed professionally for the club. It was a childhood dream for James to play for the club he supported so avidly; sneaking out of school to ensure he never missed a home game and most away games. Wasps had recently been bought by Chris Wright and were playing their home matches at Loftus Road, in Shepherds Bush, the home of QPR the football team Wright also owned.

For the first two seasons the family sat with the hardcore Wasps fans opposite the main stand, in the stand accessed via Ellerslie Road, which in those days was called the Stan Bowles stand and would take half time refreshments in the Phil Parkes bar!

The team in those days was not dissimilar to the team James first started to play in years later. Kenny Logan was the star on one wing, Josh Lewsey the other. Alex King was fly half, Fraser Walters at centre and Joe Worsley, Peter Scrivener and Lawrence in the back row. Trevor Leota and Will Green in the front row.

In those days pitch invasions after a match, although not condoned, were tolerated and with a few minutes to go at the end of each game, James and his mates would creep down to the advertising hoardings, ready to leap onto the pitch when the referee’s whistle went for full time. Normally they would have the timing of this enterprise down to a fine art. However, on one memorable occasion in a very tight local derby match against Quins, as Wasps were defending their lines with great vigour, James reacted in the normal way to what he thought was the ref’s final whistle and leapt screaming over the barrier. He dashed headlong into the centre of the players with his autograph book at the ready, only to draw up very short when he realised not only was he alone on the pitch, but that, aside from the eyes of all thirty players being fixed on him in bewilderment, there were also the eyes of all seven thousand supporters watching the match. Realising the whistle had been for a foul, not full time, he turned on his heels and, with a cacophony of cat calls ringing in his ears, rushed back to the safety of his mates behind the barriers, who were convulsed with laughter.

This wasn’t the only time James drew attention to himself with the players. He was a regular attendee in the players’ bar after the match and with the same application he now shows in training, he was remorseless in his pursuit of autographs. The issue for the players was not the actual signing of the autograph, but dealing with the barrage of questions that would accompany the request, about the game, where they felt it had gone wrong and what were they going to do about it. Plus ancillary questions like, “Please tell me your daily training schedule in full detail and how can I become a professional rugby player?” He was so persistent, in fact, that the players took to scuttling away when he approached. Joe Worsley – now a very close friend – tells the story of when at an away game, he looked though the dressing room window, recoiling in horror when he spied Haskell standing outside the dressing room door, autograph book in hand. “My god it’s that kid again!” cried Joe and along with most other players left the dressing room via the back exit.

Eileen Dallaglio, God rest her, tells the story of James when he was about 16 bounding up to her. “Good afternoon Mrs D. My name is James Haskell and I am the man that is going to take your son’s Wasps and England shirt from him”. Mrs D’s response is unprintable, but she never forgot James or indeed what he said and took great pleasure on the day that James did in fact take Lawrence’s two shirts from him, in recounting the story.

Playing in the back row, Lawrence was James’ main idol, along with Joe, and he collected as much memorabilia about them both as he could. From such stuff are fairy stories created and James’ came true when in May 2007 he took to the field with two of his main heroes – Joe Worsley and Lawrence Dallagio in an all-Wasps England back row for the pre-World Cup match against France. He has some very treasured photographs of the occasions and some great shots of the three of them packing down in the scrum.

Wasps were very good to James and whilst only seventeen and still at school, Warren Gatland took him along on the pre-match friendly to Clermont Auvergne. Gatland not only included him in the match day 22 he actually started him at open-side flanker, opposite the French legend (and then French captain) Olivier Magne. The match was memorable for a number of reasons, not least of which was that it was Richard Cockerill’s debut, having moved from Leicester in the close season. Although they were England teammates there was not a great deal of love lost between Dallaglio and Cockerill and, from the kick-off this ‘friendly’ turned out to be anything but that. Within minutes Dallaglio and Cockerill were trading punches and then, after a Logan tackle on Tony Marsh, Lawrence got involved and a few punches turned into a free-for-all punch-up in front of the main grandstand and about eight rows down from where James’ mother was sitting. Initially it was just Marsh and Dallaglio trading shots but within moments players from both teams, including James, had rushed in. Having only ever played school rugby up to this point, James was uncertain as to what to do. Whilst he was in the middle of the throng determining his strategy, he was spotted at the same time by both his mother and Clermont’s 23-stone Argentinean prop. The prop drew back his massive forearm and delivered a thunderous blow to James’ unsuspecting jaw at the same time as his mother was endeavouring to vault over the row of seats in front to defend her boy. Luckily, her attempts failed and James stood his ground, although I’m sure if asked he wouldn’t have had a clue where he was, such was the force of the blow. A harsh welcome to the world of professional rugby.

James finished his education at Wellington College, having taken his A-levels, in early June. The day after he left Wellington, having turned down far more lucrative offers and overtures from a large number of Premiership clubs, he signed professional terms to join the inaugural RFU-funded Wasps elite academy with Tom Rees. He was given a week off to sort himself out and then told to report to Heathrow airport and Wasps’ pre-season training camp in Poland.

On the plane out he found himself sitting next to the Welsh legend Rob Howley who had that season just signed for Wasps so was also a new boy. James had bought a rugby magazine at the airport, which featured a centre page spread on Rob and the fact he was one of the all-time great scrum halves. James has never really stopped pinching himself ever since.

As a result of signing for Wasps James didn’t get the chance to go to university; instead he was educated at the University of Life by the senior players. He obviously acquitted himself well, was accepted by his peers and managed to acquire the nickname “Keeno” as a result of his enthusiasm and dedication not only to training but extra training as well. All of this paid off when some two months later, Gatland, the legendary Wasps coach, handed him a starting place in the team to face Harlequins in the opening game of the season, making him the youngest ever Wasps player by over six months to make his debut and the second youngest ever forward in the history of the Premiership, after David Flatman.

As for the Haskell family, they rapidly gravitated away from the Elleslie Road stand, joining the first ever Wasps Executive Club, being very active supporters of all club events, dinners and auctions and being one of only two companies from the Loftus Road days to transfer to a box when the club moved to Adams Park five years ago. In fact the family business, aside from being probably the single largest corporate pitch-side advertiser for three years, also sponsored the Community rugby section for two years, winning a very substantial Sports Match grant for the club. The Haskell’s had an executive box for fours seasons at Adams Park and were one of the largest corporate entertainers on match days. Indeed many of the customers, clients and friends whom they entertained in their box on the half-way line, have become staunch Wasps and rugby fans today.

Feeling Down After Wales

A famous Monty Python song advises us to ‘always look on the bright side of life’, but after losing at the Millennium Stadium to Wales at the weekend I find it very difficult to be all smiles. Yes, as a team, we made advances in our play. Yes, we should have and could have beaten the Welsh, but we didn’t and that’s all that will be remembered a few years from now. After the match I felt down and, perhaps unsurprisingly, was not great company on Saturday night as my girlfriend kept reminding me.

I am glad that England stepped up and went someway to gaining the respect that our hard work deserved. A lot of people who thought we were on course for a record-breaking hiding to nothing had something to reflect on after the game. I thought, as did the TV pundits, that Joe Worsley defended magnificently and played a great game, as did Riki Flutey and Harry Ellis. Personally, I was disappointed that I didn’t feature in the match as much as I did against Italy the week before. My display was a lot more workman-like than I would have hoped for.

It’s a shame we have a week off because I feel like getting on with training and being back on the field of play as soon as possible. The next Test against Ireland can’t come soon enough for me.

Italy Were A Tough, Physical Team

As a player the real emotions on match day start to kick in when the team bus stops just outside the gates of Twickenham’s west car park with their golden statues shining in the sunlight and the crowd of fans starts pushing and shoving to steal a glimpse of the England team as we walk through into the stadium. All of a sudden you’re filled with an immediate rush of excitement underpinned by a wall of nervous expectation. And last Saturday was no different. I really enjoy the feeling of walking through the crowd with them just inches away from us cheering and roaring their encouragement. It really raises the stakes and heightens the senses. And it’s not that long ago that I would have been stood in that crowd myself, pushed up against the security cordon and screaming at an ear-splitting volume.

No matter what it looked like on TV or up in the stands, Italy were a tough, physical team and my battered and bruised body on Sunday showed testament to that very fact. Obviously at times they lacked direction and organisation but you can never fail them on their commitment level. It was great to get a win against them and finally put into practice some of the stuff that we had worked so vigorously in the last few weeks.

It terms of performance England moved forward in a number of areas (especially in regards tackling and our defensive line speed improved greatly) but we stayed frustratingly static in others. Discipline is a big issue for us (and I was guilty of failing you with my sin-binning) and we know we have to sharpen up massively against Wales if we are to stand a chance against the competition’s clear favourites.

Player-wise I thought that Parisse’s sheer ability shone through in an otherwise underperforming Italy side (which in itself is a mark of true class) and for England Nick Kennedy and Phil Vickery worked tirelessly and with real quality. I am always proud to stand next to Vicks on the battlefield and Nick is developing into a real powerhouse player.

Bring on Wales.

(PS. It was great to see that the commitment to the England cause doesn’t start and stop with the players. The England coaching team were out on the Twickenham pitch for two hours solid shovelling and raking snow away the day before the match, only for it to snow again the next day and them have to start all over again.)

Aero Makes A Break For It

Picture the scene: I have just finished the longest and most physically punishing England training session ever out in Portugal and I am trudging back to my room with legs like bags of lead thinking only of a shower and a quick power-nap before lunch when my phone begins to beep. I only just manage to raise my arm high enough to answer it when a high-pitched voice blasts my ear. On the other end of the call is a lady berating me about my dog. My dog? Aero is in England with my parents. What on earth is she shouting at me in Portugal for? After a minute or so of high-level audio abuse I click that the lady is in fact Aero’s previous owner and she is demanding to know why people are calling her about “her dog” being lost at Virginia Water Lake in Windsor. She seems to be telling me that a friend of hers now has a hold of Aero and I need to come and pick him up. This is too surreal. My first thought was that the bang on the head I got from Andrew Sheridan in the training session earlier was more serious than I thought and that I had to be concussed, hallucinating and possibly even hearing things. The dog was supposed to be with my parents at home miles from Virginia Water. How on earth could he be running around lost and more importantly how could she possibly know?

And then I remembered a crucial piece of information: I’d forgotten to change the owner details on Aero’s collar. Clearly he’d got loose somehow and someone had nabbed him and was trying to return him. I rang Dad, who sounded horribly out of breath and out of sorts, and said, “Hello Dad, how on earth have you managed to lose the dog?” This took Dad completely by surprise and I think for a second he contemplated denying it and brazening it out. “Umm… how do you know?” he wheezed. “He only got off the lead a minute ago.” It turns out Dad was embarking on a new fitness regime by taking Aero for a mammoth trek in Windsor and had decided to let him off the lead for a couple of minutes while he called Anthony (my agent) to discuss some new business. Aero realized that Dad didn’t have a chance in hell of catching him and legged it. Dad was breathing so heavily and loudly that Anthony assumed that someone was giving him a dirty phone call and put the phone down.

I gave Dad a number and he ambled off to meet a lovely couple holding onto a very excited Aero.

A Mountain To Climb

Disappointed, despondent, angry: these are the feelings that filled my head after the final whistle went on Sunday. As Wasps players we hate losing, but we don’t have anyone to blame apart from ourselves for losing against Castres. I got a copy of the game straight away when we had finished and proceeded to sit in the less than glamorous environs of Toulouse airport and watch the disappointment unfold on my laptop. The simple fact is we had five opportunities to win that game and blow away Castres but we totally lacked any kind of clinical execution. And by contrast Castres took every chance they had. You can always point fingers at individuals for making errors but rugby is all about team effort and I think as a team we played under well under par. This has been the story of Wasps’ season thus far and its not getting better. As players we are solid together and eager to change things, but we stand at the bottom of a huge mountain with our last chance of a trophy sitting right at the pinnacle. We can and will climb this seemingly impossible mountain, but let’s be clear - its ‘sudden death rugby’ from this moment on.

Haskell’s Hot Wheels

I’m always getting asked what I’d like to do after my rugby career has come to an end or what I think I’d be doing if I hadn’t ended up a rugby player. We have such relatively short careers that I suppose it’s only a natural question to ask a player. It happened again just last night after the Leinster game when Joe Worsley and his lovely wife Nicky took me, Felicia, Anthony (my agent), Dom Waldouck, George Skivington and some of the guys out for a post-match dinner. When I get the career question I always answer, as my parents would want me to, something along the lines of ‘working in the city’ or ‘I’d be a barrister’. Which is really a lie. Indeed, I live near a tyre center and occasionally on my days off you might find me changing tyres for the guys. This might seem an odd thing to be doing in the run-up to a massive game but if the guys are really busy (and not being one to shirk a challenge) I have been known to don a pair of gloves and get stuck in. I had no idea that the process was so long, and I’m by no means that competent with the tools, as the guys constantly remind me. But still, I give it a go. And actually quite enjoy it. The business bit of my brain started wondering whether there was a chance here to ‘maximise the opportunity’ (as someone working in the city might say). Perhaps I could open ‘Haskell’s Hot Wheels’ and charge the public a premium for having their wheels changed by an England rugby player? Maybe I could rope in some of my Wasps and England teammates? I ran the idea past a lady customer who was waiting for her vehicle, expecting a positive response. Instead she told me in no uncertain terms that she didn’t have the slightest idea of who I was and would I mind kindly shutting up and going away. Back to the drawing board on that one then.

It’s About Winning

‘Embarrassment’ is not a good word to be used about you at the best of times, but used in professional sport to describe a performance it can be the most cutting comment of them all. I have used it about myself a few times in my career but I think when Shaun Edwards used it to describe our last performance in Leinster it was entirely justified. Wasps never lose like we did that day and we never wanted it to happen again. Unsurprisingly then playing Leinster at Twickenham today was a huge deal. The club was a very emotional place last week with nerves very much to the forefront. Because we hadn’t played the weekend before (the game against Bath was cancelled) we were concerned that our sharp edge might have been slightly blunted with the enforced rest. But there was also a lot of excitement and a real desire to get out there and make people realise that Wasps aren’t also-rans this season by any stretch of the imagination.

I have a confession to make. I don’t believe in the saying, “Its not about the winning its about the taking part.” People who happily come second or third or worse harp on about that kind of rubbish. (In fact I’m also reminded of that other saying, that “if it’s just a game why keep the score?”). I only take part to win, especially in a game that means you have to push your body to the very limit of its abilities and tolerances. I train extremely hard – and even so-called days off are taken up with extra training with Margot Wells and regular wrestling sessions – and the only way to make this amount of effort acceptable is if we win. And even then you only deserve to celebrate if you know that you have pushed yourself as hard as you can. And yes we won, but somehow I just didn’t feel like celebrating. From a player’s point of view the game was pretty dull and I’m disappointed we didn’t give the Wasps fans a more dramatic, exciting game. It started well enough but just as we started to get into the swing of things the flow disintegrated and the game became scrappy and disjointed. There was too much kicking from both sides, which meant we were unable to get a grip on the game. I wasn’t that happy with my personal performance and so I was pretty miserable company at Joe Worsley’s post-match dinner. And as I sit here and write this late in the evening I can’t wait to get out training tomorrow and start to work on the things that didn’t go that well for me. I’m totally fired up and ready to get out there again and I hate having to wait for the next game. Honestly, if I weren’t so battered and sore my only wish would be to go out and play Castres tomorrow.

On a personal note I was really pleased for Josh who dominated today and showed what he does best: running hard and direct. He hasn’t had the easiest ride this season but really showed his class today. When I was a Wasps fan (rather than player) Josh was always my favourite player – and I even had a poster of him up on my wall at home. Also, Paul “The Handoff” Sackey was in fine form. It’s a pleasure to play with these guys.

Wasps Fans - I Salute You!

Wasps Vs Harlequins is always a massive encounter and the fact that this was our first game of the New Year only added to the emotional melting pot and trebled the apprehension of playing against one of the form teams in the Premiership. I think that everyone last week – including me – had swarms of butterflies in the pits of their stomachs in the build-up to the game. Those nerves perhaps lent training an extra edge this week. An edge that perhaps has been missing since the beginning of this season. And as readers of my blog know, I think edgy, ill-tempered training sessions often lead to powerful performances.

Wasps' style of defence is something that is hotly debated in rugby circles – is it one dimensional? Is it ugly? Is it too high risk? – well, as Shaun always says, this system (the 'blitz defence' as it's known) was never meant to be top of the statistics charts but was meant for must-win games. And Wasps Vs Quins was one of those must-win games. The first 40 minutes were probably the best rugby we have played so far this season. Our defence was at its most aggressive and formidable. One commentator even said that we were "hunting in packs" with our tackling and that we looked like the Wasps of old for the first time this season. I won't disagree. Dan Leo lead the way in the first half with some really big hits and then Serge Betsen showed time and time again throughout the game why he is rightly seen as one of the finest back rowers on the planet. He's like a turbo stock car smashing into the opposition and he never, ever gives up. And I thought Phil Vickery had a great game too. In my humble opinion I think he's recently rediscovered a lot of his aggression and fire and is playing some of his best rugby in years. It really is an absolute pleasure to get to play with such a legend week after week and it's hard not to be inspired when you see him destroying the opposition. Obviously I was gutted to see Tom Rees limping off with a serious knee injury. He's had a dreadful few weeks injury-wise (what with getting a free nose-job from Joe Worsley in the Sale game – though ironically Joe's current hand injury was the result of that same collision) and I'll really miss him on the pitch for the next couple of months. I can't imagine how he feels knowing he'll miss The Six Nations.

To win the game as we did meant that there was a mixture of real positivity and a strengthening in our belief that on our day we can beat anyone. However, especially in light of Wasps' position in the league table we have to channel that self-belief and enjoy the moment but quickly move onto the next big challenge. We certainly don't deserve to gloat or bask in the glow of victory for more than a minute or two.

What set this game apart (apart from the fact that it was a convincing win for us for a change) was the incredible atmosphere and support from the fans packed in at Adams Park. The Wasps fans were astounding and really lifted the players. I think people often underestimate the impact on players of having really vocal fans but I can assure you that if you were there cheering for us you were a huge part of our victory. Thank you, from all of us on the pitch. I'm glad we could finally repay your loyalty and patience this difficult season with such a great game and such a welcome win. Can you all come with us to Bath

Canine Update

My new dog Aero has revealed himself to be quite a handful. Any time I let go of his lead he scarpers and it takes me at least 20 minutes to catch him. I took him to my parents’ house in the country over Christmas and for his first night locked him in an almost empty down stairs room to sleep. Unfortunately he howled incessantly and tried to scratch his way through the door. When I let him out I realized that the room hadn’t been entirely empty: I’d left my kit bag on the top of a high chest of drawers (way out of Aero’s reach, I’d wrongly assumed). He’d ripped my bag apart and eaten a whole tub of cod liver oil supplements and most of a drum of Maximuscle. I waited days for the expected ‘back-end explosion’ but thankfully it never came. Aero clearly has quite a solid constitution. And in terms of my attempts to train him I’ve finally got him to stop leaping up and putting his paws on people’s shoulders any time anyone meets him and he at least pretends to understand ‘sit’ and ‘lie down’. He still disappears at light speed any time I let him off his leash in public though.

Stitch That Tom!

I remember that during my first ever professional pre-season Wasps trip to Poland that Josh Lewsey – fresh from his army training at Sandhurst – was awarded the “most likely to get shot by his own side” award at one of our team ‘court sessions’. This special accolade was handed out by none other than Joe Worsley. I only mention this charming little tale because Worsley gave out another little ‘award’ last week – 36 stitches to Tom Rees. During the dying minutes of the Saracens game Joe joined into a tackle that Tom had started and entirely accidentally managed to swing his arm around and punch Tom so hard in the nose that his face looked like a split watermelon. Honestly it looked absolutely horrendous. I joked that I’d have been straight in a helicopter on my way to the country’s top plastic surgeon but Tom got stitched up right there and then. I’ve told Tom not to worry – chicks dig scars.

In The Dragon’s Den

The ramifications of the new England player contract really kicked in last week with our first official out-of-competition meet up at England HQ. We’ve never met up outside of a competition before. We started at the ungodly hour of 6am with a series of blood tests – never the best wake up call. The rest of the day was filled up with tests with the respective England medical and physio teams, a biomechanical test and a one-on-one with one of the team nutritionists to go through my test results (my blood work showed that I was fit and healthy but that I needed to eat less red meat, which isn’t a problem because I like fish just fine). There were some improvements from the last time I undertook similar tests but as is always the case there’s still a lot of work to be done.

The most important element of the whole day was the late afternoon session with all the England coaches and Martin Johnson in one of the boxes at Twickenham. You can’t help feeling like a contestant on Dragon’s Den when you have to sit there with a representative of every part of the England management set-up sat before you going through your reports and your performances in the autumn internationals in excruciatingly honest detail. But it was all open and honest and fair – and it’s good to get feedback from such a senior level straight to your face. Each player got to talk about themselves; their part in the set-up; get a definite steer on what was expected of them as an individual going forwards and finally ask the top table about what they thought went right – and so wrong – with our last batch of games. The bosses were positive about the way I’d played but had some specific areas they wanted me to concentrate on going forwards. I’m going to be working hard over the coming weeks and months to rectify what they identified as my areas of potential weakness.

My New Best Friend?

My agent said no. My parents said it was the worst idea I have had to date. My girlfriend gave a Roman Emperor style ‘thumbs-down’. My teammates laughed in my face. So when I turned up last week with a very energetic and very badly behaved one-year-old dog at my parents’ house it went down like the proverbial poo sandwich. His name is Aero (“Because he’s chocolate on the outside and bubbly on he inside,” his former owner told me as she handed over his rope lead and then scarpered whilst laughing hysterically) and he’s a brown Labrador Weimaraner cross. The guys at Land Rover have already tricked out the back of my new car with a dog cage. I’ve always loved dogs and had one growing up and so for ages I’ve had this idealized of me going for runs with the beast by my side and taking him training – real man and dog bonding stuff. Unfortunately the first time I tried to take him for a run he belted off in the opposite direction at high speed and crashed through a hedge before evading me across fields and streams for miles. He seemed very pleased with himself. And in retrospect I did get a hell of a run! This is either going to be the worst decision ever or I may just be able to train him into something like respectable shape. I’ll keep you posted.

A True Test

England vs. Australia at Twickenham? Rugby matches just don’t get much better or bigger than this. There’s always that underlying sense of sporting tension between our two nations which always makes for a hell of a battle when we face of against each other. Along with my first games against New Zealand I feel that a match against Australia is the real start of a player’s true international career. Playing ‘the big three’ is a big step for any young player like me and these kinds of games really show you where you are in terms of your growth and maturity as a player.

It’s obviously incredibly frustrating to be on the bench for a second week but the coaches have been very clear in their decision-making and in their communication of their plans to me, and I obviously respect and understand their decision. And I know that Team England compromises a squad of 35 men, not just the guys on the pitch at any given moment. But still, training this hard and starting a match sitting down is a hard pill to swallow because I so desperately want to be out there with my teammates, representing our country at ‘HQ’. But I know that if and when the coaches want me to come on I’ll be ready and won’t let them or anyone else down. And luckily I will be able to channel all that pent up energy, aggression and eagerness into my performance when I do come on to the field.

Our Friends In The North

Playing Newcastle away on a Friday night with an 8pm kick off is always going to be a difficult game. As a professional rugby player it is one of those games that you need to dig deep to produce a performance. This is multiplied many times over when you have had the start to season that Wasps have had. We needed to win and win with a bonus point to finally kick off the season and put all these previous false dawns behind us.

Thankfully we produced a collective performance that meant we achieved our goal and came away with all the points. And we won the aerial battle for possession for the most part, which is a first for us this season.

Tom Rees, as stand-in captain, had a lot of inspiring words to say before the match. And as a man who rarely speaks unless something needs to be said that had a lot of impact on us. Then on the pitch he led from the front - never afraid to put his body on the line - which is just what you want from your team leader.

Turn It Up!

When I was offered tickets for the premiere of Anvil! The Story of Anvil (a friend of a friend of a friend of mine directed the film) at the recent London Times Film Festival I said yes, that would be lovely, and thought no more about it, let alone wondered what this strange titled film might be about. So image my surprise and disappointment when I turned up and discovered it was an award-winning ‘real-life Spinal Tap’ documentary about a failed middle-aged heavy metal group who had inspired many of the more famous bands on the scene (Anthrax, Metallica, Slayer to name a few) but not actually made it big themselves. Standing in the celeb packed foyer of the cinema (even the tall, skinny one out of Trinny & Susannah was there) and confronted by a life-sized cardboard standee of Lips - the band’s decrepit lead singer - standing buck-naked and thrusting his pointy guitar skywards I sadly realised it was too late to make a break for it and settled in to watch the film. Only a few seconds after taking my seat Keanu Reeves wandered out in front of screen and introduced the film – which was unexpected and surreal. He’s not in the film or has anything to do with it. He just really likes it.

Would you believe it but I am now a heavy metal fan. This was partly to do with the film (which is a surprisingly touching documentary about this pair of deluded rockers who just won’t give up) but more to do with the live performance that Anvil surprised us with at the end of the show. Lips - the real life one, not the cardboard cutout - ran out from the wings of the stage and stopped right next to my seat before tearing off a huge guitar solo. He was gurning straight into my face! I thought he was going to ask me to play his guitar with my tongue or something. The whole audience were stood up and cheering, but I was paralyzed with fear and embarrassment (should I punch the air? Make the 'devil horns' sign that metal-heads do? Start head-banging?) and sat really still hoping he'd move away. But he didn't for about five minutes whilst everyone else in the cinema got to their feet and cheered and clapped him. I decided to nod politely in his general direction, hoping that might appease this ancient rock god. But I suddenly became aware that instead of passing myself of as a bona-fide metaller I might just instead be sticking out like a very tall blonde toff.

7 Days In The Bunker

A week in rugby can seem shorter or longer than the average week. Losing again last week against Gloucester in the EDF brought things to a head, in terms of this being a pivotal point in the season. We all know that if our defense had been on form we should have beaten them. So Wasps as a club were either going to fold right there and then (which is as totally an unacceptable idea to us as players as it is to our army of loyal Wasps fans) or do what we always do when backed in a corner - come out fighting.

I think Danny and Josh’s little tête-à-tête was the best thing that could have happened this week. We play our best when training is intense and there is an underlying atmosphere of anger hanging over proceedings. And sometimes this spills over into physical action. This might seem odd to the casual observer (and no doubt anyone who doesn’t understand rugby might have tutted and looked down on us all) but frankly that’s rugby. So dry your eyes and get on with it. We all know that we haven’t been playing the best and have been trying to do everything to rectify this. Players at Wasps are not satisfied with losing or playing badly, myself especially.

Cue a massive game against equally fearsome opposition. I knew from the beginning of the week we weren’t going to lose this game. Things felt right and at times today we all played well at the same time for a change. This was another step in the right direction for me, even if I did make a couple of stupid handling errors. I have to say that our front row was outstanding today, especially since after watching Castres during our video analysis session this week destroy teams with their scrum, our boys rose to the challenge and took them apart. Tom Voyce was matching awesome running with some real power and pace.

After the game all I could feel was relief and a sense that things might be finally beginning to go right for us. This is hopefully a turning point for us. We know how good we are – despite the recent evidence to the contrary - and more importantly how good we can and will be.

From a personal point of view I am getting a little sick of reading about every commentator or stalwart of the game coming out and warning Danny about his behaviour or how he is in danger of becoming known for stuff other than rugby. Firstly, the boy has been out for four months and has worked extremely hard to get back and look as sharp as he did before he got injured. Secondly he has just happened to start a relationship with a well-known female companion but I don’t recall him asking for the press to follow him around and pap him at every opportunity. How can he be known for his rugby if he hasn’t been playing? Lets wait and see what happens instead of banging on about this stuff. Danny wants to play well and win like the rest of us. Nobody is more committed to his game than Danny. Times have changed, get used to it.

We Took A Bath – Again

I can’t believe we lost against Bath, especially at home. It’s so frustrating for us and for the fans it must be a total nightmare. Ironically, when I’m in a Wasps’ shirt I never feel we are going to lose… but if we don’t actually put the tackles in then that’s hardly going to stay true, is it? We should have won but yet again we let ourselves down. On a personal level for the first time this season I felt like my old self. I can’t put a finger on exactly why but I felt fit, strong and confident. It’s just a bloody shame we lost because as at times we played really well.

And it was great to see Danny back. I am so pleased for him and he lifts the team whenever he plays.

Not So Headstrong After All

I'm extremely pleased that having carefully viewed the video evidence the panel saw fit to dispense with the original charge of head-butting and to replace it with a different charge of entering a ruck without being bound-on to another player. I would like to thank them for their clarity, professionalism and fairness relating to my case.

I'm obviously gutted that I won't be able to join my teammates in what is going to be a very tough game in Leicester on Friday and I hate letting down Wasps' army of fans. But at least a week out of action means I can properly rest my injured eye. I look forward to being back in action very soon.

Harden Up

Although no one said the words out loud, it was clear that “The pitfalls of being defending champions” was the subject of our Wasps analysis session today. Not co-incidentally the man leading the session has more experience than most in this area. Shaun Edwards has started 14 seasons as a defending champion either as a player or a coach. His message to us as he looked out over the briefing room today was simple and effective: “What have you got to feel sorry for yourselves about?” Either we stay strong, and as he put it, harden up, and go forward as a collective team or we self-implode as individuals. Wasps are about winning and we’re not good at losing. Which is why I love the team.

Let alone coach, Shaun Edwards is one of the most inspirational men I have ever known and when he speaks you listen. Carefully. He doesn’t waste words. He doesn’t need to. Last week’s match wasn’t good enough, we all know that. This week’s training has gone well so far and we’re looking forward to the very large challenge than Worcester offer on the weekend. The time for talking is over.

Let’s Try That Again, Shall We?

Yesterday was not a great day to be in a Wasps shirt either on the pitch or in the stands.

Yet again the kick-off to the season hasn’t exactly gone to plan for Wasps. It’s always a little galling to play your first game in September and have the Heavens open up on the pitch. The conditions were so appalling that ball was like a bar of soap. Hence, like a complete Muppet, I managed knock the ball on from a free-kick in the most cack-handedly comical manner. It may have looked funny from the stands but it was no laughing matter for me on the ground. London Irish out-thought us on the day and it showed on the scoreboard.

We are no longer champions and thus have to work doubly hard to make sure that we do the business on the field. As you can see from the press in the newspapers today everyone wants to pick holes in individuals and a team when we play that poorly. People expect us to win and win well. When we fail to deliver, our fans and the press quite rightly come down on us like a ton of bricks. It’s no fun being at the bottom of that pile of bricks I can assure you. It’s horrible being slated in the press – even though they’re nowhere near as hard on me as I am on myself. At least the press noticed that my good mate Tom Rees had had a good game.

We all know it wasn’t good enough and will in true Wasps fashion go back and re-double our efforts this week for our game against Worcester.

Pre-Season Friendly Against Llanelli

On The Red Carpet

Monday nights are normally very dull in the Haskell household. However this Monday was very different. I was invited to attend the premiere of Guy Ritchie’s new film rocknrolla. I was blown away to be asked because I’m a massive fan of Mr Ritchie’s previous efforts. Well, Lock, Stock and Snatch anyway. I’m not sure even Ritchie had any idea what Revolver was about. Italian fashion gods Ermenegildo Zegna were kind enough to dress me for the event in a really sharp, classic three-button suit. I reckon it took me from my usual six in the fashion stakes to at least an eight!

Suited and booted I was whisked down the red carpet passing Hollywood and England’s finest acting talent. Stopping only briefly to have my photo taken as a pack of photographers shouted instructions: “Over here!” “Look right”. And in my case – “Get out of the way of Harvey Weinstein!” Only Shaun Edwards can be more intimidating!

I really enjoyed the film itself. Sure it’s familiar Ritchie territory - it’s a complicated tale of ‘geezers’ and gangsters’ mixed up in a land deal gone wrong - but after years in the wilderness having the mickey taken out of him by every critic in the world I think Ritchie could be firmly back on the map with rocknrolla. The whole experience was only slightly marred by the fact the Madonna took about 3hrs to get into the cinema so I was sitting like a lemon for ages. It did cross my mind to go out and hurry her up, but I don’t like being rude to older women!

I've just returned from Wasps' 2008 pre-season camp in Granada, Spain

Pre-season training camps are generally regarded in rugby circles as the most hideous part of our otherwise extremely enjoyable jobs. Gone are the days of jetting off to some exotic location where the occasional bit of training might, might be squeezed in in-between drinking sessions and 'friendly' games with some average local opposition. The Wasps old boys assure me that was what 'pre-season' was really like in the old days – but in the five years that I've been professional (how scary is that!) the annual pre-season camps have been incredibly hard work, and undeniably draining both mentally and physically.

My first camp was in Spala in Poland at the tender age of 17. (I was so young that I was still at school). The reason for choosing Poland, and specifically Spala, was solely down the fact they had a cryogenic chamber there. This temperature in this evil torture box could plummet as low as -135, where, dressed only in cotton shorts, long socks, clogs and sporting bare top halves we would stand for two and a half minutes in an effort to engender some sort of 'super-recovery' after training. (A bit like that 'Bacta-chamber' thing that Luke Skywalker floats around in after being beaten up by that intergalactic polar bear in The Empire Strikes Back). We would do this twice a day for ten days, the idea being that with this awesome recovery tool at our disposal we could train at the same full-bore intensity every day without fear of injury or physical depletion. How wrong we were. Instead, it was like a rugby concentration camp that featured three training sessions a day, each finished off with a gonad-shrinking conditioning session. Every night I was so drained I couldn't even cry myself to sleep. And then to top it all, our only day-off treat was a day-trip to Auschwitz (which is as utterly depressing and moving as you'd imagine). We've been to Poland twice a year for the last four years.

But as I said at the top of this blog, we've just got back from our first ever camp in Spain. Thankfully that means there was no more ice-chamber or enduring the unfathomable Polish habit of cooking everything in egg batter (so you have no idea what you're eating), or the amazing pudding of cold pasta with yoghurt on top. But being situated in the Sierra Nevada Mountains (which is where Sergio Leone's The Good, The Bad And The Ugly was filmed) what Granada's camp did have was remoteness and altitude – perfect for training. Every morning would start at seven. First on the menu would be personal rehab based on each individual player's needs. Then breakfast (cereal, toast, a boiled egg, cold meets and cheese - which if I'm honest doesn't really compare to the full bacon/eggs and a sausage fry-up that I was constantly craving). Next up would be weights (alternating between lower and upper body as the week went on) followed by a welcome couple of hours of rest during the heatblast of the early afternoon then a short rugby session and yet more conditioning.

As we were situated slap-bang exactly in the middle of nowhere (an out-of-season, snow-less ski resort to be precise) the evenings held very little in the way of entertainment. There was nowhere to go, nothing to see so you could either read (I polished off John Niven's awesome American-Psycho-In-The-UK-Music-industry Kill Your Friends in two sittings whilst Joe Worsely ploughed through Christopher Hitchins' Vicar-bothering God Is Not Great), watch a movie or if you were Tom Rees, John Heart or George Skivington you could blast through Mario Kart on your Wii every free second you'd get. (I actually took an X-Box 360 with me but never got around to plugging it in).

Unusually then this year's camp was actually very successful and positive. There was a great atmosphere between all the Wasps boys and we got through a hell of a lot of hard work. The real point of going away on these trips is to bring the squad back together emotionally and physically after the summer break, which at Wasps is never an issue because it's always an amazing feeling walking back into the arms of the Wasps family. Don't get me wrong, the solid eight days of physically punishing training was still hideous, but despite that it was obvious that all the boys felt really good about getting back into the thick of things. The one expression that really springs to mind on these sorts of camps is: "This is not a time for heroes". What that means is that even though you should be working as hard as you can, you shouldn't go mad and try to start showing all your team mates up with your individual superhero antics. The camp is about team building, not showing off. The idea is to make it through the short war of attrition as a stronger team unit, not to go balls out to break camp records and end up not lasting the course. I speak from painful, bitter, personal experience as I used to be an awfully massive 'keeno' in my early days.