Donncha O’Callaghan: Wales is rugby heaven – no wonder one player was homesick in Surrey
March 16 2019, 12:01am,
Welsh players are a unique breed who always peak for the biggest games in Cardiff
There’s a slogan painted on the walls at Parc y Scarlets, “Welcome to Heart and Soul Rugby Country.” They ought to etch that in the arrivals area of Cardiff Airport too, just to make it more obvious. When you come here it’s to play a nation, not a team.
The initial plan for this column was a tactical assessment of Wales and a view on how Ireland could hurt them. Yet the more I thought about this the more I knew that to delve into game plans and counter game plans would be to miss the forest for the trees.
The truth is that Ireland, and pretty much everybody that takes a keen interest in rugby, knows what Wales are going to do. They’ll kick in behind quite a lot, they’ll tackle high and look for chokes and reefs, they’ll offload and seek to keep the ball in play. We could get a nice few boxes on the page with arrows pointing left and right. There is a time for that; it’s not now.
What Wales are going to do is not important; how they are going to do it is. To understand how Wales do it you have to understand them and their rugby culture.
No more so than Ireland, they are raised on songs and stories — yet that lore and legend leads to a certain place, to the red jersey and molten heat of Cardiff on international days.
You may think there is little room for magic in modern professional sport. Then you look at the Wales team. In every other country a good club player is an average international. In Wales, average club players become excellent internationals.
Cold logic does not always trump a belief in something higher. The examples with Wales are myriad; the latest I’ve seen is Josh Adams. I played with Josh at Worcester, a talented and prolific performer for sure. Yet that try he scored against Scotland... I just don’t believe he would have done that for Worcester. If he receives the ball in that position with his club his onboard computer tells him to stay out of touch, to win the collison, present quickly. When playing for Wales, he doesn’t entertain such mundanities.
There is one mindset: I’m going to beat this man on the outside. And off he goes and skins Blair Kinghorn in four metres of space. Rugby speak will tell you that he “backed himself” here. Sure, he did, but he also backed Wales. He’s no longer Josh Adams, a standout winger with a club towards the foot of the Gallagher Premiership. Now he’s wearing the shirt of Shane Williams and JJ Williams. In that moment he’s not thinking about them, but he knows, and it’s in the collective unconscious.
Play at the Principality Stadium and you will know all about that. When Wales are banging on the try line the noise is something you rarely experience. It is loud elsewhere but this is like the way you can tell the difference when your child is crying to raise the roof, or if there is urgent feeling behind the cry. The roar in Cardiff has an emotional timbre; it’s a primal desire from the pit of the crowd’s belly. They must crash over that line. In those moments you feel distinctly human, while trying to resist a force of nature.
Break a Welsh team down into its constituent parts and you are rarely overawed. Like most years Irish provinces are outshining the Welsh regions. Next week all of our players go back to prepare for European quarter-finals of some class. Wales won’t — this is their everything. It wouldn’t surprise me if their players wanted to stay holed up together until the World Cup.
Being in camp with the Welsh is something I’ve been lucky to experience on two Lions tours. A lot of supporters say the Welsh are the spirit of the tour; it’s the same with the players. They are different, but serious craic — once they have accepted the fact that they have to leave Wales to go on this trip that is.
For the 2005 tour, we played a warm-up match against Argentina in Cardiff. Michael Owen, the great Welsh No 8, was able to stay at home for the few days we were based in Cardiff. Then we moved to Pennyhill Park hotel, outside London, for a couple of nights before flying south.
“How are you doing?” he says to me one day. “Yeah, I’m good thanks,” I say, thinking his question a bit out of the blue. “You?”
“I’m struggling bud,” he says shaking his head. “... homesick.”
Nowadays I would be more sympathetic, and admire how someone could love their home and family so much that they didn’t want to be be away for a night. At the time I thought it was hilarious. We’d slag the Welsh players over how they’d get homesick crossing the Severn Bridge — here was more proof. How was Michael going to cope with two months in New Zealand if he couldn’t take being a few hours down the M4?
For the 2009 tour we were left waiting for the Welsh bus at Pennyhill. Ten minutes late, 20 minutes, still no sign. No one’s saying anything but you can tell lads are thinking, “Who the hell shows up late to a Lions tour?”
Thirty minutes late, in rolls the Welsh bus. It turned out they were late because Andy Powell’s mum was crying and hugging Andy so much outside the bus. “I’m so proud of you son ... I’m so proud of you.” She had also brought a load of sandwiches for the boys before their journey. As soon as you hear that you’re almost overcome with love for the Welsh; the butterflies who cannot be broken on the wheel of professionalism.
That said, who turned up on the tour? Andy Powell’s mum! The sandwiches and tears were just a ceremony to mark the leaving of Wales!
Andy was my room-mate. His reputation as a wildman is deserved. But he has also got a pure heart, he’s really quite a sweet man, in his own way. Towards the end of that tour, Jen, my wife, was over. The rules were relaxed by then and Jen stayed at the hotel. At some small hour of the morning we were startled by the sight of Andy creeping into the room. He taps Jen on the shoulder. “Jen,” he says, holding up a paper bag in the dark. “I got you a Big Mac love.”
“Oh, thanks Andy,” she says.
With that he takes off again, Jen wondering what she’s supposed to do with a cold Big Mac in the middle of the night. Next morning we woke early to the sight of Andy sprawled on the next bed, naked in a puddle of his fake tan.
The Welsh love their spray tans, or at least they did. “Look good, play good,” they’d say to sceptical team-mates. For the same reason, they liked occlusion training. Never mind the scientific benefits or absence thereof, just make those arms look more vascular!
This desire to look the part fits with their character, which thrives on confidence. Like ourselves, the Welsh can get low, but when they are up, boy are they up. Once they get on a run and have a sniff of a grand slam they are stunningly efficient at locking their jaws for the kill. Ireland, certainly in the past, could be cowed by opportunity but Wales grow into it. They will have been walking around like gods this past week, full sure they’re going to win. Stop them from winning a grand slam in Cardiff? You may as well try to shove back the tide.
What will Ireland do? What they should not do is make the mistake that we did in the past: look at their club video clips and form when compared to ours and think that we have superior players and a sophisticated plan and that will win out. Then you get hit by a wall of decibel-infused rapid-twitch red muscle. Your plan then feels incomplete. Of course, it is important to have a strategy but you must also know that it will be redundant for some of the match. These aren’t the Clark Kents you know from Ospreys and Scarlets, they’ve brought their capes for this.
To have success in Cardiff you have to go with the forces around you. When you’re caught by an ocean rip, you don’t thrash your legs against it, but let it take you and when the time is right, hit it hard. Don’t get irritated by the choir, always on your side during the warm up, nor should you let that goat bother you, if he is still on the loose. Drink in the noise and the best anthem in the history of nations. Feel the fervour of the crowd and let it fire you as it does them. Accept that they will bang on your line, and probably score at some stage. Yet despite how they may feel, Wales aren’t superheroes. They will make mistakes, and Ireland can capitalise and put their squeeze on. In this remarkable amphitheatre, the travelling fans can make a brilliant noise too.
Irish players must know that this is a huge challenge but, far more important, it’s your childhood wishes made real. To play here with a grand slam on the line is a privilege and one of the most vital experiences you could have.
I like the old stories, but I’m not much given to the nostalgia of wishing back the past. I’m happy to be a retired player. But this is one of those days I would love to be back in green, running out of the tunnel, the roar so vast you feel a physical thump at your back. Rarely can you feel so alive. As far as our sport goes, this is the still point of the spinning world, where myth and men collide. It’s our mecca, the lucid dream of anybody who’s felt their studs twist in the earth as they kick and scrap for every inch. It’s rugby heaven, breathe it deep. I understand why the Welsh boys don’t like leaving for too long.
. Not a criticism though.
