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Ireland's political and cultural magazine
48September/October 2015
CULTURE Rugby
G
EORGE Orwell wrote that
sport is war minus the shoot-
ing. Like a ritualised clash
between two tribes sport
allows men and women to
spill their primal energies, growing and
bonding as human beings in the
process.
I played rugby every weekend from
the age of seven with Instonians at
Shane Park, just off the motorway as you
reach Belfast from Dublin.
It was the defining aspect of my child-
hood: instilling discipline and notions
of fair play and friendship. Without
rugby there is no me. Rugby was not
what I did, it was who I was.
I watched Ireland with bursting pas-
sion. Being a northerner in divided
Ulster and Ireland, and with Presbyte-
rian forebears, rugby gave me identity
as well as purpose. I was inextricably
Irish, united behind Keith Woods,
Paddy Johns and Costello, ‘the Claw’ and
every man in the green cotton jersey.
Fellow Royal Belfast Academical Institu-
tion (RBAI)-alumnus and essayist
Robert Lynd long ago captured my
match day emotions:
“Every time Bleddyn Williams got the
ball I felt as apprehensive as if the frame
of civilisation had been threatened. And
when Daly scored the second try I expe-
rienced such ecstasy as I had known in
youth at the news of the relief of
Ladysmith”.
I was “excessively interested” and
“obsessed”, as Michael Longley
described himself and fellow poet Louis
MacNeice, with rugby.
It carried me through primary and
into grammar school, to the great rugby
fortress in Belfast city centre, RBAI.
That year , I watched David Hum-
phreys lift the European Cup; my
primary school team went on to win the
Ulster league.
My dad used to captivate me with
visions of playing for the school First XV
and travelling to warm weather training
in Barcelona.
I was determined if not convinced I
would play for Ulster and Ireland.
I established myself centrally within
Professionalism sidelines the near-brilliant who won’t do second best. Brian John Spencer
replies to Jim O’Callaghan’s article in July’s
Village
which said that rugby had become a
spectator not a participant sport
Rugby all and end all
Without rugby
there is no me
“
artists
September/October 2015 49
the RBAI rugby system, captaining the
A-team in my first three years.
By I was playing senior rugby.
Training three days a week after school,
most lunch times, one morning, and
playing every Saturday. We travelled to
Dublin to play the big southern teams
like Blackrock and Belvedere.
In I got a gash to the back of the
head courtesy of Cian Healy. We won the
Ulster Schools Cup on March , . I
missed out through injury: a dislocated
shoulder in late February, missing
Ulster schools selection that summer.
I wasn’t the outstanding athlete in the
school or province, but modelling
myself on Neil Back and George Smith I
still felt I was in the race to play at
Ravenhill and Lansdowne Road.
In we reached the semi-final,
losing against Methodist College Bel-
fast. It still hurts, like an open wound.
This was the occasion my dad had
spoken of since I was eight years old.
I went to university in Belfast and
chose to play for Ballynahinch Rugby
Club under the gifted coach Derek Suf-
fern. No Academy contract, but I still
felt I was in the race. I was playing st
and nd XV rugby with fringe Ulster
players, after all.
Spring was interesting as Bel-
fast was to host the under- Rugby
World Cup. This afforded me the chance
to compete against the best of my coe-
vals in Ireland.
I was born September , so I
missed the cut-off by months. One of
the coaches thought I should be consid-
ered for selection, until he knew my
month of birth. I still thought I was in
the race.
I was now going into year two to study
Law and French at Queen’s University
Belfast. Then in October I dislo-
cated my shoulder for the second time,
surgery followed.
That season was lost. The next season
was caught up in the confusion and
challenge of living abroad in France.
The season after that was engulfed by
final-year exams; and by then of course I
had become partial to free time, a week-
wide social life and those sedentary
habits that come with an absence of
rugby.
By this stage, aged , I was
coming to terms with the fact I would
never receive an Emerald Cap.
I wanted to return to the sport and
regain some sort glory, form and recog-
nition. Even if it wasn’t for Ulster I could
still be a big name in Ulster club rugby.
I gave it a crack in the -
season, but lost interest as I was so off
the pace.
I came to the mindset, if I was going
to play rugby it would have to be to the
best standard, all or nothing. No Cap,
no play. That (a fear of mediocrity as
much as hunger for excellence), burnout
and the lack of sporting diversification
steered me to boxing.
I then spent a J summer in New York
in . I ended up at a training session
with the New York Athletic Club, coming
together with lads from all over Ireland,
and former Ulster player Neil McMillan.
I had a sudden dawning that rugby was a
unique skill that granted its exponents
special dispensation, especially in the
English-speaking world.
Walk into a town, if you play rugby
you suddenly have friends, maybe even
a job. It’s not just just about excellence
and achievement, but the physical and
social act.
I rushed back striving to attain the
high pace of a few seasons back. Out of
condition I over-stretched myself and
did some serious damage to my hip. I
have an ache in it that prevents normal
exertion to this day.
That was a huge and awful lesson on
so many levels.
I have never played properly since.
The rugby-playing limb isn’t there but I
can feel and miss it intensely. I won’t
play for Ulster or Ireland, but the dream
hasn’t dissolved, it still hurts on game
day.
Interviewed recently, Peter Stringer
and Denis Leamy both spoke of the emo-
tion and challenge to being a passive
observer when the Irish XV play. That’s
me, and I have a feeling it’s the same for
most if not all the ardently aspiring
amateurs who trained and strained to
be a pro, to play at the pinnacle.
Alan Quinlan said far too much pres-
sure and expectation is being burdened
on schoolboy rugby. Ronan O’Gara said
in a recent interview that star-struck
teenagers may never recover from pin-
ning all their hopes and dreams of
lining out in Croke Park or the Aviva
Stadium.
That’s pretty much me.
The recent article by Jim O’ Callaghan
in this magazine was a masterly portrait
on rugby in Ireland as I experienced it
and see it.
Almost all of my former team-mates
who I played First XV school rugby with
no longer play rugby. Many contempo-
raries who played in the rds, ths or
ths are still playing.
I have a feeling it’s because they had a
regular relationship with the sport.
Didn’t overtrain and didn’t place all
their chips on winning, thereby allow-
ing them to play into their s and s
for the pleasure and enjoyment.
Why if you were a superstar in schools
rugby and in the academy, feted and
adulated, would you then tog out to play
for a club system and team that is rungs
down on the glory and prominence
scale?
A school and academy system is not
only producing what Shane Jennings
called “genetic freaks”, but a generation
that has a warped view of the social and
cultural role of rugby.
I was reminded in New York what
amateur rugby affords people, what a
gift and privilege it is to play even at
amateur level. Unfortunately, I left it too
late. •
A school and
academy
system is not
only producing
what Shane
Jennings
called “genetic
freaks”, but
a generation
that has a
warped view
of the social
and cultural
role of rugby
“
