"YOU'RE A LONG TIME RETIRED"

After a ten-year hiatus, Rugby World editor Joe Robinson strapped the boots back on and returned to the rugby field

- Joe Robinson

“YOU’RE a long time retired”, or so the saying goes, apparently former Liverpool and Leeds footballer, James Milner is credited with that quote, but it’s too obvious a statement to have been first said by him. It feels like something he would have posted on Facebook and repeated in an interview.

It’s true, though the longevity of careers, in a sporting sense, certainly, is vast. Most people that play competitive sport on a weekend, professional or amateur, will spend the majority of their lives not doing it. It means making that decision to hang up the boots for good is far from straightforward.

Sometimes the decision is made for you. The body gives out long before the mind. The knees, the ankles, the shoulders cannot keep up with the demands, so you call time as a measure of self-preservation. But for grass-roots players, it’s your own decision. Life commitments supersede your ability to dedicate the time to playing every weekend. A job that’s too demanding, relocating to a new area or the arrival of kids. Or, like me, you simply lose the hunger.

I started playing rugby aged nine, inspired by England’s World Cup winning side of 2003, and never looked back. I played pretty much twice a week, every week, for the next 12 years. I was obsessed with the sport. I could name the entire 2008 Toulouse squad if you’d have asked. I bet you'd forgotten about Romain Millo-Chluski but I tell you what, I haven't.

As a junior, I bounced around clubs in Kent looking for a good level before eventually settling at Blackheath, where my sheer commitment allowed me to play at a level that was probably too good for me. I was good but I was never good enough. A mouthy hooker who took pride in his set-piece, had decent hands and would never, ever not be there is how I'd have described myself.