Rugby’s most outspoken and influential journalist OUR THEME in this edition is entertainment and the joy of rugby. The way rugby is played at present, enmeshed in hundreds of mini-rucks, with both backs and forwards sucked in to play where the sun ne

WHAT HAPPENS when one of the most marketable young rugby stars leaves his sport to sign on with the back-to-back Super Bowl winners? Well, we’ll find out! Louis Rees-Zammit, the former Wales and British & Irish Lions winger who is still just 23, made

IF YOU’RE someone who still subscribes to the caricature of Finn Russell as a wanton maverick, a player in thrall to his own impulses rather than the good of the team, it may surprise you to hear that during our 30-minute conversation he uses the wor

[ Goes in Rugby World ] JONNY WILKINSON’S competitive instinct has never waned, as this recent tale from the Kick Offs and Kick Ons podcast illustrates… “I was in this trampoline park in 2021 and I’m still setting myself challenges,” says Wilkinson.

“This Gloucester-Hartpury squad had been together for four or five years. We don’t lose many people because of the culture we’ve got. We’d been the nearly team for many years. This was the year after the World Cup (for which she wasn’t selected). I w

WITH TEARS stinging the corner of his eyes as he strained to hold back his emotions, Ian King shares the poignant secret he’d guarded tightly all afternoon. The 57-year-old hadn’t pulled on his boots since losing his stepson Jamie Styles, a fellow Ma

IN EARLY April, Ulster went to Montpellier and pulled off a surprise win in the Round of 16 in the European Challenge Cup, a surprise created in no small part by a red card for Paul Willemse and yellow cards dished out to three of his team-mates. Uls

The recent citing complaint against Bulls No 8 Cameron Hanekom was just the latest in a long line of pointless disciplinary actions. Hanekom was cited for an illegal tackle he made on Fraser Dingwall in the Bulls’ Champions Cup tie at Northampton. It

THE DECISION to retire from playing rugby was probably taken out of my hands, which made it easier. But deep down, when you know, you know. You’ve got to put yourself, your family and body first. Up until about three months ago, I was still on track

UPON RETIRING from all officiating, Ireland’s Joy Neville said of a female referee calling a men’s Six Nations or World Cup match: “It is inevitable. The calibre of female referees that we have in place now is significant.” It’s high praise for a coh

▶ HAVE I ever been skinned by a modern great? Oh yeah, by lots of them and in different ways. By people that you’ve grown up watching on TV. You’ve been impressed by them as a youngster, but on the field they are even better than they look on TV. And

CHESLIN KOLBE lives his life as he plays his rugby – at high speed. For a moment, you know what it’s like to be Owen Farrell or Joe Marler, the England players who famously locked onto the Springbok wing in the second half of the 2019 World Cup final

MAX EFFORT FROM CRAIG IN HOPE TO RAISE £1MILLION Craig Maxwell completed his mammoth Wales Coast Path Cancer Challenge at the Principality Stadium in March after 26 days walking the length of Wales. The dad of two, who was diagnosed with incurable an

WASPS FANS might read it and weep. Heady days, with no hint of the strife to come. Our July 2004 issue celebrated Wasps’ Heineken Cup final win over Toulouse at Twickenham, when Rob Howley scored a remarkable winning try in the closing seconds. Colle

THERE IS a symmetry to Adam Radwan’s favourite hobby. A player renowned for his remarkable athleticism, leaping like a salmon to score by the corner flag, likes nothing better than spending a day fly fishing on the River Tyne. “My real passion is sal

MOST REFEREES don’t like to grab headlines or have their officiating put under scrutiny. Usually, the best compliment a ref can get is for no one to notice they were at the game and there’s nothing about them in the media. When officials do make the

1 The women’s competition sees New Zealand, Australia, USA and Canada compete on an annual basis. This year’s series runs from 27 April to 25 May 2 It launched in 2021 but without NZ and Australia because of Covid. Canada beat USA twice that year in

LORENZO PANI had it all planned out. If he managed to score a try in Cardiff, he would reach for the trademark ‘Siuuu!’ celebration of his footballing idol, Cristiano Ronaldo. Almost seven years before Italy beat Wales for the second time in as many

DO YOU have any phobias? I’m scared of spiders but I try to not kill them because in Italy it means bad luck. So any time I see a spider in my house I put them outside the window without hurting them. What really annoys you? War movies. I think they’

MARCUS SMITH is the pin-up playmaker who has lit up the English game since being fast-tracked to train with the national team while still a schoolboy at Brighton College. There is no one quite like him in the Gallagher Premiership, where he is a phos

THURSDAY 18TH of April started a long weekend of French rugby where both the ProD2 and Top14 were in action. If you made the trip, you could watch Provence v Mont-de-Marsan on Thursday at 9pm, then Soyaux-Angouleme v Brive at 7pm on Friday, followed

FESTIVAL FEEL is what you get across two days at the Howden Rosslyn Park National Schools Sevens. And that’s not just because the sun hammers down on the Thursday and then Wellies are a must on the Friday (rest in peace, trusty old trainers). No, it’

Age 36 Position Wing Teams Newcastle, Edinburgh, Harlequins & Scotland “MY BUSINESS partner and I started Visser & Co, a property company based around Edinburgh city centre, in 2019, buying one- or two-bedroom places and renovating to sell on. Then C

Former England women’s captain “MY MAIN gripe with this is that off the pitch one of the most useful, influential, powerful and validating things I’ve been able to say ever since I’ve played senior rugby is that it’s exactly the same game as the men.

Age 21 (18 May 2002) Born Leeds Position Flanker Club Exeter Chiefs Country England When did you first play rugby? I grew up in Bath and then moved to Birmingham before starting rugby at St Mary’s College in Wellington, NZ. What attracted you to the

FOR A while it looked like Courtney Lawes would finish as a one-club man. They are now an all-too rare commodity in a modern game where opportunities abound and loyalty is not always rewarded on both sides of the coin. Forward Lawes has been synonymo

WHEN LEINSTER replaced Stuart Lancaster with Jacques Nienaber last autumn, they weren’t swapping like for like. Nienaber, the former South Africa coach, is principally renowned for his defensive expertise whereas Lancaster, now at Racing, earned plau