Hardest job was getting ‘Dommers’ off cakes! | Peter Jackson

Whenever the pandemic permits, Alex Dombrandt will be asked to dine with a galaxy of Welsh veterans headed by Sir Gareth Edwards. The invitation requesting the presence of England's newest No.8 will arrive in due course for a landmark occasion, 70 years since the foundation of a teacher-training college in Cardiff where the assembly line remains in full production at the same campus suitably perched on the capital's highest ground.

At Cardiff Met, they love ‘Dommers' as one of their own for a whole host of reasons, almost every single one reflecting the devotion to their cause of ‘this big teddy bear of a bloke' with an unhealthy appetite for cream cakes.

The love is mutual, its survival extending beyond the grim acceptance during three student years that he could not always have his cake and eat it. It has also been reinforced rather than diluted at his having to endure more than his share of pain and suffering.

“I wouldn't be where I am today without Cardiff Met,'' he says. “Their whole rugby programme, their professionalism, quality of coaching, nutritional advice – everything was first-class. You had all the tools at your disposal to be the best player you could be.

“To be perfectly honest, I went to the university with the ambition to get my degree and play some rugby and cricket. At that point, I'd never played much competitive rugby. It was all just for fun.

“I never really had an ambition to play rugby professionally. I'm a big cricket fan but I found out soon enough that to play cricket as well as rugby and do justice to both simply wasn't going to be possible.''

The conversion of Dombrandt from overweight student into a Premiership tour de force began on a late summer's day six years ago in Taunton where he put in a late appearance off the bench against the local Titans in a pre-season friendly.

“That was my first taste of men's rugby,'' he says. “Not long afterwards I remember one of my first matches in the Welsh Championship was against Merthyr Tydfil. Who should be lining up against me but Andy Powell.

“I'd watched him on TV do his thing for Wales and the Lions and there I was on the same pitch which was pretty surreal. I'm sure he had the wood over me that day but what an experience.

“I could say the same about my entire time at Cardiff Met. The coaches there made me fit for life as a professional rugby player. I keep in regular touch with them all – Chris Davey, Danny Milton, Ian Gardner, Dai Watts, Alan Williams. As well as ensuring my development physically, they also gave me the right mental attitude.''

His capacity for taking it on the chin had been tested beyond breaking point, literally so, not once but twice. Dombrandt had his jaw broken by punches by different opponents from the same club, Glynneath – notorious incidents which ended up in court.

One led to a conviction for grievous bodily harm with his assailant given a ten-month prison sentence suspended for two years. Dombrandt's jaw is held together by four metal plates.

At the time he considered giving rugby up. “You ask yourself: ‘Is it worth this?'. You're on a liquid diet for five to six weeks which isn't much fun. The second time hit me quite hard.

“Again, the university were really good. I had long chats with the coaches and they suggested that it would be better if I just played the university matches. They couldn't have been more supportive.''

Dan Milton, Cardiff Met's director of rugby, saw at first-hand the shattering effects of the damage. “I remember Alex saying: ‘I think I'm done, Danny.' Emotionally and mentally, it took a lot out of him.

“When we went to court, you could see the draining effect that had.

There was still an element of student-bashing on the rugby field so it was a no-brainer for us to have him concentrate on BUCS (British Universities & Colleges Sport) matches.''

By then Dombrandt had created a big enough impression during the 2017 Junior Six Nations with Wales U20s that Cardiff Blues offered him a modest contract worth around £20,000-a-year.

“It would have meant dropping out of university,'' he says. “I didn't want to do that. I'd done two years and I thought it would have been a waste of my time to pack it all in.''

The following season, having completed his degree course, another club offered almost three times as much. That the club concerned happened to be the one he gladly paid to watch as a fan eliminated any doubts that this would be exactly the right move at exactly the right time.

“Harlequins was the ideal scenario,'' he says. “My local club, the one my family supports. I loved my time in Wales, being alongside players like Rhys Carre, Kiran Azzirati, Aaron Wainwright, James Botham, Shane Lewis-Hughes in the U20s. I look back on that three-month experience fondly.''

In three seasons at The Stoop, Dombrandt has played 76 matches, scored 35 tries, helped win the most spectacular of all Premiership finals and his England cap.

Back on the campus at Cyncoed where a teenaged Gareth Edwards first sprang to note in the mid-Sixties, they followed Dombrandt's stratospheric progress. “If Harlequins didn't think he was initially fit enough,'' says Milton. “I'd have been tempted to say: ‘You should have seen him when he joined us!'

“There he was, this big old lump who, to put it politely, was rather overweight. Dai Watts, our strength and conditioning coach, did an unbelievable job in putting that right.

“It still makes me laugh to think of the day I saw Alex coming out of the local Tesco's with a bag of cream cakes and then trying to hide them behind his back when he saw me. Getting him off those cream cakes was always a challenge.

“Right from the start, there was something different about him. He's such a likeable character that everyone took to him. Nobody here has a bad word to say about him, a real gentle giant very highly thought of by everyone at the university.

“For a big lad, he moved so quickly. He wasn't a big fan of defending or tackling in the early days but you knew there was something there.

He'd run through everyone but then you'd think he'll get to a level where he can't do that any more. Would he be able to do in the Premiership what he'd done for us? Now we know he can.''

After finishing studies, Dombrandt stayed on for an extra match at Bedlinog where defeat by the local villagers would confirm the students' relegation from to the third tier of the Welsh pyramid. They drew 26-all and stayed up.

That, perhaps above all, explains why Cardiff Met's admiration for him knows no bounds, an affection which will endure no matter how many times he wears the Red Rose.

PETER JACKSON