Chris Hewett: How we’ll miss Brian Smith’s brilliant sporting mind

Where do we begin with Brian Smith, one of rugby’s quiet high achievers, who died in Australia last week at the soul-destroyingly early age of 59?

We might start with the fact that he won amateur-era Test caps with both Ireland and the Wallabies before switching codes and playing dozens of professional games for Balmain and Eastern Suburbs, emerging from the rigours of the NRL with reputation enhanced.

This alone made him a man apart.

We should also highlight the two Blues he won at Oxford when the Varsity Match meant rather more to the price of fish than it does today, together with his match-winning Pilkington Cup performance for Leicester in a monsoon at Bath in 1990 – a time when the West Countrymen didn’t lose home matches to anyone.

Loyal: Brian Smith

Starring role: Brian Smith playing for Ireland in 1990 Five Nations
PICTURES: Getty Images

Genius

Smith played 10 that day, having won the majority of his early international caps as a scrum-half.

When Antoine Dupont does this kind of thing, we revel in his genius.

And then there were Brian’s coaching achievements with the Brumbies and the Aussie sevens set-up; with Bath and London Irish (he made significant marks at both Premiership clubs); and then with England under the ill-starred leadership of the same Martin Johnson with whom he had played so effectively at The Rec two decades previously.

When Johnson walked away after a painful World Cup campaign in 2011, his colleague followed him out of the door.

“Martin had appointed me,” he told your columnist. “I felt I owed him my loyalty.”

In his last years – such hard words to write of someone not yet 60 – he was both a respected schoolteacher and the go-to blue sky thinker for all manner of teams, whatever the size and shape of the ball.

Brian was blessed with a brilliant sporting mind. How he’ll be missed.