My Life in Rugby with Magnus Lund – The former England, Sale and Biarritz flanker talks about his life in the game
AS most people who know me will attest, I am quite a laidback individual, but I became a different person once I stepped over that white line on a matchday. For me, the beauty of rugby was that there was no hiding place. It's a physical game and I just loved the challenge of trying to get the better of your opposite number. There was no better feeling than walking off the pitch, shaking hands and giving each other that look in the eye, that said ‘well played'. If I have one regret it's probably that I didn't smile more often and enjoy the moment; I was just so intense!
My era was the ‘Mad Dog' era, when flankers, especially, had no thought for their own safety. I was quite fortunate in that the only long-term injury I had was an ACL reconstruction. Other than that, I only had one op – on my thumb. However, it's fair to say that those years of throwing myself into tackles and rucks have taken their toll. My shoulders are pretty battered and I will have to have an operation shortly on my elbow because I have got nerve damage. Being a health coach and fitness trainer, I need my body to function properly. I had quite a few concussions and that is something that does sometimes come up in my mind. It's scary to see what has happened to some of my peers but, thankfully, I don't have any worries on that front. It's great to see the measures that are being put in place now to prioritise player welfare, including the smart mouthguards that Prevent Biometrics have designed. My brother Erik is vice-president of their rugby division.
Erik became a professional rugby player later on in life than I did so he had some academic qualifications behind him, whereas I threw all my eggs into one basket and focused on the rugby. I did one year at university in Manchester while I was in the academy at Sale but things happened pretty quickly for the likes of myself, Richard Wigglesworth and Christian Day so everything else fell by the wayside. You definitely learned quite a few things by training with senior players like Pete Anglesea!
During those early years we were still at Heywood Road. Steve Hanley made a habit of scoring in one corner of the ground and called it ‘Hanley's Corner'. No one else did, mind! Stan never stopped scoring even when we moved to Edgeley Park and neither did the other players in the back three, Jason Robinson and Mark Cueto. All three were brilliant players but Robbo had the best sponsor of everyone – Haribo! His huge 4×4 would be half taken up with bags of sweets and the other half by his usual car companion, Apollo Perelini.
Jim Mallinder and Steve Diamond had brought a lot of us northern lads through and by the time Philippe Saint-Andre arrived and brought in some French flair and some French beasts like Sebastien Chabal, we had a pretty formidable squad. Philippe is a great coach and character. We used to go on pre-season training camps to Perpignan, which is actually where my wife is from, and Philippe always liked to have a bit of a siesta in the afternoon. Nathan Bonner-Evans had a really loud laugh on him, as befits a bloke of his size, and one day he woke Philippe up when we were all messing around during some downtime. Philippe came charging out of his hotel room stark naked to remonstrate with Nathan but the door to his room shut behind him and locked him out. So Philippe had to knock on Nathan's door and ask for a towel so he could cover himself up and go and get a spare key from reception while also asking him, ever so politely, could he keep the noise down.
We knew we were heading in the right direction as a squad in terms of turning that potential into silverware when we beat Leicester at home in the first game of the 2004/5 season and then went away to Wasps with a much-changed team in the second game and won there. Those two clubs were the powerhouses of the English game at the time and while we fell short that season, we were full of confidence about our ability to go all the way the following year, which we did by beating Leicester in the final. Leicester were a big name, still are, and always will be. But from the get-go we had the belief that it would be our day. Things just seemed to fall our way. Even the weather was more like Manchester than London and I was awarded a dubious try in the first half when the ball squirted through the wet grass from Wiggy's kick-through and I just about dived on top of it before Lewis Moody got there.
To be crowned champions of England was amazing, it's just a shame we hadn't been able to go all the way in Europe, too. Again, we felt we had the ability to do that but we came up short in the quarter-final, losing 11-6 to Biarritz in San Sebastien. Biarritz were reigning French champions, and went on to win it again, and we didn't have quite the same big-game experience as they did at the time.
I'd flown back from the Commonwealth Games the week before the quarter-final. What an experience that was! Back then, there was no rugby in the Olympics and the Commonwealth Games was as big as it got. Australia had brought in big guns like Matt Giteau and Lote Tuqiri in a bid to win gold on home soil but we beat them on the opening day with a team of players that nobody outside of England had probably heard much about. Mathew Tait was in mind-blowing form and he along with myself and Tom Varndell returned to Australia that summer for the full England tour.
Playing for your country is the ultimate honour and I was thrilled to bits to be picked. Ultimately, my England career didn't pan out the way I would have wanted to as I only got to 10 caps, but beating France and scoring in the corner against Scotland are two good memories for me. One not so good memory was being in the first England team to lose to Argentina. My Sale team-mate Juan Martin Hernandez played openside for Argentina that day and he and his brother are top blokes. We're friends to this day and I went to Juan Martin's wedding in Argentina.
We weren't able to build on the title at Sale and I decided to take up an offer from Biarritz, joining them in 2008. At the time, I thought playing for one of the best clubs in Europe might help me get back in the England set-up. While that never happened I had a great time there and got to play with my brother when he joined two years later. If you'd have told me eight years earlier when I made my first start for Sale against Biarritz that I would end up playing for them, in a European final (v Toulouse in 2010), I'd have never believed you. Iain Balshaw was in that team, and so was Ayoola Erinle, so there were a few English connections. Imanol Harinordoquy had this reputation for not liking the English but I got on perfectly well with him. I think he was just happy that I did all his work for him on the field!
I played in quite a few local derbies against Bayonne. I remember all the guys saying beforehand how huge these games were and I was like, ‘yeah, yeah'. But they really were! This is rivalry bordering on hatred with some of their fans refusing to set foot inside Biarritz and vice-versa, and winning in Bayonne has got to be one of my finest memories in a Biarritz shirt. Let's put it this way, life suddenly becomes a lot easier for you. I was also on the receiving end of this. When you lose to Bayonne it's time to lock the door and throw away the key!
Around the time that Biarritz started to run into money problems I had a calf injury which wouldn't go away and also problems with my knee and I was pretty much written off by the club. But luckily for me, Steve Diamond took me on for a second time and I had another three enjoyable years back at Sale before I decided to call it quits. I'll always be grateful to Dimes for that and, hopefully, I repaid the faith he showed in me with my performances.
After I retired, I moved back to Biarritz and got involved with a gym there along with my brother while also continuing down the personal trainer route. Now, I've relocated to Barcelona and I'm looking to get back involved in sport again after a bit of a break. Just don't ask me to play again!
