Jonny: My Autobiography (26 page)

It was the only time I ever saw Inga embarrassed.

The time has come to draw a line. I will no longer read about myself or about rugby in the newspapers. Finished, over, done. They are too powerful, one opinion for hundreds of thousands of readers.

The reason is partly because I have disagreed with too much, but it’s also about control. I’ve always felt the need to be in control. I work to be the best. I insist on a level of training and dedication that allows me to control my performance as much as possible. But I cannot control what is written about me. I am powerless in that area, and I know it has the potential to destroy me.

When I read something critical, I ask myself how can I put it right? How am I going to change that opinion? That is my natural response. But according to the papers, against France I went ‘from ovation to aberration’. I guess that means they thought I was poor. Apparently, I was also tactically
one-dimensional and so I am now supposed to ‘be hurting mentally and physically’.

If you care what people think, like I do, it hurts to read that. But what can you do about it?

It was only a fortnight ago, that I was ‘acclaimed as the world number one’ and ‘simply the best fly half in the world’.

The good stuff is bad for me, too. After Ireland, I couldn’t stop myself buying into what was being said. It tapped into life goals. I can read the good stuff and get hooked on it and I don’t like that, because if I’m going to buy into one side, I have to buy into the other.

So I’ve got two options – read it all and deal with it, or don’t read anything at all. I’m nowhere near strong or mature enough even to consider option one. I’ll take option two.

The France game doesn’t send us far off course. We come back with a 50 point win over Wales and then a 45 pointer over Italy. That’s the game in which I deliver the last of my appalling comments.

I thought I was through with backchat. I thought I had moved on, but one of their players charges straight for me, eyeing me up as the weak link. I put all my effort into the hit and, with the help of the guys around me, we drive him back and turn the ball over. Before I can stop myself, I say out loud, don’t bring that shit down my channel!

No doubt it is in the wrong language to make any impact, but my own teammates certainly hear this despicable example of trash-talking, and they have absolutely no issues with ribbing me about it remorselessly. And that is the last time I say anything like that ever again.

The England summer tour is to Argentina, but Clive and I agree that this is one that maybe I should miss. I’ve toured for the last five summers. I’d be better off with a proper rest.

But all too briefly does this sound like a good idea. Suddenly, I find myself in virgin territory. The England team are out there working hard and facing challenges head on, and with all the attention on them, I am at home not doing anything. And without rugby, without pushing myself as far as I can go, without working on my path towards being the best, who am I? This is all I have ever known. I didn’t realise just how attached to it all I had become, and now it’s not there, I am no longer sure.

My entire values system has been created around being the best rugby player in the world and doing whatever is required to get there, but away from rugby, where does that leave me? Under the scrutiny of my own harsh judgement, I don’t fare too well.

This starts as a thought, a single negative notion of myself and my life. Yet the more I try to figure it out, the further away I am from an answer, and because this is time off, down time, I have far too much opportunity to think, and so I can’t leave the subject alone. Then my obsessive side hooks in and I simply can’t let it go. The knock-on effects follow. I start sleeping terribly, three or four hours a night.

This becomes everyday life. On the face of it, this is a great summer–barbecues at home, kicking a ball around with Sparks, relaxing and watching DVDs. These are the things I normally wait all year to be able to do, but it doesn’t feel the same. A DVD may be playing but I’m not really watching it. I’m just looking at the TV screen, with no idea of what’s actually happening, because my mind is turning over a hundred thoughts a minute about something else.

A sense of helplessness dominates my summer days. Everything feels pointless, and my natural reaction is to treat the problem as I do my kicking – right, work it out and stay here working it out until you have done so. But by focusing so intensely, I just make it worse.

My obsessive side has truly kicked in. I simply won’t let it go until I find an answer, but I can’t find an answer that’s satisfactory to me because the real answer is to move on, and to do that I need an off switch and I don’t have one. I want to go with the flow, chill, relax, let it go, whatever it is that people say I should do, but I just can’t live like that.

I get back from training one day with this darkness inhabiting my brain. I go up to the Slaley Hall Hotel, which is close by and where they are really nice to me, allowing me to use their spa facilities. Usually, I use their pool to relax physically. This time, I make sure that no one else is around, lower myself into the water until I’m completely submerged, and then I let out a scream of total frustration. I come up for air and then submerge myself again and scream again. No words, just pure desperation. I carry on screaming as long and as loud as I can and I don’t stop until I am hoarse. I cannot find any other way of dealing with this non-stop barrage of thoughts and negativity.

I am the problem and I have to come to terms with the fact that I need to change. Right now, though, I am not prepared for it, ready for it or even close to it.

WHEN rugby starts again, I start to function again. Pre-season means I can be a rugby player again, which delivers me a way out of my identity crisis. Not a solution, just a way out. Not peace of mind, just some direction into which I can channel my obsessive energy a little more positively.

It’s Liam Botham I feel sorry for.

Blackie has prepared an awesome period of pre-season training. Amid all the skillwork, he has us running up and down Tynemouth beach as fast as we can. I know what he’s doing. He’s testing us, and not just our fitness but our minds. It’s less about physical, more about mental, strength. Well, actually it’s an horrendous test of both combined. It’s classic Blackie. Let’s see what you’re made of and how serious you are. Anything near to a nine-minute run is a very good time.

When he calls us to go, the group sets off and, as I only have two gears – stop and go – I flick on the tunnel vision switch and start running.
Liam, meanwhile, is possibly the best training partner I have ever had. He is inspiring because of how hard he trains, and he loves to dig in his heels and compete with me. But I have a trick up my sleeve for the run. I actually embrace my darker side.

Initially, the whole squad stays together, but as we hit the hill at the far end, Liam and I start pushing it, and by the time we are turning to come back, the two of us are out ahead. We are halfway home, about four minutes to go, and I’m thinking right, I’m going to push it up another level. You’re going to have to see if you can live with this.

This is when my mind can ignore the physical pain. If I was mentally in a better place, I wouldn’t be able to do this. I would feel naturally demoralised by the fact that there is still so far to go. But now I get angrier and angrier each time Liam tries to go with me.

I up the pace again and I feel Liam try to go with it. Then I go again, and I know that’s the end of it, but I won’t slow down. I go and go and go until the end. I finish the run in less than nine minutes. No one else has done that all summer.

And a few minutes after everyone has got back, Blackie does exactly what I thought he would do. He tells us to go again.

Most of the guys groan oh my God, you’re kidding. But I just set off at pace, adding Blackie to my list of things to be angry about. And then I allow my mind to drop back into my own world – and I finish in under nine minutes again.

The team sheet for Newcastle–Leeds, a Premiership home game on a nice sunny day, is very special. We have started the 2002–03 season badly, we have lost three on the trot, and today we have a lineup that includes
J. Wilkinson at ten and M. Wilkinson at twelve. M. Wilkinson is Mark – or Sparks. The pride I feel for Sparks is immense.

Way back when we were at school, I was small, so I was a back, and he was big, so he was a forward. That’s the way it always went. He was never able to find his niche as easily as I did. Mine just fell into place. And I had guidance from Dave, Rob, Steve Bates, Clive. I’ve worked hard, but compared to Sparks, who’s worked hard too, I’ve had it on a platter.

Here at Newcastle, he has been on the conditioning staff for three and a bit years, working on the sidelines so all these guys can go out and do what he has always wanted to do. At Northern, a talented local club, for whom he played at weekends, they’d never settle him. One week they’d say we’re playing you at six, and the next week he’d be playing at twelve. Maybe it was his own fault for having such a wide range of skills.

At Newcastle, he sometimes trained with the team, filling in when they needed someone to train with them. Then, when the second team were missing someone, they’d say why don’t you play on the weekend? And he’d come in with no preparation and no understanding of the moves or the calls.