SOMETIME IT TRIES to kid me
That it’s just a teddy bear
And even somehow manage to vanish in the air
And that is when I must beware
Of the beast in me…”
When rugby player rises through the ranks; all the way from prospect to first-team regular and on through to the international scene, the only way up from representing your country, is representing the Lions.
The only way up from there, is to lead the Lions.
The men who achieve that rank, at least in a Test match, often tend to have some superhuman qualities projected onto them from those of us on the outside looking in. They get painted as beacons to stand and inspire the rest of us.
Except, not everybody is like Sam Warburton, Paul O’Connell and Brian O’Driscoll. Alun Wyn Jones might just be a little more like the rest of us than most players like to admit.
We’re not expecting him to think so hard about the answer when TheScore.ie asks who his toughest opponent was last season. He will eventually settle with Ali Kellock, but only after citing Alun Wyn Jones as enemy number one.
“It’s not just about the 80 minutes at the weekend,” Jones explains. “It’s about getting up in the morning doing things right and not capitulating and saying; ‘I’m tired today, I’m not going to do that one’.
“It’s yourself versus yourself a lot of the time. I don’t want to get too philosophical with it, [but] if I need to do something, it doesn’t necessarily mean I want to do that. That’s why, I get up, if I gotta go training, gotta travel somewhere, sometimes you have to give yourself a kick up the Jackson – you have to be able to defeat yourself sometimes.”
The trick for the 28-year-old is identifying the moment in which he needs that backside tested. Most players – including the archetypal leaders we’ve mentioned – have all spoke of ‘getting on with it’, but every individual is different. Some will automatically power through a malaise, others will be brought to a standstill. Jones has learned to insert the extra step to correct his stride. It’s a skill which has helped him through two Lions tours culminating in the ticker-tape glory of Sydney’s third Test.
‘In a good place’
“You could have a dip in form, a dip in confidence and that’s one of the times that you have to be able to say yourself, ‘grab your stuff, get on with it and carry on’.
“Usually if you do that, you’ll be in a good place.”
A good place is exactly what Jones and his Ospreys teammates have found when facing Leinster in recent years. The lock cites the RDS as his favourite venue outside Neath or Swansea, but tomorrow Jones will lead his side out against the three-time champions when the Heineken Cup returns to the Liberty Stadium.
“It’s not as if we don’t play them enough already,” he jokes dryly. “Lucky I like the RDS, I suppose.”
The familiarity comes not only from the familiar opponents, but also a long summer or two spent with a selection of the players on Lions duty.
However, while the hype machine in early summer would have you believe that these tours morphed complete strangers into a band of brothers, Jones is much more reserved in his appraisal of the relationships that follow. They are ‘good’, friendly, cordial and most importantly, respectful.
It’s just business.
“That’s the thing. It’s funny, it’s a strange eight weeks with the boys and then, I wouldn’t say you’re pally-pally with them, but there is a mutual respect having played with them and having been locked away on tour for eight weeks. So it’ll be nice to see them and once the game is over you sit down, have a catch-up.”
Brawn and accuracy aside, perspective is one of Jones’ great skills. He joins a select group of Lions captains that have won Tests and a series. It is something that makes him immensely proud, but not as much as the feats which may lie around the corner. What’s done is most certainly done.
“I know. I was very fortunate,” says the two-time Six Nations champion of his place in Lions history.
”I’ve done it with a great group of men but that is behind me. It’s on the shelf. It’s off the to-do list, if you like. It’s been ticked and I’m just focused now on what I can achieve with the Ospreys.
“We’ve done well in the Rabo but we feel we’ve probably underachieved – well, we have underachieved in the past and we’re conscious we need to get a quarter-final, a semi-final and anything could happen… as you’ve seen us do in the Rabo in the past.”
Part of the issue Jones has with motivating himself, is that he must do it over such a prolonged period of time.
The lock returned to action with the Ospreys three weeks ago and with the Heineken Cup over the coming weekends before a slight intensity dip for the Pro12 before November brings South Africa, Argentina and Tonga to Cardiff before Wales finally bid to finish the job against Australia. After that, they cycle pretty much begins all over again.
Obviously, these are not issues specific to Jones or Wales. However, he is the one comfortable enough to admit that ‘getting on with it’ is not always an easy outlook to take up.
“You have to stay [at the top of your game] for six-eight months which is difficult to motivate.
“I want to move forward and make sure that I don’t dwell on past positives or get caught up in the future. There is still a lot I want to achieve in the black jersey and the red jersey of Wales but, you know, it all depends on selection.”
Getting ahead of himself won’t be a problem.
