By Nick Powell
From the end of January to the beginning of March, in anticipation of my 20th birthday and acceptance that professional sport is well and truly beyond me, I’m looking back through my 20 years to find the sporting memories that have had the biggest impact on me.
In this article I go back to 2013 and my Esher U14s team's special year, after years of crushing defeats, early exits at festivals and disappointments.
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2013: Take me home, Molesey Road
The story begins in 2006. I had started my junior rugby at Twickenham RFC, but left after the squad size was reduced to just six players. Every tournament we had to borrow players, so a family friend, Joe Davie, invited me to come and join him at Esher RFC on Molesey Road.
When I first arrived at Esher, I was so excited. A big squad, with enough for two teams (at first I found myself in the lower side), and they were actually decent.
Back then I was an awful rugby player. My knowledge of the game was greater than the rest of the squad put together, and I would regularly use this knowledge to tell my teammates to "roll away" and challenge the referee, which mostly resulted in us being marched back down the field, but I was a little bit less keen to get really stuck in.
For someone who hates biology, I'm not sure why I was so fascinated in the grass on the rugby pitch
Dependent on how I was feeling on the day, I would either get involved as much as I could (still limited), or hang back and pick grass while commentating in my head as events unfolded around me.
With time, I did improve, but unfortunately for Esher their squad size slowly fell away.
By the time we reached U11s (I had joined in U8s), we had a squad of about 15, which was enough to put one team out, but our form was pretty miserable.
Whenever we played a big club, it was always about playing well, maybe scoring a try, but there was no expectations at Festivals.
We would arrive at a festival at 10am and the gazebo would be down by 11, the mums were probably happy, the boys not so much.
But it was all a learning curve, as we progressed, we didn't make mistakes we had made in previous festivals, our coaches supported us and continued to focus on our strengths and weaknesses.
This is why it irks me so much that now at rugby festivals, that kids basically can't lose. Everyone plays the same amount of games and no winner is officially declared. It's another stupid RFU idea, hated by coaches and children alike.
As you'll read in subsequent articles, no team I played for or supported (or athlete) had won anything of note until I was 12, I learned how to lose before I learned how to win. It turned me from an arrogant little thing into someone who appreciated how hard it is to be successful. It's just a shame that we are so scared to let the same happen to kids growing up today.
But I never considered quitting, in part because I wouldn't get into any other A team within a 100km radius, but also because we had loyal and inspirational coaches who stood by us and gave us bucket-loads of encouragement every step of the way.
Andy Berry, Kevin Potter, Jim Hazel, Paul Gostelow and Martin Haire were just some of the coaches who turned up every Sunday morning, whatever the weather (and however severe the hangover) to come and coach us. They were a constant, along with the fact we just never, ever won.
From Left to Right: Paul Gostelow, Cameron Gentles (an Esher 1st XV player who was getting coaching experience, really inspirational and helped us improve massively), Andy Berry, Kevin Potter and Jim Hazel.
At this point, you're definitely wondering why on earth this article is about 2013, and that is because that was the year that represented the astonishing rise that happened to the club over the next few years.
From a squad of 15, the next three years saw that squad treble in size. We got the word out, and began taking on more and more players. Every week I'd show up and we'd just have two or three more really good players, it was so exciting.
And we started winning games! Beating teams that were ok, taking on clubs with six or seven teams and pushing them close. By the time we reached U12s, we actually reached the knockout stages of competitions a couple of times!
When leagues began in U13s, Andy made the call to put us into Surrey 4, rather than Surrey 2. I can't remember which of the coaches said it, but one of them mentioned that "if you're good enough, you'll be in Surrey 2 in two years", and that was our goal.
We managed to top Surrey 4 and get promoted in 2011/12, and it was such an enjoyable season. I scored for the first time in a game of (non intra-club) rugby (I must have played about 100 games prior so it was pretty special for me), and we played really well as we won without losing a game.
We lost some friendlies and our tour ended in disappointment, but we ended the season as winners of something. I myself picked up an award as well "clubman of the season". That meant so much to me, and walking up to collect it remains one of proudest moments of my life, even if it is given out for the person that isn't good enough to win an actual playing award.
The following season, with a few more new recruits, we were unstoppable. I still think I was among the weakest players in the team but I felt I had an important role to play. Calming players down on the pitch when it got heated, speaking up in huddles to talk tactics, and making a habit of being in the right place at the right time to get on the scoresheet a few more times. I also felt I had a comedic role to play, even if most of my jokes fell flat.
Me on the ball back in that great season, about six years and 40 kilos ago
That season we finished unbeaten, culminating in an epic win against League rivals Richmond. It was a dramatic afternoon, with one of our players being sin-binned for asking the ref "how much are they paying you", and a very tight scoreboard, but we closed it out and capped an unbeaten season with an unforgettable tour.
Only the second time we'd ever gone on tour as a club was a two day festival that just got better, and better, and better. We lost our first game, but just kept building momentum before playing Olney RFC. Who, in their pink kit, had made an awful lot of noise both on the pitch and off it (seriously I think they had like 100 supporters, it was really weird).
A badly hit, but absolutely beautiful drop goal by Luke Drummond, our fly half, secured the win in a tournament with some really good teams in it. He was just one of a large group of brilliant players that had been so influential that season and it was a fitting end to a perfect season.
Alex Bethell and Matt Quinn celebrate with the Tour trophy, it was pretty ridiculous but represented the extent of our delight at winning it.
The whole experience taught me the value of loyalty and the fact that good things come to those who wait, not from my perspective, but of that of the coaches.
It's not as if you'd expect them to just give up and leave when we lost a few games, but it was their enthusiasm, which they maintained through the very worst days, which had inspired us to keep going.
Sure, we'd added a lot of players who had made us a better squad, but that constant encouragement gave us the confidence to keep improving, keep going and not be downhearted.
Matt, our brilliant Captain, is congratulated by Andy as we celebrated winning Surrey 3 to get promoted to Surrey 2
The following year I left Esher, as we fell narrowly short of getting promoted to the top division in Surrey (which the squad managed to do once I'd left). I wanted to focus on my school rugby, which looking back I don't regret, but it was sad to say goodbye.
I'd learned so much from those coaches (who nicknamed me "statto") and they had provided me with the support I needed to work out where I stood as a rugby player. I was never going to be a speedster, nor a bulldozer, or anywhere near a playmaker, but if I worked hard and commitment to every game I knew I could have an impact of sorts.
It was off the pitch where I learned a huge amount too, and setting up a Facebook group among other things helped us to bond more as a group, which as I've mentioned before is key to collective success.
But finally, thanks has to go to my Mum, who consistently stood out there in terrible weather watching me play, even when I was rubbish. We had to drive to some far flung places at ungodly hours, and she watched an awful lot of losses before she saw any victories.
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