Irish lions - Rob Henderson

For players of a certain vintage, it was said that if the great Scottish commentator Bill McLaren knew who you were, or even better, bestowed you with some sort of nickname, you'd made it in rugby circles. Well, today's guest was once described by Mr. McLaren as like a buffalo on a stampede, someone you'd have to nail to the ground. This, of course, is Rob Henderson. The former Munster, Ireland, and British and Irish Lions centre. Henderson played 29 times for the country from 1999 to 2003. He was at Munster between 2001 and 2006, finishing up the same year the province won their inaugural Heineken Cup, and he also played every test of the 2001 British and Irish Lions tour to Australia. And Munster are in the throes of a European campaign which sees them travel to Castres on Friday night, a team with which Henderson did battle on his fair share of occasions. We've got Rob on to take myself, Nathan Johns, and John O'Sullivan on a trip down memory lane. This is the Counter Rugby podcast, brought to you by the Irish Times in association with Nifty Business.

Every now and then, look, I feel like I say this on this podcast a bit too much, but there comes up a moment when I, you know, have to do my research, or, you know, I figure out I'm probably too young to be doing this because the person that we speak to, and then, oh, he's too young to watch play. So I apologize for that, Rob, but I did go back and watch a lot and And the first thing that struck me was the first clip I found of you was playing in Murrayfield in 1999, and you were the replacement back that day, wearing the jersey number 18, which just is a strange one for someone my age, and bleach blonde hair. So, uh, you did it before your center partner, Bernard Driscoll, did it. So you did it before it was cool. And on that day, Bill McLaren was on commentary for BBC Scotland, and he described you as a burly chap as you came on the pitch. Another who won't hold back. You have to nail him to the ground. And then he called you a buffalo on stampede. All of which I'm assuming you take as very complimentary.

McGuinness missed out everybody to Henderson. Now that's typically Henderson. You have to nail him to the ground. A magnificent run by the big fella.

Arms flash.

Arms swinging on the tackle. Henderson. There he goes again. Like a buffalo on stampede. Tremendous effort.

100%. I mean, uh, Bill McLaren was the voice of rugby when we were all growing up, and, uh, and I just think that having been able to not only meet the man and sample one of his hoik balls— he used to sit by the side of the touchline before a match, and, uh, and if he actually liked you or if he had something to say to you, he'd invite you over and give you a hard-boiled sweet, one of his hoik balls.

You knew you'd made it.

If Bill gave you one of those. And obviously that, um, the buffalo on stampede, it's, it's something I did live down. I mean, I thought I was more like a gazelle, uh, on ice skates, but, um, but he saw it differently. He had a different lens to most people and a voice like liquid gold in your ears. So I was delighted that he actually, uh, A, knew my name, uh, and B, passed the comment that would go down in history, thankfully.

How many board suites did you get? Just the one?

Well, as they say, you can't find a thoroughbred if they're Why do you think I wore size 38 in shorts?

Oh God. John, you would have covered a lot of Rob back in the day. All those descriptions sound about right.

They do, but in fairness, and saving his presence and his blushes here, he was actually a lot more dexterous on his feet than he's making out here. He was well able to change direction, and a lot of centres, to their cost, found out that if you didn't get a proper shot the first time, you wouldn't be getting a second go at it. So yeah, no, he made his— the other guy that he used to play in the center with for the Lions in Ireland. He made him look very good as a player. In fact, I think he's probably owed— I reckon maybe 10 to 15%, Rob, of the money that the other fella earned over the years.

I think that would be an absolute disgrace. I, uh, playing for the Lions, I had an armchair ride. I had Dicko outside me and I had Johnny Wilkinson inside me. So I think, uh, I think even you could have had it, had a slot in the middle between those two fellas. Being able to play with him, Drico, when he hit the scene, 18, 19 years of age, he was electric. And, uh, and basically he, he picked everyone's standards up because it was either you're growing behind this fella and other, and other quality players in that team as well, Peter Stringer, Roman O'Doherty, etc. But you either get up to the standard or you don't play because at an early age he wouldn't accept second best. So that picked everyone's level up. And it's very kind to say flute of foot.

I was more of a, more of a banger than Brian was.

I think if I had his pace, then, uh, then Maybe would have swapped around a couple of times, but know your role, know where you fit into proceedings.

And, uh, and we had a nice partnership that worked for both Ireland and for the Lions.

Those who are old enough to remember, because what you said, Nathan, is you're too young and that Rob Henderson and myself are quite old. But, uh, those who remember also—

I didn't say the second part of that, I just said the first part.

I'm— yeah, no, I'm going to attribute that to you though. Uh, so yes, in Stade de France when Brian O'Driscoll scored that famous hat-trick The hat-trick was facilitated by, by Rob, for those who want to go back and look at the footage.

You're very kind, John, but had nothing to do with me. And when we're talking about age profiles, Nathan, I was talking to John earlier today and he said he's got boxer shorts older than you.

This is what I've missed, really have. Honest, this is person— this is personality, which is something that, you know, um, going back to the old days with us old-timers, is something that you've cut— we've lost a lot of over the years with players.

John has called me worse than a pair of his boxer shorts, I'll tell you that. So I'm well able for that. Thanks, John.

Right.

I mean, one of the reasons we came to chat to you, Rob, is obviously Lions here, Australia. It's hard to believe it's what, 2 tours now since when you went down there. Start off pretty broad. John mentioned your partnership with O'Driscoll on that tour, but what are your abiding memories? What, nearly 24 years on?

One of the standout things for me that tour was obviously playing in the Test matches. Coming up, I had lunch last week with George Dugan. I was giving him loads for about an hour and a half about how the Australians cheated, both on and off the field, commercially, with their merchandising, with their attitude, and with the general play, which obviously he disagreed with. But starting in the 3 Tests was incredible. It was a fantastic squad that went over with the British and Irish Lions. The first 3 weeks of that tour, was kind of like the best stag do I've ever been on because no one really expected me to be part of the team, even though I'd had a solid Six Nations, I'd had a solid club season as well, scoring hat-tricks for both. And then with form and with the odd injury, you managed to put yourself on the first team sheet, and I think that I justified my selection. I'd like to think I didn't let anyone down, but it's just a shame that we never finished it off because we got ourselves in a great position after the first test. We were leading at halftime the second best, and then at the end of a long season couldn't finish it off. So that's, that's one big regret. But obviously, uh, getting there in the first place, the pinnacle of Northern Hemisphere rugby that everyone wants to achieve and actually perform, was, um, was something I hold quite dear.

You've said before, Rob, uh, I've, I've listened to you before doing things like this, and, uh, I know you tongue-in-cheek took credit for, for that Unchemiso Driscoll try. There was a maul you joined the back of, gained an extra, extra yard or two just before it went back into the middle for that break.

If you look at any given scrum, though, it's not about yards, it's about inches. And when I hit that ruck, it moved about 2 inches, which is all that it took for, uh, for Biko to make the gap and then sprint in from 55 yards. And if we hadn't have had that extra 2 inches, then maybe it would have been caught short.

Who knows? So, uh, I had a big part to play in that.

Do you remember what happened the phase before that ruck, by chance?

Um, no.

You mentioned earlier Wilkinson on one side, O'Brien on the other. I think Johnny gave you a ball and there was a Rush defender in your face, so you just, you kind of no-look pass up. Problem was O'Brien had to give it one of these where his two hands go in the air to, to catch it. And, uh, I think it was Andrew Walker, their right winger, came flying up and nearly decapitated him because the ball was— you had to stop and catch the ball. So poor O'Brien, he got up on his feet and did what he went to do, but, uh, Yeah, he took a bit of a shot there from Andrew Walker, which again, probably no one talks about it now, or no one talks about these things because of what happened next.

Andrew Walker was a small guy.

Andrew Walker was like a priest in a sheep at the time. But what we wanted to do, it was actually part of Graham Henry's plan, just to show the Australians how tough Rico was. Yes, he was agile, nimble, fleet of foot, etc., but we just wanted to tee him up to take a big shot from their smallest fella. To say, actually, you're gonna have to come up with a little bit more to knock this out over. So that was the, uh, that was the reason behind the no-look pass being so high. And, uh, it wasn't a lack of skill set on my part.

It was all part of the plan from Graham Henry.

Absolute genius, because they backed off him a phase later.

Exactly.

Uh, John, your abiding memories of that trip? I'm not sure if you, if you traveled there for work or not.

I didn't. I was watching from afar. Yeah, I know that the boys combined— well, it was probably a bit of a travesty that, that they didn't win the series. And, um, certainly good enough as a team in individually and collectively. And I think I suppose I should ask Rob really what his thoughts were on that aspect of things, quite apart from it being— from maybe one or two other memories from that tour.

Unbelievable squad of players that have been assembled. Every Lions team, or most Lions teams that go out there, are because it's obviously the best players from all four nations. But I think that in particular was upsetting because we had a game plan that we stuck actually in the first test that we won. We wanted to adapt and evolve and change things, and potentially we weren't all on the same page, especially after Richard Hill went off. I thought Martin Crowe was exceptional in the first test, and when you've got people like Neil Back sitting on the bench to come in, he played well. But I just think him going off when Nathan Gray accidentally knocked him out on purpose just before halftime probably didn't help the situation. And then It was a small bit of panic. I mean, we were winning 7-8 at halftime in the second test and then just couldn't finish it off. It was the end of a long season as well, but I think there was enough experience in the squad to be able to see it out, and unfortunately didn't.

So, um, you're playing against the world champions, the World Cup holders, the tri-nation champions. They had a serious team, but so did we.

So it's one that got away.

What are your favorite memories off the pitch? And remember, this is a family podcast.

Absolutely. And as a father of daughters, I think that seeing so many men, women, boys, girls, children, whatever, coming to support, coming to support both teams actually, that long ago that it truly was a game for everyone. So the supporters made it, coming out of Brisbane on the sea of red with 50,000 Lions fans roaring us on was outrageous. So was the night out afterwards, which turned into an afternoon afterwards. We had time to let our hair down as well because the David Ibi just turned professional 4 or 5 years previously. I think playing a mouth organ with a busker in Sydney was quite interesting at 3 o'clock in the morning. I think I've still got the mouth organ upstairs somewhere in a kit bag. Going out for a quiet drink with Jason Leonard and coming back at 9 o'clock in the morning when everyone's just about to leave the hotel to go on a corporate golf day. I think Graham Henry and Steve Black both said, "Great to see you're out having an early walk." 4 golf clubs. We were actually coming in from the night out before, so we'd had a couple of beverages, shall we say. Just being over in Australia and having the opportunity to play with so many good players, it sounds a bit of a cliché, but it isn't. But if I was going to put everything together, I'd suggest that in the team room when Austin Healy was picking on Rowan Nagara and Drippey said, "Let's get the boxing gloves on," Austin thought that he was a bit sharp. He bobbed and weaved twice, Drippey moved twice, cracked him straight on the chops and floored him. That was probably up there with Everybody's highlight of the tour, and it's probably been mentioned on numerous occasions by a lot of people.

Yeah, that is a travesty really. There's no Living with the Lions documentary on that one, isn't there? No cameras caught any of that.

Well, there was, but Austin had the camera.

That was never making it off the editor's cut floor.

You must still have a jersey from that tour. I think from my mind, that's the old, the NTL. I think that's the best modern Lions jersey. I don't think we've come close yet to as nice a jersey in the intervening years?

Yeah, I still have the jersey upstairs. And actually, for the World Cup in France, I managed to dig out one of my old jerseys and put it on. But this is the pre-Lycra ones, so the old cotton ones we used to have, where you could actually put it over a VW Beetle and keep the ice off.

So that one just about fit me. If I got my Lion's jersey out of the loft now, I think I'd have to rub myself in goose fat and dive off the roof to get into it.

There was no chance.

I love the fact that Rob actually said, like, for those that don't know, Jason Leonard has wrecked many a man on the pitch, but in particular off the pitch if you went drinking with him. He was known as Funbus and had a reputation, a fearsome reputation, for being able to consume vast quantities of alcohol and have no effect on him.

So he kind of took me under his wing that evening, and we had a bit of fun.

We'll be back with myself, John, and Rob after the break.

You were involved with some, with some humdingers between Munster and Castres back in the day. And obviously, look, that's not the rivalry it once was. Castres probably don't take Europe as seriously as they did back in 2002 when you played them in a semifinal. But there's a lot of stories from those games back in 2002. Like I said, you played them twice, once in the pools, once in the semi. You beat them in the semi to get to the final. Was it as difficult, grim, let's say, place to play as it came across?

For anyone who's ever been down to Cascais, it's like the San Siro because you've got the apartments that are overlooking the pitch.

Not quite as salubrious as the San Siro, I suppose, but it is a hotbed.

And you go down there, and I remember there was an incident where my old roommate, Mr. Clancy, got bitten. And then in the semi-final when we went down, I think that was the time that Declan Kidney played us a video of The Lion King on the way to the match.

And you know where the baboon hits Simba on the head?

Going back means I'll have to face my past. I've been running from it for so long.

Ow!

Jeez, what was that for? It doesn't matter, it's in the past. Yeah, but it still hurts. Oh yes, the past can hurt. But the way I see it, you can either run from it or learn from it.

Ah, you see? This is where Beckham was trying to get to. So the lunacy and the genius in what he used to do to get you revved up for a match was incredible.

So we went out onto the field in the semi-final, having not won an away semi-final in France.

I think one of the two laggies was playing for cash that day.

Pretty tough in the middle of the paddock. But we came away with the win.

And the following day I had the majority of the Munster squad back to Castleconnell to Rob Henderson's pub, Charcos, where there were songs sung and beers drank. And we even had a team shot outside where we had the local priest holding the ball in the middle like the captain.

It was brilliant. It was a great weekend, let alone the rugby.

But the rivalry between the two teams is as much as it is between any Irish and French team, to be perfectly honest with you. I mean, we had some humdingers against them, against Stade, against Toulouse, so I don't expect Munster to be any different.

I'm still trying to get my head around the Lion King. I'm trying to picture the reaction of a— whatever about a group of grown men, but a group of rugby players to be shown a children's cartoon.

That wasn't the worst of it. I think when, um, the first time that Munster were going to play Saracens, because Saracens had the glitz and the glamour and they're playing at Watford and blah blah, and they're gonna have the dancing girls and fireworks and bring on the tea with the a remote control car. They're sitting there and watching the, um, the video of the highlights of how Sarri's play, etc. And Declan's playing around with a remote control car, dipping it between everyone's feet, and everyone's concentrating on the car, and he's laughing. And his whole raison d'être was actually, if you're concentrating on the car, you're not concentrating on the match. That'll happen. Concentrate on what your job is. So that, that, in, in simple terms, that was the genius of the man.

That's brilliant. I've never heard those stories before. I think genius is definitely the right word. Some serious man management there.

I remember the first time I came across them was I flew down for the Under-19 World Cup final when Deci was coaching the, obviously, the Irish 19 side. And I noticed that they kept their tracksuits on for the anthem and that they didn't link arms because in those days, you know, there was safety in numbers. They were playing France in Toulouse, sorry, to tee it up. And The Irish players were standing kind of, kind of arm's width apart, and I remember asking Declan Kidney after the game, and he explained it to me that it was, uh, it was cold. He wants the boys to stay warm, and he didn't want the Irish players to be overstimulated during the anthems because the match wasn't going to start for another 4 minutes afterwards, and he wanted them to be kind of composed and then give the themselves that little bit, that 60 seconds before the game started to get, if you like, energized. And I was just fascinated by this, but Deccy thought of all of these things. He would go off on a tangent on any little thing that he could to kind of define something, a 1% here and there, to use a sporting cliché or a phrase. That's what he would look for. But that's something that struck me as well. So kind of backing up what Rob says, nothing would have been kind of too left field for Deccy to, you know, if he thought it would it would add some value.

That 1% that you talk about, John, it's so true because if you think about it, boiling water and steam, the difference is 1 degree. Now boiling water will make you a cup of tea, but steam will fire a jet plane off of an aircraft carrier.

So what do you want to be?

Do you want to be a kettle or an aircraft carrier? That's the difference between 1 degree. And, and Ducky managed to find that. And there were many other fantastic Irish coaches and monster coaches that would be able to do that, which is why I think that over the last 25 years, um, the evolution of Irish rugby has taken it from happy also-rans with performance to actually competing and being number one in the world. And watching it nowadays is, is night and day. It's a joy to behold, watching all the provinces, watching Ireland play. If they were picking a captain for the Lions next year, just to bring this back to where we were, Nathan, I think Eamonn Dorris has got a great shot of doing that because I think he's been outstanding for the last couple of seasons.

And, um, and if you want a big articulate, aggressive, skillful player to be your captain, then you need look no further than him.

Rob, do you want to take us through your dietary requirements at late at night, uh, as soon as you mentioned your former roomie Peter Clossey? And you've been outed in several books about club sandwiches and various other things in terms of, of your nighttime regime.

One of the funny ones is we were—

I think we were staying at City West, and I had a young Gordon Darcy with me. He was in my room and I'd flown in.

I was playing with Wasps at the time and, um, and we trained in the morning and lunch was at 1. We got back to the hotel at about 12:30 and I said, right, order the toasted ham cheese and onion sandwiches and a pot of tea. So we've got lunch in.

I don't know why I got that.

I got the sandwiches in.

So we had a sandwich, same thing happened in the afternoon, rode together for 3 or 4 days, whatever it was.

And I think it was one of his first camps. So he went down with the two plastic keys you got for the room. You don't really need to take back, but it's nice if you do. So he pops along the counter and he said, thanks for it, because I've gone. And I'd say, what room was that? 308, let's say. So she looks at him and then presses the key. Oh, one second. And you can hear the printer just—

she's smiling at him like one of these people on the reception desk at the airport. Anyway, he hands him a bill for €408.

I thought he was on a contract, it was about €300 at the time per month, and he just panicked and didn't know what to do. So he walks up to Manex, he said, Manex, I've got an issue, there's this room bill here.

Give it here, he says.

He looks at the—

uh, Don Lennon—

he looks at the bill, he says, who are you rooming with? I was with Hendo. Leave it to me, he says. I think it was well known that, uh, I think you can't fatten a thoroughbred, and the more calories you can get in The more energy you'll have to perform to the best of your ability.

So, wow, poor old D'Arcy.

If he's not still writing his next novel or his new book or, uh, wherever he is floating around, that's the top man. And actually, at a point in time was— I mean, we all, um, know that Brian has been one of the best centers ever to play the game for the Northern Hemisphere, and I think it would be remiss not to mention D'Arcy in those terms as well, because for a period there he was as good, if not just beating ahead of Drieko. And I think When the two of them got together, that's when the Irish midfield really took off. And delighted that I got a chance not only to play with both of them but to watch their careers after I'd had my bit of time.

Nathan's big into his cricket, writes on cricket for the Irish Times. You want to have a quick chat about your cricket career in the latter days? I see, are you going to captain the Third Eleven?

Did I see somewhere on Wikipedia his Wikipedia page is the last paragraph is all about his club cricket. Stats since he's retired?

Yeah, so I, uh, I do play the odd game of English hurling.

I played until recently, until the middle of last year, for my local club, Templeton.

I now play for another local club, Hampton Wick Royal. I would say that I am a low, low, slow offspin bowler that doesn't spin the ball. I'm not the most mobile in the field. For those of you that know cricket, I, uh, I was fielding at first slip and someone ran a single which is quite embarrassing because it's about 4 yards away from the stumps, but I couldn't bend down to pick the ball up. But I did clatter 100 off of 42 balls. It's, uh, I'm sure that the under-7s will invite me back next year if I promise to retire after 50.

Before you go, Rob, I do want to ask you as well, because I think it's easy to forget given we talked about the CAS semi-final and how that led to an unsuccessful final against Leicester in 2002. You weren't there in 2000, but Munster lost another final that year as well. Finally get over the line in 2006. And look, look, European droughts and losing finals is topical in Irish rugby at the minute for obvious reasons. So that must have been quite a relief for maybe, you know, we were talking about one percenters and Declan's man management earlier. Talk a little bit about that, about how mentally that group got over the line and finally won a title in 2006.

You go back to the beginning, you go back to 2000 and losing 8-7 to Northampton and Twickenham, and then you get to 2002 where the English machine that was Leicester at the time cheated with Neil Back putting his hand into the, into the scrum. And I think that no one's ever let him forget that. I certainly haven't. Um, I remember being at a lunch in Dublin with him and I made him stand up and make 2 pints and apologize to 300 people in the room for being such a cheating person. And then obviously it would be remiss— before we, before we carry on, actually, there was, uh, there was another fantastic near miss for Munster, which was obviously the semi-final in Lansdowne Road against Wasps, my former club. Which was arguably one of the, one of the best Heineken Cup matches ever played. And I just would like to take a second, if you don't mind, to say thoughts, obviously, with Tom Boyce's family and friends, because there's been tragic news over the past couple of days. So when you're talking about disappointment, let's put things into context.

There's one of ours, one of our own rugby players that unfortunately may not grace the field again.

So thoughts and prayers with, with his family and friends. Uh, he's a fantastic man, fantastic player. But then moving into 2006, uh, for the match against Biarritz in Cardiff, I think one of the reasons why Munster won that day was I had my best position. I was on the bench and the team were outstanding to a man. It was a good Biarritz team. How can anyone ever forget the gun Peter Stringer Doubting the entire team and then skirting around the blindside to score ultimately will be the winning try.

It's there for Stringer, Peter Stringer! Oh, he's fooled them all! He fooled them all! No one saw it coming. The man can't make a break. He just did it in a Heineken Cup final. Wonderful.

A sea of red within Cardiff, 74,000 capacity, whatever it was, 72,500 of the Munster fans, 60,000 lining O'Connell Street in Limerick, in Uige. It was just an unbelievable experience to be part of. We flew back in, um, into Shannon in the early hours of the morning, and there's still 20,000 people at Shannon Airport at 1:30, 2 o'clock, whatever time it was we got back. And we, we sang together, and then we got buses back into the Clarion Hotel in Limerick. And as we're walking through, in front of me was Ronan and his wife Jess, there was myself and my wife Angie, And, um, this lady comes up and just says, Ronan, will you sign my breasts? And, and Roger just turned around and said, listen, I've got, I've got too much respect for you, I've got too much respect for my wife. If you get a piece of paper, I'll sign that for you. My wife Angie from Hartlepool, she turned out, eee, love, isn't that nice? And she turned around and I was signing someone's backside. That's the difference between the two lads. Roger, Roger, global superstar, now a global coaching superstar. Centurion of caps and, uh, and some, uh, rhino on stampede with a Sharpie. That's the difference between the two.

Do you stay in touch with any of the lads, Rob? Do you have a WhatsApp group from, from those days?

So speaking of Frankie Sheehan this morning, obviously Frankie has had his eyes and nose on and off the field and is now leading the charge of the Pendulum Summit, Dublin's premier business convention.

Held every January, 30,000, 40,000 people going through the doors, and there are tickets still on sale.

So please reach out, pendulumsummit.com.

Oh yeah, you must be speaking at this. He's got to get you at some point. I see yourself, Andre Agassi, is it this year? And I can't remember somebody else. Somebody else have—

yeah, he got Andre Agassi this year, only for the fact that I can't deal with a backhand slice.

You do a little bit of charity cycling. I'm just wondering how you amuse yourself outside of obviously Angie and the 3 daughters and, and, uh, the cricket and various other things. But on a more serious note, you've also done a few cycles, I think, for charity.

Yeah, done a few. Um, to admit, when I get into the lycras, I look a small bit like 2 pounds of sugar in a 1-pound bag. But, um, but it's one of the things you do for charity. So you use the axle grease and get on a bike. And when you're in a dark place trying to cycle 150 miles in a day, whatever it is, uphill, uphill, you think about why you're doing it. And, uh, and those that perhaps aren't in a position to be able to do that, and be that children that are born with disability or visually impaired or people with MND. We do quite a lot of cycle rides for that, and it's something that you can do even though the game is taking its toll on a lot of people's knees and shoulders, etc. Being able to give back to charity is huge. I'm actually the honorary president of the Surrey Wooden Spoon branch. The Wooden Spoon is a children's charity which was set up after England won the Wooden Spoon in Dublin in 1983, and they've raised north of £50 million now for children's causes.

So I'm putting a lot of effort into that as well.

So I think the game has given so much to me and continues to give so much to me that trying to give a little bit back where you can, I think, is only right and fitting.

And you've given us plenty, plenty over the last— I don't think I've laughed as much on this podcast, I have to say. Thank you very much. That's all for today. Our thanks to Rob Henderson for his time, his humor, and his insight.

Hopefully it's not the last time we hear from him. My name is Nathan Johns.

This is the Counter Rugby Podcast, sponsored by NIFT Business.

This episode was produced by John Casey.

We'll be back on Monday.