It’s little wonder Healey found he was out of puff
Have you been watching The Big Tackle with former England international Austin Healey on ITV4?
Basically he has been wandering around mostly amateur rugby clubs trying to sort them out.
In for a couple of weeks, seek to effect a transformation and then on to the next one.
I know it doesn’t sound that riveting but actually it has been.
It started with some grunt and groaners in Bristol and then went up a grade or ten with Rosslyn Park.
And on Sunday it was the turn of Whitney Ladies from Oxfordshire to be on the TV.
Recorded, because the side just happened to be playing the Moseley women’s team on the same day and, though it didn’t feature in the documentary, the cameras were rolling, presumably for some sort of “so how did they get on” resume.
Not Austin’s first visit of the season to Billesley Common.
Previously he spent a week being coached by Moseley’s community team to gain his RFU level One badge.
Austin professed to be enjoying himself – even if it didn’t much look like it – despite a 25-7 reverse for Whitney courtesy of tries for Moseley by Jo Kilby (2), Candice Pugh (2) and Michelle Gwynne.
“It has been a great experience to go back to grass roots clubs,” he told Bright.
And he was proud of the way the Whitney girls had responded, praising their effort.
“They are so much better,” he declared. “When they last played Moseley at home it was a 48-0 defeat.”
Smaller than some of the players, the diminutive Healey took the opportunity of the spring sunshine to bring his family along.
Wife and four daughters playing on the “Moseley beach” in front of the clubhouse.
So it was one eye on Whitney and the other on what the kids were up to.
He didn’t bother to get involved in the warm-up until the cameras appeared and for a man known for being gobby said very little from the touchline.
Indeed, star of the show was the official.
He changed prior to kick-off from a fetching pink to green because he decided the shirt better have an official referee’s badge on it. Just in case.
And there were plenty of shouts from the touchline of “stop playing to the cameras, ref” as yet another infringement was signalled.
Indeed the rotund one’s fitness regime was interesting – a fag before the match and a fag after it.
No wonder he was puffing.
There was just one disappointment.
With Healey a Strictly Come Dancing celebrity, Moseley catering supremo Geoff the Chef, one for the ballroom himself, asked whether the lad might take to the floor at an upcoming event he was organising.
Sadly, it was a no – going to be elsewhere that night.
Well, it was worth a try!
And the win for MWRFC keeps them on track for successive promotions.
