John Langford: Munster’s first Wallaby lock on the great times he occasionally struggles to remember
Before John Langford left Limerick and returned to Australia, he was asked to make one final contribution to Irish rugby. Over three years, his impact had already been seismic. The province pushed towards professionalism; their mentality transformed. A figure crucial to the making of Munster.
In the final days of the 2001 season, IRFU chief executive Philip Browne reached out with a request.
Would John write a report on Irish rugby, where it was going and what needs to change?
“I have been hoping to catch up with Phillip Browne for a while now,” says Langford. He leans back and pauses as he ponders the years that have passed since.
“I don’t think he came out here in 2018 on that tour. Then I was hoping to catch up with him at the World Cup in Japan but that didn’t happen. I just want to ask him if he ever read the report? What did he think about it?”
What was it that he detailed in the report? How crucial could it have been?
Could it possibly have contained the key to Ireland finally overcoming their World Cup quarter-final hoodoo?
At that, he leans forward intently.
It was this mindset that manifested as anger during that infamous team meeting before the 1999-00 season. To recap, a question was asked of the squad: ‘who thinks Munster can win the Heineken Cup this year?’ The season prior, they had just secured their first away win in four years of the tournament.
Three people raised their hands. There was audible laughter in the room and rage in the import’s soul. This was a standard that could not be tolerated. Eventually, the team realised its potential and reached a Heineken Cup final. Before the following season, it was back to UL and a repeat of the question.
This time, every hand went up.
A clear sense of satisfaction permeates from Langford as he recounts that anecdote now. He is sitting in a North Sydney bar but still fully invested in the ongoings around Thomond Park. His phone shows alerts from the recent interprovincial derby. The group chat is alive with congratulations after two members, Denis Leamy and Paul O’Connell, gained new employment.
It is a bond that goes both ways. Whether it be the line-out calls or warm-ups, Langford’s legacy lasted for years. He did the province a service.
Just as he was leaving, Munster’s progress was further boosted by the arrival of fellow Aussie Jim Williams. It was Langford who helped secure the signing. When news broke that Williams was looking towards Europe after winning the Super 12 final with the Brumbies, Declan Kidney reached out. He quickly realised serious persuasion was necessary, so Langford made his move.
“I remember we had Jim and his wife Megan to come over for lunch and chat about it. I couldn’t stress enough how much fun I had there. He did me out of a position, the bloody bastard, because of the foreign player rule! Ah, he was a great addition to Munster,” he says with a smile.
But you cannot always look outside for the answers. During his time in Ireland, there were constant questions enquiring about how they do it down under. The same external obsession still lingers. What are their development pathways like over there? How does that school system work?
This, Langford stresses, is not the solution.
“Sure, you can learn from certain things they do. Just don’t try to copy others.
“That was key to my report. Do not follow other teams. Make your own system. You are unique. Look at provincial rugby in Ireland, let them develop their own. Copying others means you are in their slipstream. Generate it yourself.
HE passion with which he speaks about rugby is striking, particularly because of his unusual path to the sport. In many ways, John Langford was a reluctant rugby player. The Wagga Wagga native knew next to nothing about game until he attended Sydney University to study engineering.
His story started with their fifth-grade colts after being collared by a desperate coach surveying the dorms in a bid to make up numbers. It was a week before exams. He didn’t know the rules yet, the gentle giant was incapable of disappointing a friendly face.
Over the next few years, he played university rugby at various grades before graduating to North Shore-based Gordon RFC. These early days are what instilled a deep love for the grassroots of the game. Just mentioning them is enough to produce a mild giggle.
Like that one time they took on the renowned Randwick at Coogee Oval. The team could scarcely gather 15 bodies to tog out. They didn’t even have something to tog into after the jerseys went missing. So, they wore what they had: Some in singlets, others in pyjamas, one prop sported a ski jacket.
“I remember I had a t-shirt from the local fishing shop I liked on. A mate I went to college with, Stu Ronan, he had a woollen jumper on.
“People still ask me to this day what games stick out in your mind; I’ll never forget that one!
“I am a big supporter of grassroots and funding it properly. It is disappointing to see guys become Wallabies and then they are overseas in Europe and Japan. I don’t know if that is just the way it is and I’m just a cynical old bugger these days.
“I was lucky enough to see both sides of the game, we all worked before it went pro so we appreciated how lucky we were.
“No matter what, I used to love going back to play for the club. I don’t know, I think it stems from playing against the Wallabies when I was younger. You come up against Simon Poidevin or whoever, and you are scared shitless.
“Good! This is an opportunity to come up against the best in the country. I needed to lift my game to that. Kids coming through now, if they are put in a bubble and only playing in their group, when do they get the chance to do that?”
Langford’s first trip to Ireland was on a university rugby tour in 1991. They arrived with a simple mantra that he would adopt for much of his career: Work hard, play hard.
“We played UCD first. I just loved it. Without a doubt every place we went, UCD, Belfast, Galway, UCC, and finally to Trinity, before every game they would take us out on the lash. I remember clearly being in the Bass brewery helping ourselves to top shelf stuff. I’m pretty sure the goal was to handicap us for the game the next day.
“We did not lose a game. Our closest was against Trinity.
“We played into a howling wind that day in the first half. Mate, the coldness!”
Often the best memories were made at this obscure level. One prominent story involves Langford’s head on collision with a fresh and belligerent opponent during a Shannon versus Young Munster match.
Langford’s partner in the second row, Mick Galwey, had just been kneed in the back by this young opposing lock. This upstart was already attracting attention locally. His name was Paul O’Connell, and he detailed what happened next in his autobiography, The Battle.
“As I was running over to a lineout, John Langford started shouting at me. Langford was a superstar of the second row. If it wasn’t for John Eales, he’d probably have won 50 caps for the Wallabies. So he deserved respect, especially from a kid who had achieved nothing. I jerked my head in his direction and gave it to him: ‘Go f**k yourself. F**k off home to Australia!’”
Langford smirks and nods. He wouldn’t have had it any other way.
“Everybody had been talking about Paul for ages before the match. Coming up against an oldie like me.
“I think he edged me that day, to be honest. It goes back to what I said earlier, coming against someone and you need to lift your game. It is exactly like me playing club rugby here against Wallabies. This is your chance to shine, to prove yourself. Can you cut the mustard or not?
“I have no problem saying it, Paul edged me that day. He would probably say he slaughtered me.
“Going into it you would say ‘can he come up with the standard everyone talks about?’ That day he did.”
’CONNELL will have a big future in coaching, Langford predicts. Certain players just know how to read the game in a way he cannot quite contemplate. It is an avenue he was never interested in. As he sits and chats about his career, the 52-year-old cuts a content figure. He lives and works in Sydney with his wife and three children. Rugby gave him memories of a lifetime but at the top level, it is becoming a game he no longer relates to.
“There was talk about going into coaching or even administration. I got asked to be the team manager for the Brumbies, but I declined. I still knew a lot of the players and I did not want that conflict. There were potential opportunities at SANZAAR. Rugby for me was a fantastic opportunity that changed my life. Look, I got into engineering before I played rugby.
“I get immense satisfaction out of building things,” he says, before pointing across the road to a vast structure, looming over us.
“Over there is a station I worked on with a team, a big upgrade, I am really proud of it. I love my job, mate. It is not as good as playing rugby, but it is the next best thing.”
Every time Langford meets his friend Pat Howard, the former Wallabies out-half and Leicester Tigers coach, they reflect fondly on their trip to ‘Mecca’. That is what playing professional rugby was to them, enjoyment and employment in perfect harmony. They lived the great transition.
The sweeping change that came as the game discarded amateurism and rushed headlong into professionalism.
ND yet, the recent harrowing revelations by the likes of Steve Thompson and Michael Lipman are a cruel reminder that this came at a cost. This was a time when there was a devastating lack of awareness around the serious issue of head injuries. Langford played with Elton Flatley, the Australian out-half who was forced to retire in 2006 after continued blurred vision due to several concussions.
The game gave him so much; it could have taken even more. Does he feel fortunate to have emerged with his health?
He raises a quizzical eyebrow at the objectively bad question. Not even this thoughtless assumption could muster ire from an engaging and affable man, but it has made him uneasy.
“Fortunate…” he repeats with a sigh.
“It is terrible to hear about all this. I actually had a few significant concussions. In 1993, I got kicked in the head while playing against the Blue Bulls at Loftus (South Africa). Knocked me into tomorrow. I was put into a hotel; it was our last match and all I can remember is the disappointment that I couldn’t go out on the lash with the boys before we flew back.
“Our team manager stayed with me that night to monitor me. I remember I rang home to tell them I was all ok.
“The next time, I remember getting knocked out… so, sometimes you see stars coming into a ruck or whatever. I had countless of those moments. But properly, I was playing in my first test against the All Blacks and ran into Craig Dowd’s knee.
“I remember walking to a lineout in the house of pain, Dunedin. I could not remember the lineout calls. I just shouted, ‘don’t call it to me, I can’t remember the calls.’
“My biggest fear at the time was not being able to play in South Africa the following week. I went anyway and played; it was actually a record loss.
“After I played in Ireland I came back and played fourth grade up until 2011, I just loved playing so much. I remember playing against Manly in Manly Oval. John Hopoate, the Australian heavyweight boxing champion, was playing.
“I came into him carrying the ball… Actually, I probably have got this wrong. It makes you wonder; have I been knocked in the head too many times? Either he had the ball, or I had it, but something went wrong in the tackle. Next thing I know I woke up 20 minutes later. At half-time apparently the doctor checked me and I said I was alright, but I blacked out for I don’t know how many minutes.
“I came to in the second half when I saw the other second row being called off for a substitute. I said hang on, I’ve been out of it. I do not remember the last 40 minutes, take me off instead. There is a photo from the AGM of Sydney Uni that year of me flat out. It never went to judicial committee because there was no video.
“The thing that I often think about, every time, I was the one who rushed right back in. I got knocked down and get back in.
“It would probably kill me in terms of any lawsuit against Rugby Australia, but I was always the one who said ‘screw it, I’ll get up and play’. It was a sign of strength. Now we know so much more about it. I don’t know what the medical knowledge was at the time…”
Is it something that affects him now? He responds that a friend, the journalist Peter Fitzsimons, is a big promoter of the impacts of concussion and making the game safer. Langford reads his stuff. He has watched the movie Concussion. He is glad the sport has started to take the issue seriously. He moves on.
A few days later, the phone rings. ‘Hi mate, I’ve been thinking a lot about that question…”
When we met, he explained what happened to him back then. He never really explained how he feels about it now. That is troubling him, because the truth is, he and his wife think about it a lot.
“It is something we worry about recently. I know it is in the back of Nicole’s head…
“Honestly, I don’t know. I am going to talk to Peter Fitzsimons who has done a lot of work around this. I don’t know if there is anything I can do. Maybe a cognitive test, similar to a dementia test…
“The sooner you start looking at it, the more evidence they can collect and assess. I guess it might help down the line.
“I am happy to donate my brain, or what is left of it, to science. I hope that helps.”
This is a feeling shared by a generation who just wanted to play a game they loved. It serves as a brutal reminder that urgent action is required so no one else has to experience the same dread in the future.
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