Two red cards in two Test matches makes Charlie Ewels sound like someone from a young offenders list but the reality is far from it.
When he was pulled aside by England’s in-house lawyer in the changing rooms of Tokyo’s National Stadium, he knew his tour was not going to end well. The 6ft6in lock had just become the first player to be sent off twice in as many Tests and, on second viewing, his reckless clear-out on Michael Leitch did not look good.
‘I watched it back in the changing room with the KC, Richard Smith, and thought, “Yeah, that’s a red card”,’ recalls Ewels. ‘I’ve never stepped onto a rugby pitch with any intention to hurt anybody but I got that one wrong. For about five seconds, the lads show they care about you, then rugby’s quite good at filling the gap with humour. Aled Walters just put his arm around me and whispered into my ear: Imagine if you get a third!’
Ewels is not the menacing presence you would expect of someone with two red cards in two Tests. Funny and engaging — more lineout technician than snarling enforcer — he is quickly ordered to cover up his novelty ‘Hawk Tuah’ t-shirt as he talks all things club and country at Bath’s stately training base.
He recalls the lonely 14-hour flight home from England’s summer tour. A laugh or cry moment. Downgraded from the usual business class luxuries of an England rugby player, allocated a seat with a broken TV as his team-mates travelled onwards to New Zealand.
England and Bath star Charlie Ewels sat down with Mail Sport for an exclusive interview
Ewels has won 30 caps for England, but he has been sent off in his past two Test matches
Ewels opened up on the unwanted record and the lonely trip back from England’s summer tour
‘To be honest, I was half expecting to be in with the luggage!’ says Ewels, who now has 30 caps. ‘I couldn’t watch a film because my screen wasn’t working so I just read my book. Ryan Halliday, Stillness is the Key.
‘There was a feeling of, “Ah, not again” but that’s sport. I spoke to the guys the night before the game and said this means more than my first cap because I’ve almost had to work harder for it. Then it ends. That’s life. I’m not proud of it but you realise that pretty quickly it’s ancient history and the only thing you can change is what you do moving forwards.’
Back in Bath, there is plenty to keep him occupied. He arrived home the day before his 29th birthday and booked tickets to watch the British Grand Prix at Silverstone. It was primarily an off-season social but doubled up as an opportunity to learn from the masters of the pit-lane.
‘Finn Russell, Mr Worldwide, sorted us out with some pit passes. As we were doing the pit walk a lady who used to work in the Bath marketing team, Kat Farmer, who now works for Red Bull shouted, “Ewelsy, Ewelsy, come over!” It was the end of practise day, when the cars don’t look like cars, just floating engines that are being tinkered with.
‘It wasn’t the one per-centers they were looking at. It was the 0.001 per-centers. Three or four hours after the race, every garage was still going flat out; what can we take from the data to tweak to make us slightly better tomorrow? The driver had gone, surrounded by screaming fans asking for autographs, but these guys were there in the dark with the spanners at 10 at night and nobody even knows their name. We have the medical team, the S&C team… it’s so much more than just Finn Russell. Those are the parallels.’
Bath have weathered a few turbulent years, flirting with relegation. Now, thanks to Russell and Co, they are favourites to win their first Premiership title since 1996. As someone who first joined the club in 2012, what does Ewels see as the fundamental changes?
A summer trip to Silverstone helped Ewels get over the disappointment and learn lots of things
Ewels also hailed the impact of Johann van Graan in transforming the fortunes of Bath
But Ewels also highlighted the little changes elsewhere, such as diets and a hot yoga craze
‘Johann van Graan is the guy at the top of it. It’s taken lots of little changes to turn the direction of the ship. We now have a meeting auditorium whereas before we doubled up with a physio room and a meeting room. They’ve put a sauna in the changing toom; a little one percenter like the F1 analogy.
‘They knocked a wall down in the changing room at the Rec to open up the space in the middle so we can have two TVs; one facing the backs and one facing the forwards.
‘We’ve got a nutritionist so every day the food is tailored towards that day; breakfast might be more carb heavy because we’ve got a big session in the afternoon.
‘We do yoga a couple of times a week so the lads have a greater understanding of their bodies and what’s tight. We have place in town called YogaKave where they tailor a session towards rugby players. It’s backs and hips, not sitting in a downward dog for 20 minutes because all our shoulders are knackered.
‘It’s really easy to say, “It’s Finn, everything’s Finn, all we needed to do was sign Finn” but Johann has recruited really well across the board. The squad is extremely competitive and that drives training. I’m a big believer that everything comes back to training and when you add up all those little things it leads to a higher performing environment.’
Last week, Chelsea’s new academy director Glenn van der Kraan, formerly of Manchester City, was welcomed into the club’s training base. It is a constant school of improvement, tapping into the sharpest minds from rival sports.
‘Mikel Arteta came into an England camp once and said, “I love how much you touch each other, I love this”. When we do something well in rugby, we hug or pat each other on the back. In football, there’s fewer players on a bigger pitch and the ball in play is so high so they never touch each other. The only time they ever get together is when they score or concede a goal.
‘Now you see Arsenal players celebrating and hugging when they make a tackle. Last week, Glenn said the most powerful time to do that is in training. He observed our sessions and said the difference between a Champions League player and a League Two player is that obsession with the detail. Can you become obsessed with how you play that one metre pass? Things like that all add to the bigger picture.’
The 29-year-old also revealed what Mikel Arteta learned from a visit to England’s rugby camp
Ewels is hoping to help guide Bath to their first Premiership title since 1996 this season
Bath fell agonisingly short in last season’s Premiership final, losing by a fine four-point margin to Northampton but, as with his red card in Japan, Ewels quickly moved on.
‘After the final, Johann booked out a hotel in Windsor where we had a club function. Johann’s a very religious guy and he’s not a massive drinker and the place we went to was a real chapel that turned into a nightclub. He had a few beers and then then said, “It’s that way to the nightclub, which is a proper chapel, which I do struggle with!”
‘You want to decompress, get on the piss and be normal for a bit but the England guys were in camp at 10am on Monday morning. The next thing very quickly creeps up on you. In a week’s time it’s ancient history and you’re onto the next thing.
‘I’d like to think we made city and the fans proud of us again. Last year was good, there were some good memories but we come back in and now everybody starts on zero.’
