We’ve only just stepped through the door of Gareth Anscombe’s brand new home in the south of France when we’re hit by a wall of noise and activity.
‘Sorry, it’s carnage here,’ the Wales fly-half says with a laugh, as his two children explore their surroundings, he and pregnant wife Milica get to grips with their latest property’s state-of-the-art technology and Kobe the Rottweiler – tennis ball in mouth – relaxes by the pool. ‘We only moved in yesterday!’
Anscombe has got used to packing boxes over the years. The town of Anglet – nestled between Bayonne and Biarritz – is the latest stop on his magical rugby mystery tour.
After spells in New Zealand – the country of his birth – Cardiff, Japan and Gloucester, the No 10 is starting over once again in the thriving world of France’s Top14 with Bayonne, punching above their weight.
It is, in so many ways, completely different to Wales where rugby is struggling badly. Soon, four regions could become two as the seemingly never-ending financial crisis continues to take huge bites out of the domestic game.
Gareth Anscombe is not afraid to speak his mind on any issue – and here he pulls no punches on the Welsh rugby crisis
Anscombe has played 46 times for his country but has no clue if he will ever add to that tally
He has joined Bayonne this summer after a season with Gloucester in the English Premiership
‘I’ve purposely tried to stay away from Welsh rugby news,’ says Anscombe. ‘But I honestly think if Wales goes to two clubs, the game there will struggle to recover. It might never do.
‘Change is needed. But I don’t see how going to two teams will benefit Wales in the long run. I have genuine concerns about the success and longevity of Welsh rugby if that happens.’
Since arriving in Wales in 2014 from New Zealand, Anscombe has seen first-hand the highs and lows Welsh rugby has to offer.
In 2019, he was a Six Nations Grand Slam winner. But he has also experienced injury heartache, off-field chaos and contractual uncertainty. After 18 months or more of struggles, the Welsh Rugby Union has proposed the two-team cut as part of a radical review into how the country’s national game is run.
The backlash has been ferocious, and Anscombe has never been afraid to voice his opinion. ‘I’ve been outspoken over the years about what’s gone on,’ he says. ‘But now, I just feel a bit beaten down by it all. I’m sick of it.
‘I don’t want to fight it now or care. Now I’m in France, I can kind of dissociate myself from it. That’s really sad, isn’t it? As players in Wales, we should have stuck our heels in the ground more.
‘In 2023, the boys should have gone through with the strike threat. One million per cent it should have happened because look at the mess we’re in now. The frustrating thing for me is we’ve had people in power who come across like they know everything.
‘Look at the trouble they’ve put the game in. They’ve been sacked or had their payouts and walked away. But at the time, they tried to make us players feel like idiots. Many of those players are still in the thick of it all now. It’s so easy for those guys at the top to come across like they’re above us as players.
Anscombe experienced some huge highs with Wales including their first ever win in South Africa in 2022 (pictured), and the 2019 Six Nations Grand Slam
Anscombe won the European Challenge Cup with Cardiff in 2018 – now they stand on the brink of crisis as Welsh rugby proposes cutting from four regions to two
‘But they’ve made some horrible decisions. I also feel like what’s killed Wales has been a lack of decision making. They’ve been so scared to make one. The knock-on effect has been we’ve sat on our hands and the game has got worse and worse.
‘The people in charge have looked at Welsh rugby like a business. But in rugby, you’re dealing with people first, not products. In Wales, rugby has been treated like a product – buying low and selling high. It doesn’t work like that.
‘The WRU invested in a hotel and a zip line. But we’ve stopped the main thing being the main thing and now the main thing is in a bad, bad way. A lack of investment has put the Welsh game in a really tough position. How many times over the last couple of years have we had to hire external teams to give advice?
‘You do need consultants. I get that. But if that’s the case, why are we paying the people in charge?’
At 34 and with his full focus on Bayonne, he is unsure whether he will ever add to his 46 caps for Wales and hasn’t spoken to the new head coach Steve Tandy.
The WRU’s stakeholder consultation into its preferred ‘optimal solution’ of two teams is set to end next month. But it remains to be seen whether the proposal will be approved by the governing body’s board in the wake of some significant reproach. Once again, uncertainty reigns in Wales’ national game.
‘The problems I could see from my experience in Wales post-Covid were that talented young players just weren’t playing often enough at a high enough level,’ Anscombe continues.
‘I don’t see how having two teams with squads of 50 each changes that. My opinion about what is best for Welsh rugby would be having at least two teams in the English Premiership. It’s a no-brainer from a rugby and commercial point of view. It just has to happen.
‘The people in charge have looked at Welsh rugby like a business. But in rugby, you’re dealing with people first, not products.’
Anscombe (left) was born in New Zealand and won the Super 15 with the Chiefs in 2013
‘I don’t think the United Rugby Championship serves Welsh rugby. The game in Wales is in such a state right now, so the WRU needs to be so selfish with their decision making.
‘They can’t get this wrong. Two teams seems light to me. Ideally, I’d love to see three Welsh teams in the Premiership and then a fourth in the Championship on a much smaller budget. I’d push our best young players to that team and throw in a few older, more experienced heads in there to help them develop.’
Such is the sense with Anscombe speaks that you simply wonder why those in charge haven’t listened to him – and other leading Welsh rugby lights – more.
It is an uncomfortable truth that Wales’ players have been let down badly by those in charge over recent years. It was the case when Wales’ golden era lifted trophies for fun between 2012 and 2019, and it is the same now when such success seems a long, long way off.
It is no wonder then that Anscombe is happy to be away from the Welsh goldfish bowl. Given that he spent more than two years out with a serious knee injury from 2019 and had to have a bone graft inserted into the joint, it is in many ways remarkable he is still playing.
He represented Wales at the 2023 World Cup, but then saw his contract with Suntory torn up by the Japanese side because of a groin problem. A season in England with Gloucester followed. Now, it’s French side Bayonne and a fresh start in France.
‘I loved Gloucester, but at the time I was really disappointed with how my contract situation played out,’ he says. ‘They said one thing and did the other.
‘It probably wasn’t done with full honesty. There were certainly some messed up channels of communication. I got called back in by Wales for the Six Nations this year and I thought after that I was going back to Gloucester to re-sign. I found out a couple of days before playing Ireland that Gloucester were going in a different direction.
Gloucester moved on from Anscombe after just one season and he upped sticks for France
Anscombe will have the likes of ex-England star Manu Tuilagi as team-mates in Bayonne this season
‘That’s rugby. It’s led me to this opportunity now which feels like the right one. It’s tough when you enter the back end of a season and you’re still trying to figure out a contract. There all the logistics and there’s financial and real-life pressure. It’s an emotional rollercoaster. I suppose that’s what you sign up for in professional sport.
‘But the uncertainty of it all is very tough on families. It absolutely is difficult, especially as you get older, have children and your responsibilities grow.
‘We’ve certainly had our fair share of uncertainty as a family. I was always keen to test myself in the Top14. I had opportunities in previous years, but never did it – predominantly because of the rules on playing for Wales and where I was with my career there at the time.
‘Now, the timing is right. Bayonne is rugby mad and I’m excited for the opportunity. There have been financial challenges around the game globally, but from being here I think French rugby is beating to its own drum a little bit. The game is thriving.
‘Now I’m able to reflect on it, I moved to Wales from New Zealand so young. At the time, I thought I was ready for it. I wasn’t. It certainly took a couple of years to adjust to how everything is in Wales! It certainly made me mature a lot and quickly. I never really knew if I’d be a success.
‘All I was looking for was an opportunity. I never in my wildest dreams would have thought I’d have the career I’ve had and would come to think of Cardiff as home.
‘My career has certainly had a few more curveballs compared to others. There have been some crazy things along the way, but I’ve also had some very good moments and you have to take the good with the bad. I want to keep playing and stay in France for as long as possible, but when I think about the day I retire, it’s pretty likely we’ll return to Cardiff.’
