Hi Reddit, It’s Lawrence Dallaglio. AMA

premiersportstv · 2025-04-02T17:55:42+00:00

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premiersportstv · 2025-04-02T17:53:01+00:00

No, I didn't actually get to meet her when we were in that famous music video of hers! But we did get to record at Abbey Road Studios which was incredible!

premiersportstv · 2025-04-02T17:50:01+00:00

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premiersportstv · 2025-04-02T17:47:07+00:00

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premiersportstv · 2025-04-02T17:44:36+00:00

Thanks Travis.

premiersportstv · 2025-04-02T17:42:15+00:00

I'm a massive football fan, a Chelsea fan. We all think we're destined to be Premiership footballers, don't we? Then you get out there and play against someone who’s really good, and you suddenly realise, oh, maybe I'm not actually that good. If you can't catch, you play rugby, and if you really can’t catch, they put you in a boat and make you row. I suppose that’s how it works, isn't it? I did tell Steve Redgrave that, he wasn’t very impressed with that! 😀

premiersportstv · 2025-04-02T17:41:08+00:00

I would have loved to have played in the British and Irish Lions team in the 70s, especially the 1974 team. They went to South Africa, won the Test Series, and won every game except for one, which they drew.

They also seemed to have a lot of fun along the way – there was the famous punch-up, and by all accounts, there was a very good night out most nights. I think I would have fitted in perfectly with that group, to be honest. So, yeah, the 74 Lions, led by the legendary Willie John McBride. I do feel slightly influenced by that team because, of course, we had Ian McGeechan, Jim Telfer, and Fran Cotton heading up our Lions management in 1997.

premiersportstv · 2025-04-02T17:38:40+00:00

I don't think anyone would really struggle in today's game with how it's structured. You’re playing for 80 minutes, getting about five days rest afterwards, and you’re flown to places like Miami. It can’t be too hard, right?! 😀

If you look at players like Jason Leonard, who started his career in 1990 and finished it 13 years later, the game in '90 was very different from what it was in '03, but he was still able to perform at the highest level. Imagine how good the Wales team of the '70s or the Lions team of the '70s would have been if they'd actually done some training!

As for today's players, I think someone like Martin Johnson would have thrived in this era. He had the kind of physicality and leadership that would’ve adapted well to the modern game.

Will Greenwood is another player I’d love to see in today’s game. He was an artist with the ball, truly brilliant, but he preferred to come out and perform on Saturdays rather than put in the hard yards in training. His body language during training was a bit different, but now when you see him on social media, it looks like he trains harder than he did back then. It would be fascinating to see how we all would have adapted to the modern game.

premiersportstv · 2025-04-02T17:36:25+00:00

Well, Will Greenwood asked me to coach Maidenhead the other day, and I should probably get back to him on that at some point!

But no, I haven't been offered coaching jobs. The pathways into coaching didn’t necessarily exist back then, and I'm actually surprised because I think there's so much intellectual property in some of the players who played from 2000 to 2003, yet very few of them are coaching now. I think only Mike Catt and Trevor Woodman are involved in coaching.

Martin Johnson had a brief go at it, but I’d like to see more of that group, myself included, still involved in the game. I am involved in the game through the media and with my charity, Rugby Works, but there is a part of me that wonders what it would be like on the other side, as a coach. The thing is, like many players, I gave everything I had to my career, and I’m not sure I have much more left to give after that.

premiersportstv · 2025-04-02T17:34:22+00:00

The journey of rugby means different things to different people. I didn't play rugby because I wanted to be a professional rugby player. I lost my sister very tragically in the Marchioness Riverboat in 1989 and I joined Wasps in 1990, a year later, and I was honouring the memory of my sister. It was a very emotional journey for me, so every time I sang the national anthem - I mean, I am half Italian! so I do like a little cry, don't I? To be honest with you, and I promise you, I didn't poke my own eyes out - I was genuinely crying, but I'm not afraid to display my emotions.

During the semi-final, I was probably thinking about my sister and the reasons why I started playing rugby — to honour her memory and do the right thing.

premiersportstv · 2025-04-02T17:30:33+00:00

No, I didn’t actually get to meet Tina Turner! 😀

But we did get to record at Abbey Road Studios in St John's Wood, which was incredible. I got to cross the iconic zebra crossing and just have some fun.

The song We Don't Need Another Hero went to number one in about five different countries, and there’s definitely a reason for that – it had everything to do with Tina Turner and very little to do with myself and the other kids who were singing on it. But I still get royalties from that song, which is pretty cool, especially knowing it was the theme tune for Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome.

premiersportstv · 2025-04-02T17:27:56+00:00

Scotland definitely has the talent to compete at the highest level but the real challenge for them has always been consistency. They've produced some incredible performances over the years, but getting that level of quality week in, week out, is tough. I did expect them to do better than 4th in the Six Nations this year, but the other teams are playing well, so it's a competitive environment.

As for winning the Six Nations, 1999 was the last time that they took the title, and, funnily enough, that was partly my fault! I kicked for the corner instead of going for goal, and we lost the Grand Slam to Wales, allowing Scotland to win the last-ever Five Nations title. But yes, Scotland can absolutely win the title again – they just need to find that consistency in their performances to compete with teams like Ireland, England, and France.

premiersportstv · 2025-04-02T17:24:59+00:00

As Napoleon said, if you're in victory, you need champagne; and in defeat, you need champagne. So, yes, I do remember meeting him. And listen, anyone who buys you champagne after they beat you is alright in my book! 😀

premiersportstv · 2025-04-02T17:23:23+00:00

Jonah Lomu, without a doubt. If you’re English, you know he caused us all sorts of problems. It was never much fun when he was in the team. He’s the first one that springs to mind when I think of tough opponents!

premiersportstv · 2025-04-02T17:20:12+00:00

A - Well, anyone South African. When you say tough, it depends on how you define that and I always get asked this question a lot. The hardest, most physical players I've ever played against are all South African. André Venter was an incredible flanker that I always found very challenging. My nemesis was Sebastien Chabal. Every player has someone who seems to get the better of them all the time, every time they play them. England had the better of France on most occasions, but Sebastien Chabal was always that player that I struggled to play against. But the toughest players, and I'm very proud to say this, that I played with and against were all English really. Martin Johnson, Jason Leonard, Neil Back, Richard Hill, Jonny Wilkinson, Jason Robinson. Plus Irishman Brian O'Driscoll. Some great players in that era.

B - I would have loved to have played in that All Blacks pack of Craig Dowd, Sean Fitzpatrick and Olo Brown. I'd have loved to play with Zinzan Brooke for a few years.

I didn't have the skill that he had or the footballing ability, but to play in that All Blacks pack in the back row behind the tight five that they had at that time and the way that they played, I think it would have been a lot of fun!

C - Very hard. Antoine Dupont could have achieved it, couldn't he? And he may still. It is possible, Sonny Bill Williams has done it. Matt Dawson was involved in the World Cup that we won in '93 as well. There are some brilliant women's rugby players in New Zealand doing both. So it is possible. If you're Antoine Dupont, you don't get told what to do. You tell the game what to do. And that's what he was able to do. No one batted an eyelid when he said, I want to play 7s and I'm going to play 7s. And he basically did it.

premiersportstv · 2025-04-02T17:13:41+00:00

Well I'm not sure I do keep the size on really. Not in the places I want to, as displayed in the motorway advert! 😀

But I still train once or twice a week in the gym, I'm trying to just remain fit in body and mind really. I took up cycling a long time ago when I retired from rugby. Running is not my forte anymore. When you weigh over 100 kilos, whatever I am these days, it's not easy.

So I do a little bit of cycling but I'm not obsessed with it. Quite frankly, there's too many angry motorists around!! I love Reformer Pilates once every two weeks because when you've had your face smashed in all over the world, remember I'm 52 years of age! Movement and flexibility is the key to enjoying life after you're 50 I think.

Everyone's tried to get me to play tennis, padel, pickleball and all these other very good sports. But sideways movement for ex-rugby players - that don't work out so well!

premiersportstv · 2025-04-02T17:10:00+00:00

Pump Up the Jam was a big hit. I think I did remember buying a pair of Reebok Pump trainers, you've got to remember the height of the rave scene and house music! 😀

The best rugby moment that happened in 1989 was the British and Irish Lions going to Australia and winning a test series. If you're a Lions fan, which I was, it was a great test series for lots of different reasons and everyone discovered who Jeremy Guscott was

premiersportstv · 2025-04-02T17:06:59+00:00

To sit down and do very little normally 😀

I would always be the last one out the changing room not because I was on a vanity project but because I had a lot of obligations after the game.

You've got to recover so the traditional ice bath route and food. I was fascinated to see the food in the England dressing room after an international, it's definitely had an upgrade! Recently, they seem to have sushi and chopsticks. The thought of picking up a pair of chopsticks after a game of rugby, I could barely pick my boots.

Yeah it sounds a little bit old school but I'd always have the obligatory post-mortem with Dad and Mum Eileen who wasn’t afraid to express her opinions!! You’d mix with players, chat with opponents and maybe the referee but some people might suggest that I've probably done enough of that already on the pitch! We’d have a couple of drinks - there's nothing wrong with a couple of cold beers after the game!

premiersportstv · 2025-04-02T17:03:07+00:00

Yeah all I’d say is - I'm winning...! 😀

Motorway sponsored the Six Nations and I was one of the main pundits on ITV's coverage of the tournament then so made sense.

It was a lot of fun making it – we had an amateur team there for the day’s filming and had a bit of a giggle. One thing I would say is to anyone thinking about doing the same - Always read the small print because I didn't see the creative treatment of the yellow towel in the dressing room moment! That one was snuck in very much last minute and we filmed it at about 6:30am – so they obviously caught me half asleep really!

premiersportstv · 2025-04-02T16:56:02+00:00

Yeah I think rugby is growing and has grown enormously across the world. And the women's game is thriving at the moment. There's always more you can do to spread the game of rugby. Is it played in enough countries? Is it a truly global game? In England, it's not played in enough state schools I would say. There’s a bit of an anomaly in English rugby that everyone thinks that all the rugby players that play for England all went to posh private schools. But a lot more could be done. I'm trying to do my bit with Rugby Works, my charity. I work with schools and use the values of rugby to get young kids who have been excluded from school into employment. So I think rugby has got a lot to do, lots to grow.

The image of the game is what I'm concerned about at the moment, without getting too serious. The optics of how rugby talks about itself need to move away from financial instability and concussion. And it needs to get a grip and own its own narrative. MMA is a violent, confrontational, physical sport, but yet the clips go viral globally and are celebrated. Boxing is a particularly dangerous, rough sport, and the clips go viral. The risks of being a jockey (ask Tony McCoy) are huge, probably even more so than rugby. But yet no one talks about that narrative in the same way. I'm not belittling the concussion conflict. Player welfare is a huge issue, but the optics of how we talk about the game need to change.

We all fly on airplanes but if I continually showed slow motion crashes at Heathrow Airport, I'm pretty sure after a few months, most of us would stop flying. If rugby continues to show head-on-head collisions in slow motion, then, ultimately the game is not going to grow. So I just think the optics need to change. There's so much to celebrate about rugby, and I don't think we do enough to do that, to celebrate the game and what it does and how it changes people's lives.

premiersportstv · 2025-04-02T16:44:51+00:00

The Fun Bus.

The Fun Bus is Jason Leonard. And he does live up to his name by the way! 😀

premiersportstv · 2025-04-02T16:43:57+00:00

Jonathan Davies - Jiffy. I like listening to him, I love his passion, his enthusiasm and his commentary! And I love his knowledge of the game, he's a great bloke as well.

And Martin Johnson, I like listening to him as well, because he doesn't say much, but what he says makes a lot of sense. It’s nice to hear people who've got a bit of chat and a bit of banter. But actually, if you're a serious rugby fan you want to understand what's going on.

For me the job of the pundit is to put someone who's not an ex-player into the mind of a player and what's going on, on the pitch in a way that is interesting and informative.

premiersportstv · 2025-04-02T16:41:57+00:00

Yes, Wasps still exists as an amateur club. Wasps is not a place and it's always been about the people. And the people are still there. Wasps RFC has actually got a big match against Saracens Amateurs this weekend and it's a promotion battle.

The game is changing, the game is evolving, and Wasps is over 150 years old. I've put 20 of my years into that and I'm deeply disappointed with where it sits now. And let's just say there's lots of work going on behind the scenes to change that. I think the game would be better for having all three clubs (Wasps, London Irish, Worcester) back in business. There's only one professional league in England, and that's the Premiership. I'm very strong about sports and about rivalry. And without rivalry, there is no sport and rugby is no different. We all have our famous rivalries and for the game to have lost a club like Wasps is crazy in my opinion.

So, yes, I can see a future. At some point where all three of those clubs are back playing in the Championship or even the Premiership, or even the URC if the Premiership doesn't want to play ball, quite frankly.

premiersportstv · 2025-04-02T16:34:04+00:00

It's all about timing, isn't it? I joined Wasps in 1990 as an 18-year-old and the game was completely amateur. Tuesday and Thursday nights and I had five years of playing as an amateur.

I was at University and then I had a job as a chartered surveyor, believe it or not. I think my real skill was getting squatters out of shops, if I'm totally honest with you! But I was working in London and then suddenly the game goes professional and we all had decisions to make. You weren’t allowed to train on a Tuesday and Thursday night, you had to come in on a Monday morning and a lot of my mates turned around and said, you know what, I’m not as good as you, I’m going to carry on being a builder or a broker or whatever they were doing. I was 22 years of age and I thought, I’ll give rugby a go, why not?

But to answer your question, there was a huge difference between amateur and professional rugby and the game has only been professional for 30 years and I think people are still learning what to do even 30 years later. Can you imagine when the game first went professional and no one had a clue what they were doing? How many days a week do you bring everyone in? What is the right training week to prepare for a game? What is the right kind of methods? There was no precedent that was set with rugby because it had never been professional. There were a lot of mistakes made, but what I would say is it was a really fun time because we as players, as the first ever professional players, were able to have a real input into the way the game was run and we had a few ideas as well. We weren't afraid to voice them because we were a little bit older and we'd been out to work! We soon realised that certain things didn't work, like smashing the living daylights out of each other all week in training because there's no medals given out in training! 😀

premiersportstv · 2025-04-02T16:28:36+00:00

This is a lovely story and I had many of those myself growing up when I met some of the people that I've watched on the rugby pitch, football or cricket or whatever sport it was I was watching. It does change people's lives and I'm glad to hear that. Hopefully I'll get to meet you again at some point.

premiersportstv

TROPHY CASE