Not everyone is fortunate enough to fulfil their childhood dreams, but that’s precisely what Michael Owen has done.
“When I was a kid, I would have said I wanted to play rugby for Wales, be a PE teacher and be a commentator on rugby. And I’ve been lucky enough to do all three,” he says.
“I was quite young when that was my ambition. I was probably something like nine. It’s crazy really to think about.”
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He has actually surpassed those goals, not only playing for Wales, but captaining them to a Grand Slam and also skippering the British & Irish Lions, while his teaching career has seen him progress to the role of Director of Rugby at Haileybury College in Hertfordshire. A father-of-three, he’s also blessed with a happy family life, so it’s a very contented man I catch up with to reflect on his journey so far.
It was always likely that Owen was going to forge a path in rugby, with his father Colin having been a second row for Pontypridd and Pontypool, to mention a couple of his teams. “He’s got a list of clubs longer than your arm.”
Brought up in Church Village, young Michael followed in the footsteps of his elder brother David by joining Beddau RFC, taking up the sport at the age of six, then going on to attend Bryn Celynnog Comprehensive, a real breeding ground for future internationals, where a certain Gethin Jenkins was in the same school year.
“My mother collected loads of scrapbooks of cuttings from my rugby. She passed away in 2014, so we got those books for my kids to have a look at. It’s extraordinary to see the experiences I had as a kid,” he says.
“I played for Ponty Schools U11s and we got to the DC Thomas Cup final. So we got to play at the Millennium Stadium in a curtain-raiser for the Welsh Cup final. That’s an amazing thing to do as an 11-year-old. It was just an unbelievable experience and it really captured my imagination.
“The other that sticks in my mind is at Bryn Celynnog they had the pictures of all the Wales rugby players the school had produced up on wall, the likes of Neil Jenkins, Paul John, Greg Prosser, Andrew Lamerton, Chris Bridges. So that was something to aspire to. It helps you to have that dream. They were all heroes to me, people I used to look up to, and I was lucky enough to go on to play with most of those guys.”
Progressing to Pontypridd Youth, with whom he won Welsh Cup, Owen marked himself out as an obvious talent with his size and athleticism at No 8, earning a Wales call-up for the U19s World Cup in March 1999. A team that also featured Rhys Williams, Ceri Sweeney, Jamie Robinson and Dwayne Peel reached the final at Stradey Park where they met a New Zealand XV boasting the likes of Richie McCaw, Jerry Collins, Mils Muliaina, Aaron Mauger and Tony Woodcock!
“That was an unbelievable experience. The crowds just got bigger and bigger as the tournament went on and Stradey was sold out for the final. We were staying in a hotel in Cardiff, we were in the papers, it was a pretty special time.”
Then came the step up to senior rugby with Pontypridd.
“I was 18 and I think it was the most nervous I have ever been going into a changing room. They had such a fierce reputation and a lot of them were my heroes growing up. But they were all, to a man, unbelievable to me. They were just really encouraging and kind and looked out for you. It was brilliant. They were top class.
“I felt at home pretty much straight away. You would play touch at the start of a session and Neil Eynon used to commentate as we were playing and give people nicknames. He called me the Broon from Troon after Peter Brown, the Scotland No 8. It was just funny and I settled in really quickly. It was a great group of people.”
Owen soon established himself as a key member of the Ponty set-up and really started to catch the eye, particularly with the ball-handling that was to become very much his trademark. Looking back, where does he think that ability came from?
“It’s probably a combination of factors. We used to play a lot of touch rugby in the street when I was a kid. After a Wales game, you would go out and try and recreate the match, so that you were playing for Wales and winning the game at the end. I used to play a lot of other sports like basketball, cricket and football as well. All of that would contribute to your skills and your vision.
“Plus, at Bryn Celynnog, they had a rule where you could only kick in your own 22. So obviously then you had to chuck the ball around and offload and I think that really helped me develop my skill set. With the environment I was in over the years, I was encouraged to take chances and not be too afraid of the consequences.”
Having dreamed of playing for Wales as a kid, Owen was to do it for real in June 2002, when his fine club form was rewarded as he made his Test debut on the blindside flank against South Africa in Bloemfontein, becoming the 1000th Welsh international.
“I was given the jersey in the presentation the day before and I can remember going back to my hotel room, putting it down on the bed and just thinking ‘Flipping heck, that’s awesome’. I didn’t care about having a second cap. It was just like ‘Wow, I have got that, I have achieved my ambition’. It was my dream, so it was amazing.”
But a second cap was to follow along with many others, 41 in all. He looks back on 2004 as his real breakthrough year with Wales, which was also the year in which Mike Ruddock took over as head coach.
“Mike had taken me to the Dragons. He had a load of faith in me and really believed in me and backed me. That makes a massive difference. He played me all the time and gave me loads of confidence. Him going into Wales was fantastic for me.”
Under Ruddock, Owen was to become a key figure in the team that went on to win the 2005 Grand Slam - a first in 27 years. His footballing ability at the base of the scrum was crucial to the free-wheeling Welsh game-plan, while he also took on the captaincy after Gareth Thomas broke his thumb in Paris, with the two of them hoisting the Six Nations trophy aloft together following the Slam-sealing victory over Ireland on that never-to-be-forgotten day in Cardiff.
As he looks back on those heady times, when he was just 24, what memories resonate with him most?
“For me, it was lifting that trophy. It just felt a massive relief after everything that group of players had been through. I remember looking up to my wife, Lucy. She was sat right in front of us. She was pregnant with our second child at the time and I just remember us smiling at each other.
"We’d been together from a young age and she’d sacrificed a lot and been so supportive of me, helping me loads during my career to get to that point. So that was nice.
"There was such a sense of pride and satisfaction. That would be the most special single moment that encapsulated it. It had been such a big journey to get there.
“One of my other favourite moments was actually the training session the day before the Ireland game. We had the biggest match of our lives coming up. It was massive, but we had one of the most fun, relaxed training sessions ever. We just played a bit of touch.
"We had hit a bit of a sweet spot where we had worked hard and prepared well, but we had that fun element as well. That summed up how we were all together, just having a good time during that campaign. Personally, I was confident and felt I was playing well and an important part of the team.
“When you look back at the pictures of the Ireland game and see the supporters, it’s extraordinary, the scenes that were unfolding in Cardiff and around the whole country. There was such a sense of occasion. It just felt like a very special day.
“When it came to giving the team talk, that wasn’t a problem for me. I always had stuff to say anyhow, so it was like an extension of that. I remember saying how it was an amazing opportunity and for us not to let ourselves down.
“We had come a long way as a group, put in a lot of work and it was just a case of making sure we didn’t have any regrets. It was pretty much as simple as that. They showed the game on TV during lockdown. I sat back and watched it and just felt chuffed at having been part of it.
“When Phil Bennett passed away last month, it got me thinking back to when I met him at a dinner at Beddau Rugby Club not that long after that 2005 Six Nations. I remember him saying ‘I can’t believe it’s 27 years since we won the Grand Slam’. You could see then how amazing it was and how much it meant to people. It’s nice to have those memories.”
Having had a such an outstanding Championship campaign, Owen appeared to be the frontrunner to be the Test No 8 for the Lions on that summer’s tour of New Zealand, a feeling reinforced when he was chosen as skipper for the warm-up game against Argentina in Cardiff. But he wasn’t to feature in the series against the All Blacks under Clive Woodward.
“It was an amazing experience to be part of the Lions. It’s an extraordinary thing to be selected and there were loads of positive parts to the tour. I met loads of great people.
“I was disappointed not to get into the Test team because that was what I wanted to do. But I just think it’s different to playing for Wales. It didn’t consume me as much. My big ambition was to play for Wales.”
That’s what he continued to do the following season, but it was to prove a real contrast to the Grand Slam high as Ruddock stepped down as head coach midway through the 2006 Six Nations, amid much rumour, speculation and talk of player power.
Owen found himself caught up in a much talked-about incident in the build up to the coach’s shock departure. That was when skipper Gareth ‘Alfie’ Thomas refused to attend a press conference because a particular journalist was in the room. At that point, Ruddock asked vice-captain Owen if he would step into the breach, which he said he didn’t feel able to do.
“It was a very last minute thing from my point of view. I had to make a decision quickly. I didn’t have loads of time to ruminate about it. You have to do what you think is right at the time.
“I don’t think many people would have gone ‘Ok, I’ll do it’. It was a case of showing solidarity with your team-mates and the group as a whole backing the skipper. I don’t think I’d make a different decision now.
“It certainly didn’t feel as though that was a slight to Mike. That was about the journalist, it wasn’t about Mike. It was a stand against the journalist, not a stand against Mike.”
Wales went on to beat Scotland that weekend, but then just a couple of days later - on St Valentine’s Day - came Ruddock’s bombshell departure.
“I had no sense at all that was coming. It was just a real weird episode. It’s hard to know what to say about it. It was a really strange time. I still don’t know exactly what happened. I certainly don’t feel I contributed to it.
“As a senior player, I would have gone to Mike and spoken to him about the feedback from players about what we would have liked to have done and maybe doing something different in terms of the way we were training and stuff.
"But that’s part of your role as a senior player. You are not there to be passive. There’s always something I would be engaged with the coaches over. My working relationship with Mike was such that I would have done the same with the Dragons. That’s not player-power, that’s just trying to be a good player.
"The contract situation between Mike and the WRU would appear to have been the biggest factor. That’s what I thought then and that’s what I think now. There would have been other factors and pressures, but that would have been the straw that broke the camel’s back, I would think.
“Mike phoned me up at the time and said thank you very much for everything and how he hoped we’d get to work together again. My one regret is I then sat in a press conference and didn’t say about that. I wish I had because it would have sort of absolved me, whereas I felt I ended up with a portion of the blame being apportioned to me.
“I have been in contact with Mike recently in his role with the Ospreys, telling him to keep an eye on various English school games I am involved in. I spoke to him about that and I just said thank you to him really for backing me. He was brilliant for me. He backed me massively and gave me a real licence to express myself.”
Following Ruddock’s departure, Owen found himself in something of a rut.
“I had a bit of a lull in my career. I felt a bit low in confidence and wasn’t quite playing as well as I could. There were maybe a few doubts about me within the Welsh set-up.
“But then I galvanised myself and trained really hard. I got back in a position where I was playing well for the Dragons. I think I played some of my best rugby in 2007 and felt I went really well on the tour of Australia that summer.
“Going to the World Cup I felt really confident and like I could play really well. I was stronger, I was really fit, I was experienced and I knew how to influence a game, but unfortunately I didn’t get the opportunity to start. From Gareth Jenkins’ point of view, I think he thought other people were better long-term bets. So I never got more than about 15 minutes off the bench in that tournament. It was disappointing, but that’s just how it goes.”
As it turned out, Owen’s appearance as a replacement in the defeat to Fiji in Nantes that ended Wales’ World Cup campaign also marked the end of his international career at just 26. He wasn’t to feature at all under new coach Warren Gatland.
“The only time I really heard from him was when he picked Andy Powell in front of me in the autumn of 2008 after I had joined Saracens. I managed to speak to him and he just said Andy had played outstandingly in Europe and that was it then really.
"It just wasn’t to be. You have to pick who you think is best as a coach, but I would have obviously picked myself!”
Owen had a “brilliant” time at Saracens, but was the forced to hang up his boots at the age of 29 in 2010 due to a persistent knee problem after two reconstructions. He tried his hand at punditry work, ticking another box, before completing his wish-list by moving into teaching, first at a school in St Albans and, for the last nine years, at Haileybury College. He’s also taken up the role as Director of Rugby at local club Hertford RFC in level five of the English pyramid.
So as he reflects on it all now, at the age of 41, what are his thoughts?
“When you look back on your career, there are always things. I wish I could have played for another five years and had another 40 caps for Wales and been involved in other Grand Slams. There are always going to be things you regret however successful you are. You are wishing for more all the time.
“But, actually, when I finished, it was like, 'That’s amazing, I am more than happy with that'. If someone had said that to me when I was 18, I would have bitten their hand off. It was just an extraordinary experience and really brilliant.
“You asked me a question at the start of this about what rugby has given me. Rugby has given me an extraordinary amount. It has given me everything I could have ever hoped for. It’s been an amazing life.”
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