Phillips: How it all turned sour between Gats and me after we'd had so much success
| Published date | 18 October 2021 |
| Publication title | Daily Post - North Wales Edition (Wales) |
Here, in the first of three days of must-read extracts, fans' favourite Phillips candidly reveals how he badly fell out with Warren Gatland, despite the two men achieving so much together in the early days.
This is a story of dressing room honesty from a man right at the centre of everything with Wales and the Lions and who has seen the highs and the lows.
PHILLIPS WAS PART OF THE SUCCESSFUL LIONS CLASS OF 2013 UNDER GATLAND, BUT FELT THE RAPPORT WITH HIM AND ROB HOWLEY WAS BEGINNING TO FALTER DURING THAT TRIP TO AUSTRALIA. THINGS THEN STARTED TO COME TO A HEAD DURING THE FOLLOWING YEAR'S SIX NATIONS, BEFORE AND AFTER A 26-3 THRASHING IN IRELAND.
AFTER the way Warren Gatland was with me on the Lions tour in 2013, I began to suspect that things might also now be different when he returned as Wales boss. I was right to be suspicious.
The build-up to the Ireland game didn't exactly go too smoothly for me.
A few days before, I was doing bench press in the gym. As I've gone to push out a rep, I felt my pectoral muscle pull. After that, I spent a lot of the week training on my own and I would only join up with the boys for the light stuf. f.
I should have probably put my hand up and said I wasn't right but I dug in. I didn't play well, the pack got dominated, it was a wet day, they kicked well and strangled us a bit.
The morning after I got into a bit of a barney with Gethin Jenkins. It all went back to the build-up in the week. On the Thursday, I joined up with the boys for a bit of a team run and it was a poor session. Balls were being dropped, we weren't slick at all.
Heads were down, it was just one of those days when everyone was five percent off it. Gethin has a bit of a go, trying to spark something: "The standards today have not been good enough. We've got a huge game away from home coming up against a top class side. Get your heads on!"
" But, to be honest, it felt to me like he was aiming some of it specfically at me. In the back of my mind, I'm thinking: 'Hang on mate, I'm digging in here.' I was really trying to push the pain of my pectoral injury to the back of my mind and do my best for the team, so that annoyed me.
In truth, Gethin was well within his rights to have a go and you need the experienced players to do that if sessions are going poorly. I just took it personally because the injury was messing with my head.
Then after the match we were told to drink in the hotel but about 10 of us ventured out into Dublin. That had started to get on my nerves as well, it felt like we were being treated like schoolchildren and by now I was in my 30s.
It felt like there was no respect any more and if you keep people penned in, that's when it can kick of. f.
Anyway, the morning after the Ireland game I was a bit worse for wear. I saw Gethin on a laptop in the team room and I said to him: "What are you looking at there Geth, all the penalties you gave away yesterday is it?"
Apparently, it was too soon for jokes.
He was not best pleased and got up in my face: "Right. Outside. Now."
Obviously we didn't go outside and I didn't have any dramas with him. He's an absolute legend, one of Wales' greatest players and there was no bad blood. Emotions were just running a little bit high after the previous day's defeat.
The coaches made a bigger deal out of it though. Gats didn't like it. Keep in mind this was the same guy who let Gav (Henson) leave a World Cup training camp to film his own reality TV show but now he wanted to make a fuss about this?
He was believing his own hype by this point and I think he wanted to show me who was boss. Either way, it didn't really help my cause going forward. I got quite...
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