Interview by Scott Ingleton
Current Gloucester star and Italy international gave RugbyPirates an interview. Here, you’ll find insights into what led him to rugby, his Italian roots, the difficult choice between national sides, and how one man’s comments helped give him the drive to become one of the most exciting flankers to currently grace the game.
Starting with his rugby roots, we asked him how he found rugby, how he got into the game and where his influences lay;
- My father captained Bristol back in the day, before all these health and safety rules came in, and I think he reached something around 500 caps. Considering the conditions, I think that’s incredible. He always drove us towards rugby (literally, he was our taxi driver!) and I definitely caught his love of the game.
But was it always rugby, or was there some other sport that took Jake’s eye?
- I was into football, cricket and hockey, but I always saw them as extra training for rugby. In football, you have to be agile. In cricket, you have to be quick and have great reactions, and in hockey you have to be tough. Put them together and you get a pretty well rounded rugby player, plus playing actual rugby of course! I took them all fairly seriously, but always because I knew it would help how I played rugby.
On a personal note, while I love rugby now back at school my main love was basketball, as I’m pretty tall. Considering Jake is around a daunting 1.9m (6” 2), we wondered whether he had always been a bigger gentleman.
- No, in fact back at Bristol academy I was quite small. They kicked me out because they didn’t think I’d make it in rugby due to my size – not the academy as such, but just one guy. Flankers obviously tend to be larger and there I was, a bit over five foot (~1.6m), but I knew what I was doing, I trained very hard and I was determined to show what I could do. A lot of my early success I attribute to proving him wrong, just that one guy, and showing him what a mistake he made in letting me go. I like to think I’ve shown him that now!
We wholeheartedly agreed that Jake has proven his worth time and again. Considering that role at flanker, we asked if Jake had any special bonds in the Italian camp, particularly with other back rowers such as Sergio Parisse or Sebastien Negri, and how different it is going from an English background to the Italian National Team.
- Well, my Nan, who is 92 and can barely speak at the best of times, can’t speak English, so I grew up with some Italian influence. But other than my grandparents my upbringing has been very English, and there was certainly a bit of a culture shock. The missus and I are currently taking Italian lessons, but we haven’t even started the past tense yet! But moving on yes, I definitely have a bond with Seb. We actually met when we played together for Hartpury College; he was studying at the University whereas I was just playing for the team, and we really hit it off. He was part of the reason why I ended up playing for the Italian U20s, and again when I decided to join the Italian senior team. With Seb being from Zimbabwe it was nice to be able to talk easily with someone in camp, and of course Sergio always comes over to ensure we understood everything, although he does want us to speak Italian when we can!
Completely understandable, it is a very hard language to learn (coming from a fellow Englishman currently trying to learn Italian). Speaking of the national team, we then asked Jake whether he was approached by the English RFU at all, and whether he had to choose between the two Unions.
- It was Conor O’Shea who approached me when I was with Gloucester. He was in England for something to do with referees I think and he called me up and asked to meet. He pitched me his idea for the Italian team and I was swayed, I liked his ideas, but of course the idea of playing for England was also on my mind. After he left, I had a really hard decision to make. I ended up speaking to my dad and, after a lot of thought, I went with Italy. I wanted to play International level rugby, and it was either go with Italy now or wait and risk never being picked by England. If I could go back though, I’d definitely make the exact same choice, I have no regrets.
We of course agreed that Italy has plenty of potential, we all saw that in the dominant displays against Canada and Namibia. We actually wondered if Jake considered his Man of the Match performance against Canada to be one of his best performance to date.
- Yes, I would consider that one of my best so far. The whole World Cup was an incredible experience, except for the red card of course. Silly decisions like those really cost us against South Africa and that was hard to take, we knew we were better than that.
We agreed that it’s definitely been an undesirable aspect of Italian rugby over the past few decades, that in big games the pressure got to the players and silly mistakes were made. However, it is something we have noticed is disappearing from the Italian game, and we had to ask Jake if he thought that was O’Sheas influence in the team.
- He has definitely had an impact since arriving, if these errors are disappearing as you say. He’s helping us become better, smarter rugby players. I was disappointed when we found out he’d resigned, but it wasn’t that unexpected, his contract was almost up after all. Plus he has his kids and family elsewhere, his choice is completely understandable.
Of course, when you have a family you have to choose your priorities. We here are hoping Franco Smith will be an effective interim coach. But we had to ask what the feeling in the Italian camp was after the World Cup, and of course after the disappointing news that the New Zealand match was cancelled.
- After the World Cup we felt very optimistic. Two wins out of three was a good way to finish, though of course we were very frustrated at the New Zealand match being cancelled. I felt bad for Sergio [Parisse] and Leo [Ghiraldini] as for them, it would’ve been a fantastic way to retire from International rugby. I think Sergio had a point, if New Zealand needed to win then would the match of been cancelled? Who knows. But the main thing is we went to the World Cup not to be the team everyone thinks can just walk over, and I think we proved that. With the change in coaching staff none of us expect to win every six nations match next year, but you never know what can happen.
With that optimistic thought we brought the interview to the end. We wish all the best to Polledri in his efforts at Gloucester and for the Italian national team, and the upcoming Six Nations will be fascinating. Forza Italia!