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Titterrell aiming to reignite passion at Leeds
Leeds have enlisted the help of a former British & Irish Lions hooker who is not only aiming to help them climb the Premiership table but who is out to prove a point. Nick Westby reports.
THE start of pre-season was only three weeks away when Andy Titterrell was told he was no longer needed by Gloucester.
The 28-year-old hooker had a year left to run on a three-year deal he signed in 2007, having spent his entire career to that date helping establish Sale Sharks in the Premiership.
He had pledged his future to the Cherry and Whites, taking his heavily pregnant wife out of her comfort zone, for the challenge of progressing his career and building a life in the south-west.
Two years later, his world was turned on its head when Gloucester cited the recession as their reason for releasing him from his contract.
Titterrell, who won the last of his five England caps in the summer he signed for Gloucester and who had represented the British and Irish Lions in New Zealand two years earlier, had initially been told he was surplus to requirements at the end of the 2008-09 season.
But then Dean Ryan was sacked and Titterrell's old team-mate, Bryan Redpath, arrived at Kingsholm with assurances that his future was secure, only to turn round and tell him in mid-July that there was, indeed, no room for him in the budget.
"They left me with no option," said Titterrell yesterday, whose career has been revived by the offer of a three-month contract at Leeds Carnegie.
"Even at Christmas, clubs are setting their budgets for the next season so, just weeks from the start of the season, I was left with nowhere to go.
"It was very stressful for me and my wife; she didn't enjoy going down to the south-west because I'd moved her away when she was eight months pregnant from her network of friends and family.
"I said to Ken Nottage (Gloucester's managing director) 'you can't treat players the way you've treated me'.
"Players go into a new club 100 per cent committed, move their family there and have mortgages to pay. If a club can tear up a contract regardless of the duration, it doesn't paint a very good picture of the club."
Fiji centre Seru Rabeni arrived at Leeds two months ago, having suffered a similar fate at Gloucester, and long before he should be thinking about retirement, Titterrell was at a crossroads in his life.
He had a Premiership winners' medal with Sale and two European Challenge Cups to his name, but was on the scrap-heap.
"I wasn't necessarily worried whether my career was over because I was still asking questions whether I wanted to get back into the sport," said Titterrell. "Over the last couple of seasons, I'd become self-criticial of my performances, asking myself is there a specific reason why I'm not playing?
"There were a lot of those questions when I left Gloucester, and even though it wasn't a rugby matter why I left, you cannot help but think your performances or the way you conducted yourself wasn't how they saw fit.
"I was searching for answers to questions that weren't even there. But the break has done me good. I shut myself off from a few people and explored business ventures – it has allowed me to have a different focus.
"Coming to Leeds is an opportunity to put my marker back down to the guys I'll be playing in front of, proving a point to myself."
The short-term deal at Headingley has offered him a route back into a game he says he hopes to reignite his passion for.
From Leeds' point of view, Titterrell brings invaluable experience and support in a position where they have become vulnerable with only Vili Ma'asi operating at full fitness.
Question marks are always raised about a player's fitness after a lengthy lay-off but he returns to the game leaner and fitter than he has been for a long while after re-dedicating himself to the weights room and his conditioning.
"It's just match fitness now for me but, hopefully, that will be like riding a bike," he added, with Friday's game against Harlequins perhaps coming a little too early for him to get back into the saddle.
"I'd like a full-time contract here. I've re-evaluated what I want out of the sport and that is to try and find that passion I had when I was 19 when I arrived at Sale and they were scratching around at the bottom of the league and I saw something grow.
"There's no reason why that couldn't happen here.
"Where I come in is to ease the pressure on the three hookers, to help get them through the season, bring a little experience, and, after those three months, if Andy and Neil want me to stay then great. If not, there's no ill feelings and I'll shake their hand at the end of it and move on."
Which is the least he would expect of any employer.
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Saturday 26 May 2012
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