Gareth Ellis - So, it seems I had a story to tell after all!

I was one of those players who initially wasn’t that bothered about writing a book.

I have done now, though, and really enjoyed the experience even though I didn’t think I had much to say.

The majority of sport books I’ve read – not just rugby ones –normally have a bit of a story.

Usually part of that involves doing something wrong in their life – before they realise the error of their ways, come back and turn their lives around!

Yet I didn’t feel I had that story. I don’t have that story! I consider my life to be what I would say as fairly normal so, in terms of writing a book, I’ve never really thought I had a story to tell or one that would be interesting enough for someone else to read.

But I got approached a while back. Dave Howes – my agent –mentioned it to me, and he spoke to a few people and set up some meetings and it was sold to me to sit down with Vince Groak, speak to him a few times, start putting things down and see how it goes.

From speaking to Vince, who’s a Hull and rugby league fan, and seeing how engrossed he was in the conversations, that I thought even though there isn’t much in terms of what I’d consider as sensational, he was engrossed in the story, the thought-process and the mindset around my career.

Almost the narrative of my story is that, yes, I do consider myself to be quite normal, I’ve towed the line and never really got into any trouble but that is what I’ve been about.

Probably what I lacked in talent I had to make up for in hard work and I achieved it that way. There’s been times in my life when I did think maybe I should have been a bit more daring or cut loose more.

But then I think if I had done that, I don’t think I ever would have got to where I did; the raw talent wasn’t there for me – I had to work really hard to get it.

The challenges for me were probably more around the decisions I made in my career: at Wakefield Trinity, Leeds Rhinos, Wests Tigers and now Hull.

When you do get to talking about it, I realised maybe there is something interesting there that people maybe don’t know about me – the reasons behind why I made those decisions – and it’s been quite a good process for me.

I said to my wife Rachel, if anything comes of it, to think you’ve done something in your life that warrants someone to say ‘why don’t you write a book about it?’ then that’s the biggest achievement.

Even if there’s just one book sold and it’s sitting on my shelf, there’s something there that leaves a bit of a legacy whether that’s for my kids Isaac, Eva and Florence to read when they grow up or their kids; they’ll always know something about their dad, their grandad and maybe their great grandad and beyond that.

So, there’s something a bit special about doing it regardless of how successful it is.

I started contemplating writing an autobiogrpahy in 2018. I’d retired and started sitting down and talking about it and it was great to spend some time looking back on my career.

You don’t have time to do that when you’re actually playing; you’re always on to the next game.

It’s been sent off now to be edited and checked. Hopefully it will be out sometime soon.

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