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The moment Nigel Owens knew Jonathan Davies would be 'special'

The now-retired Jonathan Davies in Wales action in 2021 (Photo by Ian Cook/CameraSport via Getty Images)

Retired referee Nigel Owens has paid tribute to Jonathan Davies, the Wales and British and Irish Lions midfielder who announced his retirement as a player earlier this week at the age of 36. The former centre spent 15 seasons with the Scarlets first team and another two at Clermont before deciding to finish up.

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Writing in his weekly walesonline.co.uk column, Owens has now recalled the moment he knew a teenage Davies would be a special player. “At the peak of his powers, he was unstoppable and he will rightly be remembered as one of the greatest Welsh players of his generation,” he suggested.

“Of course, it’s easy to say it now, but there was something about him that made me realise early on that he would go on to be a star. In the mid-2000s, it was part of my role as a professional referee to visit each region and offer my services and expertise if they requested I do so, so I used to go in to see Phil Davies and the Scarlets every Tuesday.

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    “I would go through the penalties they conceded the week before, how they could do better in their next game and discuss what referees would be focused on, it was just things like that, while I would also referee their contact training session that day.

    “There were some big characters in that Scarlets squad, but amongst them all was a baby-faced young man called, as I was soon told, Jonathan Davies.

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    A post shared by Jonathan Davies (@jonfoxdavies)

    “Of course, say that name to anyone in Welsh rugby at that time and they would think only of the all-time great that is ‘Jiffy’. But you could see just from the occasional training session that this youngster had a special talent himself.

    “He was very physical for a kid that was 18 years of age. He was very, very strong and he stood out a bit amongst the rest. It was clear he was very special. It was no surprise to me that he went on to hit the heights that he did.

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    “He was a crucial part of the Scarlets’ success over the years, especially when they won the PRO12 title in 2017, while he also lit up the international stage for Wales and the Lions.

    “In fact, that Lions series in 2017 was when he was at the absolute peak of his powers. He was unstoppable, truly on top of the world and a nightmare for the opposition to deal with.

    “The word ‘legend’ is thrown around too much these days, particularly when a player retires, but in this case it really is justified. ‘Fox’ is truly one of the all-time Welsh greats and I hope that he will be remembered and celebrated for decades to come, just as we do with the icons of the 1970s.”

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    Soliloquin 1 hour ago
    Competing interests and rotated squads: What the 'player welfare summer' is really telling us

    I don’t know the financial story behind the changes that were implemented, but I guess clubs started to lose money, Mourad Boudjellal won it all with Toulon, got tired and wanted to invest in football , the French national team was at its lowest with the QF humiliation in 2015 and the FFR needed to transform the model where no French talent could thrive. Interestingly enough, the JIFF rule came in during the 2009/2010 season, so before the Toulon dynasty, but it was only 40% of the players that to be from trained in French academies. But the crops came a few years later, when they passed it at the current level of 70%.

    Again, I’m not a huge fan of under 18 players being scouted and signed. I’d rather have French clubs create sub-academies in French territories like Wallis and Futuna, New Caledonia and other places that are culturally closer to RU and geographically closer to rugby lands. Mauvaka, Moefana, Taofifenua bros, Tolofua bros, Falatea - they all came to mainland after starting their rugby adventure back home.

    They’re French, they come from economically struggling areas, and rugby can help locally, instead of lumping foreign talents.

    And even though many national teams benefit from their players training and playing in France, there are cases where they could avoid trying to get them in the French national team (Tatafu).

    In other cases, I feel less shame when the country doesn’t believe in the player like in Meafou’s case.

    And there are players that never consider switching to the French national team like Niniashvili, Merckler or even Capuozzo, who is French and doesn’t really speak Italian.

    We’ll see with Jacques Willis 🥲


    But hey, it’s nothing new to Australia and NZ with PI!

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