My Hedkayse journey…..

As a player I was lucky enough to win four Premiership titles and two European Cups with Leicester Tigers, a Premiership title with Newcastle Falcons, play 19 times for England and tour with the British and Irish Lions squad that defeated South Africa 2-1 in 1997. 

Being part of playing groups with a shared purpose was an incredible period of my life, only topped by being alongside my wife at the births of our three children.  

At Leicester we prided ourselves on kicking seven shades out of each other at training - and it worked too, we had a pretty awesome record.

But the evidence we got it wrong is starting to mount, and I have numerous teammates suffering life changing consequences from repeated concussions including depression and memory loss.

That’s something I find very difficult because I was Leicester’s elected player welfare rep at the time, and it feels like I let them down.

It’s the way it was. I can accept that. What I can’t accept is that we don’t learn the lessons and make our game safer going forward so it’s sustainable.

Discovering Hedkayse and sharing the desire they have, not only to better protect people, but also their absolute focus on the importance of concussion education is  inspiring.

I feel really energised and like I’m in the right place again. It’s great to be part of a group with a shared purpose to innovate, educate and protect, so we can learn from the past and make the game safer for future generations.