Old School

On the day that the Six Nations kick off, here is a profile of Andy Ripley, the rugby and Superstars giant of yesteryear who is now going toe to toe with prostate cancer.

"I've had such a privileged life. I did sport when it was a window on a great world but not the only world you inhabited. They wouldn't want me to, but I feel a huge sympathy for professional sportsmen now. It seems such a narrow and narrowing life. It makes them fascists because they're special, they're continually being told they're special and mainly because they are so single-minded they have no room for compassion. They have to be like that because professional sport is about 'one-nil'. All the other stuff is just noise. You've gotta win.

"But I think, 'You're born. You die. And you've got to do all you can in between'." He has. He is. And no one can say more than that.

His life was gentle, and the elements
So mixed in him that nature might stand up
And say to all the world “This was a man.”