The last time we saw Austin Healey he was topless. His dream of ballroom glory in the 2008 series of Strictly Come Dancing was in tatters, along with the hairstyle of his professional dancing partner, two hanks of which (artificial, blessedly) had become detached during a vigorous but ultimately disappointing salsa. “Hair loss,” the former England rugby union player must have been thinking, ruefully. “If it’s not my own, it’s somebody else’s…”
Yet he was proud. The shirt had come off in defiance. The unbowed spirit of the pectorals was there for all to see. The audience was on its feet for the “Leicester Lip”, recognising what he had given across those hectic and oh so hopeful weeks of dancing, and needing no encouragement from Bruce Forsyth to show its appreciation for the plucky, 51-times capped utility back.
Even then, with understandable emotions crowding in, no one in their right mind thought that it would be the last we would see of Healey in the television arena. Sure enough, only three months later, he’s back with his own series, The Big Tackle with Austin Healey.
Name in the title, note. It doesn’t get any bigger than that, surely, for a retired rugby legend, although I suppose it’s only fair to point out at this juncture that the programme is going out on ITV4.
Here’s the deal. Every week Healey visits a rugby club in dire need of repair and attempts to work some transformative magic, based on his years of experience at the highest levels of the game. And Leicester.
In other words, it’s the familiar but reliably enjoyable makeover format, with Healey operating diagnostically across all levels – administrative, tactical, philosophical – as a combination of Sir John Harvey-Jones, Gordon Ramsay and even, when it comes to redecorating the changing-rooms, Laurence Llewelyn-Bowen.
Now, doubtless some hard-to-please viewers will want to pick a fight about qualifications here. On paper, if you were going to select a telegenic former England player with the right kind of knowhow to helm a feel-good turnaround show, the odds are that the first name on your teamsheet would be Matt Dawson. It’s not simply that Dawson, unlike Healey, has a World Cup winner’s medal in his locker. That’s an irrelevance here. It’s more about Dawson being a team captain on A Question of Sport, reaching the final of Strictly Come Dancing (where he only lost out to Mark Ramprakash who is, let’s face it, the Tiger Woods of celebrity ballroom), and lifting silverware in Celebrity Masterchef.
Since then, Dawson, too, has known name-in-the-title glory in Mitch and Matt’s Big Fish, a programme about, er, big fish. And only last weekend the former Northampton player was fronting a documentary on high-endurance running.
Healey wouldn’t be human if he didn’t feel the shadow of Dawson’s magisterial CV looming over him from time to time. Was that what inspired the little dig in episode one of The Big Tackle? Healey, down at the game’s raw end with Bristol Barbarians, contrasted the situation with the pampered life of the international player, with his masseur, his nutritionist and his boot-cleaner. “That was Matt Dawson for me,” Healey added.
But the Lip must know that there is no point letting Dawson’s successful precedent get to him at this stage. There will be plenty of time for medal-waving later. In the meantime, he’s simply got to hunker down and play his own game. And that involves performing the part of a television-assisted Fairy Godmother to a few of rugby’s Cinderellas.
At Barbarians, the changing-rooms were in a terrible state. There were bits of discarded tape on the floor, odd boots and solitary, soiled socks lying around, mud and grime everywhere. Frankly, it looked as if a rugby team had got changed in there.
Healey ordered up a broom, some tins of paint and a few rollers. He then addressed the training regime and the general problems of attitude that had left the Barbarians uncomfortably adrift at the bottom of their table with minus one point. (They were docked a point for failing to get a team out one weekend.) In full motivational speaker mode, and adopting a tactic that rarely fails for Ramsay, Healey went back to basics, defining what rugby was about: fresh ingredients, simply prepared. Hang on, no – that was Ramsay. For Healey it was “pride, passion, respect, camaraderie, but, above all, loads of fun”. (He didn’t mention getting your ear ripped off.)
He also explained, during training, that “if you touch the roof of your mouth with the tip of your tongue, it engages another set of muscles”. Something for all of us to try at home, there.
The result? The Barbarians lost their next game. Not the one after that, though. Magnificent. A few more results like this, and Dawson will be looking over his shoulder.
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