[the truth]

An extraordinary human being. When you consider the fact he had serious kidney problems even before and throughout his rugby career and yet still he went on to become the biggest rugby star of all. It seems maoris have a 3.5 higher chance of kidney related illness. He was also from a poor family in a rough neighbourhood and survived being stabbed a few times in his younger days. On the field he was just plain awesome, athletic, powerful, passionate, brave...seeing him perform the haka sent shivers down the spine...He fought on , with the support of his family, running havoc at 99 world cup too and scoring umpteen crucial tries and was generally used as a wrecking ball against all comers....The great van ver vesthuizen was the only player who seemed capable of stopping him.


He later made a few rugby comebacks including a promise he made to his welsh manager to play rugby in Wales. Even after rugby he became a bodybuilder and threw himself into charity work with unicef too. He just seemed like a lovely bloke, humble and polite at all times, with a great family, he handled everything with humility and patience. Absolutely everyone loved him. My own little memory is seeing him around town before Ieuan evans testimonial in his legendary car which supposedly had the loudest car speaker system in new Zealand. He was interviewed at stradey park saying hed come over out of respect for ieuan who hed seen score some beautiful tries in new Zealand with the 93 lions....Then of course the enormous stradey roar that greeted him and greeted the moment a scarlets player Jonathon Griffiths, managed to tackle him lol...
His passing is tragic, but his life was extraordinary and that's what will always be remembered.