Kieran Read

As a number eight.

I was only just, I was probably only just started, you know, being the starting number eight, maybe a game or so before, and then suddenly you're calling the line-outs.

Yeah.

Uh, for the team and, but yeah, it was right in my wheelhouse.

It was kind of perfect for me.

I think I was confident.

I was confident in my ability to influence the team as a number eight.

I'd been starting there for a few years.

Then the week before the tournament, I do some dysmosis in my ankle and brizzy.

Brisbane, we lost to Australia.

15, 20 minutes in, I get caught in the back of the ruck and do my ankle.

Deb puts a plaster cast on it.

I'm in all sorts that night, thinking the worst.

Next morning, whole team flies to Auckland for the reveal of the World Cup 2011.

I fly to Christchurch to get a scan and to look after it and that.

And then, so yeah, I was like, shit, is this my World Cup done?

Yeah.

Yeah.

So, yeah, I was in a moon boot for the first – well, they kept me on in the squad, obviously.

So I was in a moon boot for the first kind of two games, going to training.