After being released by the Waratahs at the end of 2014, Matt Lucas returned to the Intrust Shute Shield looking to fall in love with the game again. In just over 12 months, he led Manly to the a grand final, had a stint in Italy, picked up a Waratahs contract and rediscovered his passion for the game. 

So mate, you picked up a Waratahs contract on the back of a strong Intrust Shute Shield season with Manly. Talk us through the last few months.

Yeah it’s been an interesting few months. I briefly headed back home to Brisbane (after being released by the Waratahs) at the end of 2014 and then got the opportunity to come back down to Manly and I picked up some work and it just went from there. Really, 2015 was one of the most enjoyable seasons of rugby I’ve ever had. I wasn’t involved with a Super Rugby side throughout 2015 so it really made me appreciate why I played rugby and I really began to enjoy it again. Not that I wasn’t enjoying it before, but I probably lost some of the passion for it, so coming back to Manly really helped that. Towards the end of the year, I got the opportunity to rejoin the Waratahs for the next couple of seasons so it was a busy but really rewarding period of my rugby career.

What were your original plans after you were released from the Waratahs at the end of 2014?

There weren’t many plans to be honest. I was heading back to Brisbane to take up a training spot with the Reds and was going to live at home while I trained full time and worked part time. Then I agreed to a little stint in Italy at the end of the 2015 season, so I went back down to Manly to play until I had to head overseas.

What were you doing for work last year in Sydney?

I was just doing a bit of labouring. The club helped me find little bits of work here and there. Before that in Brisbane I was working at a self storage company, so basically I was just working to make ends meet and playing footy on top of that.

Did you ever imagine that you’d be back playing with the Waratahs on a two year deal just 12 months down the track?

I definitely had to reevaluate things, but the goal never changed. I never gave up on it and I knew where I wanted to be and the footy that I wanted to be playing, I just needed to find a different route to get there. When I got released in 2014, I didn’t think there was much I could do about it. I was in a winning team so obviously there weren’t a lot of changes being made so that made it tough, plus I had a few injuries throughout the year. Despite that, the plans never changed. I always knew that I wanted to be back playing at this level, I just realised that it was probably going to take a bit longer then I would have liked.

Tell us about your time in Italy?

I left pretty well straight after the Shute Shield grand final. We played on Saturday and I think I left on the following Wednesday and was there through to Christmas. I was playing for a side called Calvisano (near Milan) and it was a really good experience. It was a completely different brand and style of rugby, plus it was an awesome life experience, living in another country with a foreign language. It was obviously quite different from the type of footy I’d been playing in the Shute Shield. I went from playing an expansive, attacking style of rugby to a set piece focused, forward dominant game. In saying that, I learnt a lot. It was completely different, so I had to develop some new skills to adapt to their style. I enjoyed it a lot, but the opportunity to come back to play with the Waratahs was too good to ignore.

What are the major changes you’ve noticed at the Waratahs since you left in 2014?

Obviously there has been a big turnover of players, particularly after last season. A lot of the older and more experienced guys have moved on and have been replaced by some young guys out of the Shute Shield, so we’ve got a younger squad that is really competitive. A lot of boys are competing for spots that had been locked down by the older guys for quite a while, so the energy at training is great.

With Genia, White and McKibbin all overseas there is an exciting opportunity for the young halfbacks in Australia. What are you looking to achieve in the next few years?

Yeah a lot of spots inside Australia have opened up and it’s always been a dream of mine to one day play for the Wallabies and that hasn’t changed. In saying that, at the moment I’ve got Nick Phipps in front of me here who is playing some of the best footy of his life at the moment, so I’m just focussed on contributing to the squad and continuing to improve. I’ve got some short term goals and things I want to achieve, so if I can do that then anything could happen in the future.

How are Manly looking this year?

We lost a fair few guys on the back of a good season last year, but there are lots of good young players coming through colts at the club so that will help. Damien Cummins had a great first year as coach and he will keep improving, so hopefully that core group of players stay on the field and have another good year.

This interview was conducted as part of a collaboration between Rugby News and The Rugby Union Players’ Association (RUPA), designed to help the Australian Rugby public get to know some of the newer professional stars of our game who have graduated from Club Rugby. For more information on RUPA and the services they offer, click here.