'I want to get under their skin' - arch-pest Pollock aims for Leinster

BBC News

30-04-2025

Investec Champions Cup semi-final: Leinster v NorthamptonDate: Saturday 3 May Venue: Aviva Stadium, Dublin Kick-off: 17:30 BSTCoverage: Live commentary on BBC Radio 5 Live Sports Extra and BBC Radio Northampton
Courtney Lawes called him a "cocky little" something.Lewis Ludlam's description, external is similarly difficult to print.Maro Itoje opted for "absolutely annoying" and "a pest".And they are Henry Pollock's team-mates.Tommy Freeman, who plays alongside Pollock for England and Northampton, smiles at the inevitable question."What's Henry really like? You can probably guess what he is like..."A lot of people have been asking. Because a lot of people have been watching.It is not just what Pollock has done in the past 12 months - winning the Under-20 World Cup, scoring two tries on his senior England debut, being nominated for the Champions Cup player of the year, preparing to line up against Leinster in Saturday's semi-final and butting into the Lions selection conversation.It is the way he has done it.The 20-year-old back row has swagger and self-possession, and a side order of skulduggery.There has been no dutiful trade-learning and spur-earning.Instead, just prodigious talent, Tigger-ish energy, galloping pace and a presumption that the world is his for the taking.It gets people talking. And has done for a while.Eighteen months ago a video circulated among Bedford's players.They had been told that Pollock, then only 18, was joining them in the Championship on loan."He came with a little bit of a reputation as he was very well thought of by Saints' academy," says Bedford's Alex Woolford."This viral clip of him did the rounds among us. He was being interviewed after an England Under-18 win over South Africa and swore three times in about 10 seconds."We knew he was going to be very enthusiastic."
He was."We were pretty poor in the first half against Ampthill," adds Woolford, remembering Pollock's first start."Henry tried to give us the hairdryer treatment. He was effing and blinding and telling us we were not good enough and I remember thinking 'bloody hell, what is this kid doing?'"But you have to give him credit."In rugby environments it is very easy to get confidence confused with arrogance. For all the stick he gets, I don't actually think he is an arrogant person."
Still, that perception persists.Freeman and Woolford say Pollock is a different, calmer character off the pitch, and his Northampton team-mates assured the rest of the England camp that the incoming youngster wasn't the "idiot" they were expecting., external Their PR work was duly undermined by Pollock gleefully ripping the ball from Ollie Chessum when tasked with holding a tackle shield in an early training drill."Probably some of the boys were quite shocked with how I was when I first joined up with England," Pollock told BBC's Rugby Union Weekly."But I guess over time they realised this is just him."I am quite loud, someone that just brings a different type of energy to other types of players. Whether that is good or bad energy depends who you are talking to."
There are plenty of fans.At Franklin's Gardens kids wear his distinctive black head tape and make cardboard signs asking for Pollock's boots.They love his celebrations. A basketball-style finger-roll lob in the direction of a beaten defender against Castres and an extravagant swallow dive against Bristol were two recent efforts. They love his cunning. Pollock cheekily pulling the sock of Wales prop Gareth Thomas to milk a penalty gained social media traction during the Six Nations.And they love his abrasive style as he goes nose-to-nose with the opposition, raising tempers and the stakes."I want to entertain and get the crowd as close as possible to the team," he told BBC Radio Northampton's Saints Show."When I was growing up there, there was a lack of a idols. There were one or two that stick in my mind - Courtney Lawes, Michael Hooper, Richie McCaw - but not many."For this game to grow and this sport to get bigger, we need more characters, more players the fans want to come and watch."If you look to the football world, fans very much have their players and the personalities they like."
Pollock is harder to warm to when you are up against him.Woolford, Pollock's Bedford team-mate, also faced him in the Blues' annual pre-season fixture against Saints."On the pitch he is very loud, very confrontational, very in-your-face," Woolford remembers."He just exhausts you, as much mentally and emotionally as physically. But he has backed it up at every level he has stepped up to."In the teams' most recent match, one Bedford player attempted to sledge back at Pollock, suggesting he would be back with the Blues on loan by October.Instead, by then, Pollock was a Premiership regular."Being annoying is part of my game," Pollock agrees."I want to wind the opposition up; I want to get under their skin. It is something I relish."This weekend he will be digging into Leinster in a re-run of last season's Champions Cup semi-final.The Irish giants could field back-row trio Caelan Doris, Josh van der Flier and Jack Conan."It is probably one of the best back rows there is," says Pollock. "I am just excited to be able to say I played against them. To share the field with them is special."But the deference won't last past the first whistle."They are beatable," he adds. "We definitely see parts of their game we can attack and go after and hopefully ruffle a few feathers."If Pollock's streak of success extends to the Aviva Stadium and his final and toughest Lions audition, he could well make the squad cut five days later."I have heard the rumours and stuff, but as a player you can't control that," he says."I just have to keep playing well, and if it happens, it happens."So far in his career, things invariably do.