Rugby: Hayman keeps options open on Cup role

Carl Hayman. Photo / Getty Images

Carl Hayman says he will think sometime soon about "the option" of returning to New Zealand for the 2011 World Cup.

He deflects claims he broke Australian cricketer David Boon's infamous beer drinking record on a flight home from the last World Cup - and is finding life interesting as captain of a much-changed Newcastle Falcons team.

When he arrived on Tyneside on a reputed £250,000-a-year ($484,000) contract, following the All Blacks' World Cup quarter-final exit to France in October 2007, the farmer's son from Taranaki was seen as the big piece of the jigsaw that might give a trophy-contending look to a team blessed with the backline talents of Mathew Tait, Toby Flood, Jamie Noon, Tom May and Jonny Wilkinson.

Two years on, those home-grown Falcons have flown the nest and Hayman is the cornerstone of a new Newcastle. Over the summer just gone, there were 23 departures from the Kingston Park playing staff.

Among the 17 arrivals were Springbok centre Gcobani Bobo, the London Irish lock James Hudson, the Samoan back-rower Felipo Levi and Jimmy Gopperth, formerly of the Hurricanes and Blues.

As the new captain of the new-look Newcastle, it has been Hayman's task to help Steve Bates, the director of rugby, blend the new blood into a winning mix.

Thus far, it has been more of an evening mix. In the Guinness Premiership the Falcons have drawn against Leeds, Sale and Harlequins and lost away to Leicester (15-9) and at home to Saracens (22-15).

They have won in the European Challenge Cup against Padova and Albi but lined up at Bath overnight without a Premiership victory on the board.

"I've never been involved in a team with so many changes, so it's a new experience for me - especially being captain, having so many new guys and having to gel everyone together as a team. But, in a way, it's fairly exciting because there's no history there, no baggage. It's a whole new group of people, so effectively we can shape it how we want to. Yeah, it's been interesting... but we're getting there."

Hayman hails from Opunake, the Taranaki town that also produced Peter Snell and Graham Mourie. After six years in the All Black pressure cooker, the Kiwi has been savouring the relative anonymity of his life on Tyneside.

"I don't get stopped around town," he says.

"With Newcastle being a football town, rugby's got a lower profile. It's completely different to what you get used to back home. It's quite nice, in a way, just to be able to go about your business."

And yet, with his contract up at the end of the season, surely the 29-year-old will be heading back to the Land of the Long White Cloud (and of the Long Wait for the Webb Ellis Trophy) to be part of the All Black quest to win the World Cup on home soil in 2011?

"I haven't really made any firm decisions," Hayman says.

"At the moment I'm just concentrating on my captaincy role at the Falcons, just pouring my best efforts into getting the team up there in the table. Obviously, there's some stage of the season when I'm going to have to give my future a bit of thought. Going back to New Zealand to play there again is definitely one of the options."

In the meantime, Hayman will continue his captaincy with the kind of pragmatism you might expect of someone whose ultimate professional goal is to maintain the family farming tradition.

After home matches, he insists on taking his players to mingle with the punters in the West Stand bar before they fulfil their obligations with the corporate fraternity upstairs.

On Tuesday and Thursday evenings he can be found coaching the butchers and bakers who turn out for Blyth Rugby Club, members of Durham/Northumberland Second Division.

He draws great inspiration from his sister Rebecca. She was paralysed from the waist down at the age of 21 in a car accident in 2006.

Formerly a talented rugby player, she has since represented her country at wheelchair basketball and is now trying to make the Paralympic grade in the track and field throwing events.

"She's doing well," Hayman says.

"She's enjoying the training and the challenge. It is an inspiration to me. If you see people who haven't been dealt the best sort of cards in life take up challenges, it's an inspiration to anyone."

It took some bottle to tackle Carl Hayman on the Boon-breaking story but, in the interests of nailing the legend the questions had to be asked. So had he ever downed 60 Newcastle Brown?

"Sixty?" he queries. "In one go? No... I'm not sure where you're going here."

The gentle smile suggests otherwise.

On the flight that took the All Blacks home to Christchurch after their quarter-final exit from the 2007 World Cup, Hayman, folklore has it, knocked back 60 cans of lager, breaking the sporting 'world record' set by Boon en route to London from Sydney with the Australian cricket team for the 1989 Ashes.

The Tasmanian, known as "kegs on legs," managed a mere 52.

"Oh, I don't know if it was 60, but it was a fair few," Hayman says, overcome with natural modesty. "You might have to ask Andrew Hore [the All Blacks hooker] when he comes over, because he was sitting with me. I know we sampled a few on the way home. I'm not sure if we got to 60...".

- INDEPENDENT