Graham Rowntree

Graham Rowntree
Full name Graham Christopher Rowntree
Date of birth 18 April 1971
Place of birth Stockton-on-Tees, England
Height 6 ft 0 in (1.83 m)
Weight 17 st 5 lb (110 kg)
School John Cleveland College
Rugby union career
Playing career
Position Prop
Professional / senior clubs
Years Club / team Caps (points)
1990–2007 Leicester Tigers 398 (82)
correct as of 2014-06-22.
National team(s)
Years Club / team Caps (points)
1995–2006
1997, 2005		 England
British and Irish Lions		 54
2		 (0)
(0)
correct as of 8 January 2008.
Coaching career
Years Club / team
2007-present
2006–2007		 England (asst.)
Leicester Tigers (asst.)
correct as of 8 January 2008.
Rugby union career

Graham Christopher Rowntree (born 18 April 1971)[1] is a former English rugby union player. He played loosehead prop for Leicester Tigers and England. He was capped 54 times for England, despite having to compete for his position with the world's second most capped forward, Jason Leonard.

Rowntree was born in Stockton-on-Tees. He was educated at John Cleveland College, Hinckley, Leicestershire, which has also produced other rugby union players.

In 1988 he joined Leicester Tigers from Nuneaton and made his first-team debut against Oxford University in 1990. For much of that time he was in harness with the famous ‘ABC club’ alongside Richard Cockerill and Darren Garforth. At Leicester Rowntree enjoyed great domestic success, and started both the 2001[2] and 2002[3] Heineken Cup finals.

In 1993 he made his England A, Barbarians and Midlands debuts, and on 18 March 1995 he gained his first full England cap against Scotland in the Five Nations tournament as a temporary replacement for Jason Leonard. He subsequently played in the 1995 Rugby World Cup. He also made the 1997 British Lions tour to South Africa, playing 6 games and the 1999 Rugby World Cup.

After the 1999 World Cup Graham was not capped for almost 2 years until a series of fine performances for his club forced him back into international contention. He was prominent throughout the pre-2003 Rugby World Cup years. He was selected for the England squad to tour Canada and the US in 2001, participated in all that season's Autumn internationals — being named as man of the match in England's 21–15 Cook Cup victory over Australia — and started in each of the 2002 Six Nations games. He started in England's 15–13 win over New Zealand in Wellington in 2003 and put in a particularly memorable performance against the All Blacks when England's pack was reduced to just 6 men. Despite playing in the 2003 pre-World Cup trial match in France, Rowntree was omitted from Clive Woodward's squad, which won the tournament. Clive Woodward admitted that leaving Rowntree behind was one of the hardest decisions he had to make in his time as England head coach.

Rowntree returned to the England side in the 2004 Six Nations and was the first-choice loosehead prop for the 2004 Autumn internationals.

Notes

  1. ↑ Graham Rowntree player profile ESPN Scrum.com
  2. ↑ "European glory seals Leicester treble". BBC. 19 May 2001. Retrieved 7 September 2014.
  3. ↑ "Tigers retain European Cup". BBC. 25 May 2002. Retrieved 7 September 2014.

External links