It was a bank holiday weekend in 2016 when a giant lump in fancy dress barged into me at the bar of The Ship in Wandsworth. He was dressed head-to-toe as Bane – the super villain from DC Comics – enough to put the frighteners on anybody.
‘You getting the drinks in then?’ he said, pulling down his mask. It turned out to be Joe Marler, the young prop who had forged a particularly frosty relationship with the media during his early years as an England international.
His media sessions were always chippy, his answers short and dismissive.
“How has life been since the 2015 World Cup?”
“Broccoli.” Awkward silence.
After calling time on his career Joe Marler will go down as one of rugby’s most colourful characters
The hulking prop quickly made a name for himself early on with his unique sense of style
But as his career progressed Marler became an outspoken advocate for progressive causes
He was one of life’s non-conformists, with bleached mohawks and rat-tail haircuts.
It was not long after his ‘gipsy boy’ storm with Welsh prop Samson Lee that we drank a few gin-and-tonics by the bar. Marler was the master of putting his foot in it. This time around, he had kicked out at the world but the world had kicked back a hell of a lot harder.
He opened up-about the stress it caused, branded a racist for his misunderstanding of the gipsy history, often entertaining ideas of quitting the sport altogether. Thank God he didn’t.
We swapped numbers and randomly engaged in a long-running game of Words with Friends – the digital equivalent of Scrabble – as he gradually let his guard down.
Over time, Marler became rugby’s leading advocate for mental health. He broke down the sport’s traditional barriers around toxic masculinity, taking a stand against Israel Folau’s views on homosexuality.
‘I didn’t want my struggles with mental health to provide the opposition with an advantage so early on I tried to become this fake tough guy,’ he told me over a coffee at his house during the covid lockdown.
The 34-year-old has made the decision to step away from sport while being five short of a century of England caps
A one-club man, Marler twice won the Premiership with Harlequins and was a three-time Six Nations winner with England
‘I made a thing out of telling people to p*** off. The scary haircuts and everything else were just part of this persona of, “F*** you lot, I’m all right, I don’t cry, I don’t kiss or cuddle”.
‘I was driving to work every morning, putting the radio on and crying. Everyone has some form of sadness, don’t they? Just to varying degrees. You shouldn’t be worried to say so if you’re feeling a bit s***. That’s the stigma we need to get rid of.’
He discussed his use of anti-depressants and changed the narrative within the dressing room. His words have been just as valuable as his dominant scrummaging displays.
These are the sort of tributes usually saved for a player’s 100th cap but Marler announced his on Sunday morning, five short of his century.
As I scrolled through our WhatsApp history before sending him a message of well-wishes, I was reminded of the time he dressed as a Disney princess. The photograph ended up being printed head-to-toe in the Mail on Sunday. A flash of colour in an often-bland sporting world.
Our last meeting was in Tokyo this summer, when we spent a couple of days exploring the city’s ninja schools and pig cafes. ‘I once had an MRI scan in the same machines they use for the animals at London Zoo,’ he said, always full of surprises.
His retirement on Sunday seemed less of a surprise. At 34, he is in the final year of his contract at Harlequins and a new generation is coming through on the international front.
But even after so many years in the spotlight, his penchant for putting his foot in his mouth hasn’t deserted him – as evidenced by his recent Haka comments
He has bowed out true to style, putting his foot in it with his comments about the Haka last week. Marler was never going to go quietly.
‘Alright cheese tits,’ he answered when I phoned him on Sunday morning to offer my congratulations. He happened to be standing on the sidelines watching his son play football in Eastbourne, finally content with his decision to step into the next chapter of his life.
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