Young Gun: Jean-Baptisite Bruzulier – Worcester scrum-half

Jean-Baptiste Bruzulier gave himself a five-point birthday present on Monday leading Worcester to victory against Northampton in the A-League.
The scrum-half even got on the scoresheet scoring a fine solo-try in the 22-16 win at Sixways. The 22-year-old joined Dean Ryan’s revolution at the Warriors this summer from French outfit Pays d’Aix where he spent the last two seasons.
Facing stiff competition from Jonny Arr and Charlie Mulchrone, Bruzilier aims to keep performing for the Cavaliers in a bid to earn himself a place in the first team squad.
“It was awesome to captain the side and cross for a try on my birthday against a big club like Northampton and it was a statement of our desire to do well,” he told The Rugby Paper.
“The fact our first team is successful is pushing everyone in the squad to train harder because we want to be part of it. I hope I can keep playing well for the A side and maybe get some Championship experience later this year.”
As his name suggests, Bruzulier has French heritage from his dad but he was born in his mother’s native Wales and grew up in Cardiff.
His rugby journey started aged 8 at Llandaff North where he spent seven years while attending Sam Warburton’s old school, Whitchurch. He then joined the Cardiff Blues U16s South and went on to represent Wales U16s.
Two years later, after missing out on the U18s selection while at the Newport-Gwent Dragons, he became a dual-code international jumping on the opportunity to play Rugby League and represent Wales once again at U18 level.
But his Rugby Union career really took off during his year at Filton College in 2011 where he won the Rosslyn Park Sevens alongside Bristol full-back Auguy Slowik and England Sevens player Alex Davis.
After impressing during the Premiership Sevens, Saracens offered him a contract but, although he helped Old Albanians get promotion to National League One, a move to his father’s home country was on the cards.
Turning out in the Pro D2 in the South East of France, Bruzulier caught the eye of neighbours Toulon who were keen to sign him. However his president did not let him go, having a year left in his contract, and he spent last season training with Toulon while playing for Pays d’Aix.
He said: “It was disappointing not to be able to join Toulon but training with them was amazing. When you’re there you don’t really realise because you see all these great players everyday but looking back now it was surreal.
“I trained for hours with Jonny Wilkinson working on my kicking and passing which gave me huge confidence. It was unbelievable to see a player that has won everything be so meticulous and train so hard.
“But in the end, because of changes to the rules regarding academy players, they could not offer me a contract so I decided to come back to England and within a couple of days the deal with Worcester was done.
“Listening to Dean and his project made it so easy for me to sign.”
NICK VERDIER