After excelling in Bath’s successful U18s side, James Short is hoping to impress the England age grade selectors while performing in BUCS Super Rugby.
The 18-year-old centre, who’s the brother of Hartpury University Championship flanker Harry, was a standout player in Bath U18s’ six-match win streak last term, catching the eye with his strong footwork and quick acceleration which lent itself nicely to the club’s dominant pack.
He said: “When we got our starting team together we just clicked. We found a way of winning and playing a style we were good at which made us hard to beat. To go six for six after Christmas was fantastic and we only lost the first two games before that. We were mainly a maul try team but it was good to be a part of.”
Short was delighted to have a stellar season last year, especially after enduring a torrid time with concussions the season prior during U17s.
He added: “In my first year in U17s I couldn’t play at all because I was concussed for three months which was really frustrating. Rugby is pretty much everything to me and I couldn’t even go to the gym for three months and I still had to go to watch boys play every week which was devastating, thinking that I should be out there but I couldn’t be.”
Short is in his first year at Bath University studying sports performance and made his first appearance in BUCS Super Rugby on Wednesday in a 43-30 defeat away at Loughborough.
He is enjoying balancing his time between Bath and the university and hopes to secure some Premiership Cup minutes at some stage this season.
“Everyone’s pretty welcoming at Bath and the senior players really drive the standards,” said Short. “There’s a real sense of wanting to win which I like, I’ve always been very competitive so that suits me well here. I only started uni this week, so I had been training with the first team beforehand during preseason. I managed to play in a couple of training games against Ospreys and Scarlets which was good to be apart of.”
As well as his setback with concussions during U17s, Short endured the disappointment of missing out on the U18s Six Nations Festival earlier this year and is determined to break into the age grade setup in the short-term.
He said: “I had a bit of hardship with that as well. To not get picked was tough to take but I thought I was going to get called up later on but then I got injured again. It’s still a clear goal of mine to represent England and hopefully by me playing in the Premiership Cup and starting week in week out for Bath Uni I can get the exposure to take me there.”
Short previously attended famous rugby school Beechen Cliff which possesses an impressive alumnus, including the likes of Henry Arundell, Freddie Burns and Billy Burns.
“I was there from year 7 to year 13,” said Short.
“The rugby’s a decent standard in the lower school from year 7-11 but we then get loads of boys coming in from across the country for sixth form for the ACE programme and that’s where it really stepss up. I couldn’t ask for a better programme, we had really goodod fixtures travelling around the south west and played the best teams.
“In my first year we didn’t do that well but when I was in my final year we got to the ACE final against Hartpury, which was live streamed so you couldn’t ask for a better opportunity to showcase what you’re about.”
