Arrogance took over in the autumn admits Billy Vunipola
However, bullocking back rower Vunipola insists he has learned the painful lessons from being dropped and is doing all he can to be in prime form for the Six Nations, in which he aims to win back the shirt from the incumbent Ben Morgan.
Vunipola, who was jettisoned from England’s match- day squad for the last two November matches against Samoa and Australia, told The Rugby Paper: “I fell off the horse a bit, but feel I’m slowly getting back to where I’m supposed to be.
“The autumn was a bit of a shock to me. I’d be sitting up thinking, ‘what’s wrong?’ and go through all the match preparations – things I did, things I might have changed – and then try to change them back, but to be honest I was just struggling.
“I’d crossed the line between confidence and arrogance and had kind of taken my place for granted, thinking there’s no way anybody’s going to stop me from being England’s No.8. And, at the same time, I let go of my Christian faith a little bit.
“That was me being naive, me being inexperienced and it was a very good lesson to be taught early on. I’ve got my faith back to where it was now and started believing in what it tells me again – following God and doing what I do best.”
Vunipola, 22, explains: “My faith’s my biggest thing but I found myself going to church for the wrong reasons. I went because I wanted my rugby to be good, not because I was going there to listen. I was just ticking a box, not hearing the messages.
“I was taking advantage of what I had behind me – the praise and all the adulation you begin to get when things are going really well – but I should have been better than that, my parents taught me better when I was young. I was so naive that I didn’t feel any pressure when things were going well.
“When you get praised you feel everything is good, so the biggest lesson I’ve learnt is how to deal with a downturn in fortunes and I must keep moving forward now.
“Graham Rowntree and the England coaches didn’t get into me too much. The biggest thing was letting me figure it out for myself and those two weeks where I came back to Saracens and was away from the pressure cooker helped me a lot.”
A force of nature at his best, a man-of-the-match display against London Irish last weekend proved Vunipola is back on track.
“I’m just trying to take it step by step at the moment and performing consistently is the biggest thing,” he said. “I’ll know when to pull myself up the next time I cross the line from confidence to arrogance, so hopefully I won’t fall over again.”
Saracens face two huge matches against Munster and Clermont Auvergne over the next fortnight to determine their progress in Europe.
Vunipola was devastated to lose last season’s Heineken Cup final to Toulon and is desperate to make amends in the inaugural Champions Cup.
He added: “It’s a massive fortnight coming up. We had a tough loss to Munster at their place so to get them back here this week is really exciting. Hopefully, we can beat them and then go to Clermont with some confidence for our final game.
“These matches will define our season and we’ll have to win both to earn the right to try and win the competition this year.
“Losing the final to Toulon was hard to take but those experiences, hopefully, will push you on when times are tough. You’ve got to go through the tough times to really appreciate the good ones – and I now know that better than most!”
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