Josh McNally views his move to Cardiff as the perfect outcome after contemplating for a time that his rugby career may be over.
McNally’s five years at Bath came to an end last month when his contract wasn’t renewed and a return to full-time duty with RAF was one of the options available to him.
The towering 6’9 lock has been on an elite sports programme with the RAF for the past 10 years, which has allowed him to play professional whilst still being a member of the Armed Forces.
And thankfully that arrangement can now continue after he penned a two-year deal with Wales’ capital club, allowing him to combine the best of both worlds.
As far as the 33-year-old is concerned, it is a move that ticks all the boxes. McNally won’t have to uproot his family from Bath, whilst he sees the chance to spread his wings and play league rugby outside of England for the first time as another added benefit. “We are not really at the stage of our lives where we can pick up and move anywhere so when Cardiff came asking it was a bit of a no-brainer really because it means we can keep our life pretty much as it is, in Bath. My commute will just go up from 20 minutes to just over an hour,” he said.
“I understood my time at Bath was probably coming to an end and we looked around and opened ourselves up to anything really because you don’t know until something is slapped in front of you what is possible, and there were other opportunities out there. But it wasn’t going to work for us as a family.
“I’ve seen a lot of players who have tried to keep going for another year while being away from their family, and you have to think is rugby worth that. We are a really close family and I don’t want to be away from the kids at the age they are (six and one).
“I always knew I could go back to the RAF, and I was excited to do that if it was going to be the next chapter for me. But, thankfully, this opportunity with Cardiff came up, which I am also excited about because I feel I have a lot more to give.”
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Having played seven seasons of Premiership rugby, at London Irish and Bath, where he was captain during their darkest days, and a stint in the Championship with London Welsh, McNally has built up a wealth of experience.
Two of his previous clubs have gone bust, and he was at Welsh when they announced they were going into liquidation, so he has experienced most of what professional rugby has to offer, good and bad.
McNally feels that he, along with other stalwarts such as Taulupe Faletau and fellow new signing Callum Sheedy, can help Cardiff bring through the next generation of talent at the Arms Park.
“From talking to Jockey (head coach Matt Sherratt), he knows he has young Welsh raw talent – the players that could go on to become 50-60 cap internationals, the young guys who could take Welsh rugby on. But they just lacked a bit of leadership after losing a lot of players over the last two years. Hopefully, signing a bit of outside experience will help bring that group on, and I’d like to think I can add some value and help to drive the club in the right direction.
“Last season’s results probably didn’t go their way but you could really see they were building a brand of rugby. The foundations are there for them to really kick on.
“Will I be there when they are winning the URC in a few years? Maybe not. But hopefully I can go in and add more and more as the year goes on and develop some guys and contribute to the success of the future.”
McNally’s first commute as a Cardiff player begins tomorrow after the Welsh club honoured his five-week rest period.
“I was in a position 3-4 months ago where thinking rugby was probably going to come to an end, and you start thinking about what life will look like away from rugby. And then I get this opportunity to play in a completely different league. I am actually really excited by that because all of my rugby up until now has been played in England,” he said.
While sad that his time at Bath, the rugby club, has come to an end, McNally is glad he can still call the city home and wishes his former employers no ill will, despite being let go.
“I’ve been at clubs where players are moving on and it is almost becomes a situation where they want the club to fail and don’t want anything to do with the club, and I have vowed that I never want to be that player. I can vouch for myself that, 99.9% of the time, I am not that player.
“You don’t doubt for a second that I wanted to be a part of that squad that went on that final run of games, but there was a role to be had, the group that wasn’t playing was just as important as the guys that were playing. We took it upon ourselves that we were Sale for a week, or Northampton for a week, we turned up and prepped and we got some recognition from the whole group.
“All you want is for the club to be successful, I was captain during what was probably the darkest period in the club’s history and I really tried to drag the club off the ground. I feel like I have added so much to get us to where we were at the end of last season.
“I am so close to so many of the guys that I wanted it so badly for them, the Tom Dunns and Charlie Ewels, and it would have completely rubber-stamped my great time at Bath if I could have walked away a Premiership winner. I was desperate for the boys to go on and win it and have the club be where it should be.
“I have got no doubt the club will continue with that; I don’t think it’ll be a flash in the pan because they have the right people in place.”
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