Earlier this week I managed to meet up with Bath back row player Mat Gilbert. Fresh from a convincing victory against Saracens Storm the night before we caught up in one of his locals (it's ok Mr Gold he was drinking coke).
Mat has had an interesting career so far, Hartpury college and playing in Gloucester 'A' team, 2 stints in Italy, Llanelli and Scarlets and now residing at Bath Rugby. Mat was very open and honest with his answers as he explains things haven't totally gone to plan at times in his career.
Congratulations on another great performance last night, another win and again another try!
It's just being in the right place at the right time!!
You're playing some great rugby at the moment and with every game having a solid performance, doing your job and grabbing a few tries. How are you enjoying your rugby at Bath?
The tries I've scored this season have come off of driving from the lineout, a big team effort a big forwards effort. And obviously I'm just lucky enough to be the one who gets the ball down.
Tom Dunn got one last night and Anthony Perenise got one against Falcons, it's just a great forwards effort and everyone knows that in the team.
All if the supporters and press see it as 'Mat Gilbert try' but amongst the player's and coaching staff see it as a forwards performance.
I love Bath, it's a really good club. I came from Scarlets so I'm used to a big club, with a lot of tradition and expectations.
There's a really good group of guys and good coaching and management set up, yeah it's a really good club to be at.
There's a great depth in back row players for Bath this season is the completion to get a place tough between the players?
Yeah massively! You look at François Louw who's probably one of the greatest open sides in the world, Fearsy fit, Matt Garvey has joined the club and made a huge impact, and also Leroy (Houston) as well. So fortunately every at the moment is on top form which pushes everyone else and everyone pushes each other, so we're lucky enough to be able to create that environment where we can push ourselves to be the best we can be to get selected.
You're becoming a favourite with the fans and many are championing you for more first team starts, does the fan support drive you on towards gaining more first XV appearances?
Fans are very important for the club, yeah it's nice to have support on Twitter and I do try my hardest to respond to as many as I can. It's the same as when I was in Wales, I tried to keep a good dialogue with the fans, I think it's important because really they're ultimately the one's paying our wages.
I do try my best to engage with people, I suppose it's the way I am and the way I've been brought up.
You're very proud of you Hartpury roots, with such success in rugby it's not surprising, was Hartpury the driving force behind you wanting to be a professional player?
Yeah massively! I went to a military school in Dover, as my father was in the army. I played through under 7's up to under 18's and county rugby, when I went to Uni I loved my rugby but didn't think of it as a career.
I applied to go to UWE, they looked at my CV and thought it better if I went to Hartpury. I turned up at Hartpury and the wealth of talent was phenomenal. In the first year I played for the club on Saturdays in the Gloucester premier league. With players like Dan Norton, you look at the Gloucester back line with Trinder, May, Sharples they all come from Hartpury.
The season after you moved on to Aghero you became top try scorer, for a back row that's pretty good going, was the lure to come back to Britain for a bigger challenge with Llanelli an easy choice?
I didn't realise I was the top try scorer, had no idea of that just scored a few. That was a great year in Aghero in Sardinia, I'd just left uni and didn't have any direction in life I didn't really know what I wanted to do. I didn't want to go to work but then this offer came up to play in Italy, the offer also came up with another lad from uni. It was challenging, the level wasn't great but we had a great time. Aghero is a lovely place and the other international player there I'd played with at academy level, so I knew him, so the three of us had a good laugh and just passed the ball between us. The rugby wasn't great but it really was a lovely place to live.
It got me away, after four years in Gloucester and owning a house there it was very difficult to leave. With being a Hartpury for four years I thought 'right I've got to leave Hartpury now'. Because I had the tie of the house I found it difficult to accept offers from championship sides, I didn't want to go and rent a house somewhere else, going to Italy helped me to break all ties.
With Llanelli you progressed to playing for Scarlets and even got to play in the Heineken cup, you received much acclaim there, what led to you leaving and heading back to Italy?
I had no choice. It was not through my choice to leave.
They ended up with a shortage of second rows, Dom (Day) obviously left everyone seemed to desert them from the second row. My contract hadn't been renewed, it had been agreed in principal but hadn't been signed, and with a loaded back row and shortage of second rows they needed the money to buy more second row players.
Unfortunately it left me without a club, I wanted to stay in Wales. I did everything I could to stay with Llanelli, but you can't help with budgeting and I had no part in their bigger picture.
You originally came to Bath from Mogliano as injury cover, before securing a full contract. I understand you weren't entirely happy at mogliano and with the Amlin Challenge cup fixtures coming up how will it feel playing against them?
In regards to the time scale and what happened with Scarletts I wasn't left with a great deal of choice, most clubs had done their recruiting. I had a few options of a couple of championship sides or go to Mogliano. I did a bit research and previous players were saying it's a great club, they were in the Amlin cup and saw it ad a bit of a window. I didn't think the standard wouldn't be great but if I put in some good performances there could be a route back to the Rabo or even the premiership, so my sole focus was to perform well in the Amlin and try to to get back to a decent standard again.
My levels if expectations of Mogliano were too high, coming from a highly professional club like Scarletts then going to a fairly basic almost amateur setup made me realise it wasn't what I wanted and wasn't going to make my career.
After say six games, two of which were Amlin, I had a discussion with the club and mutually agreed to terminate my contract. It was easier to come home and find a club, your much more appealing as a free agent.
I preferred my time in Aghero over Mogliano but I did get on with the guys, my main problem was with the coaching structure and the way then went about coaching, not the personalities. So when they come over I'll be able to have a little dialogue with them in my basic Italian. It won't be difficult to play them, I'm in a much happier place now. It was interesting when they got pulled out to play us in the Amlin and I realised we would play and it's a good chance to stick two fingers up as we beat them.
No to be honest I'd much rather play against Scarletts would be better rivalry and competition.
You've also represented the English deaf rugby team and Barbarians, I'm pretty sure the dream is there to manage to reach the EPS team and play at Twickenham again.
Every boys dream!!
I've always said 'If you don't aspire to play for your country then you shouldn't be playing at all.' every boys dreams of playing for their country no matter what the sport, how high I'm off that I don't know but obviously it would be fantastic.
Being a deaf top flight rugby player you are often called an 'inspiration' and many look up to to you, do you treat it as normality and at times frustrating that your always referred to as 'Mat Gilbert the deaf rugby player' rather than just 'Mat Gilbert the rugby player'?
Yeah some times, I've done interviews before where it's been 'your deaf this, your deaf that'! You know but basically I'm the same as everyone else in this game, I haven't got here because I'm deaf, in fairness it's probably been harder to get here. Yeah basically I'm Mat Gilbert the rugby player who happens to be deaf not Mat Gilbert the deaf rugby player. It's something that's always going to be with me, it's part of me but it doesn't define me.
We are all aware of the huge amount of banter that goes around the club, but you seem to be caught up in quite a bit of it. Two points in this are-
1) what's the deal with you and Dom Day over the towels???
Well it doesn't happen often here but when were playing together in Wales basically every day my towel was wet, it probably wasn't always Dom, but it's happened a few times here and I change next to Dom so I blame him. It's not the end of the world I can live with a wet towel.
2) a lovely picture was released on Twitter from Micky Young, will you be looking to get any payback?
That machine is designed to stretch your back out, so you lock you feet in and it tips you upside down. I was wary of there being a few people around, it happens to a few people you're tipped upside down and but for me the culprit took it to the next level, took my shorts down attached them to the foot holding and left me stranded. It's just some good humour but it terms if payback we'll have to see, but I've been at the club long enough to know not to hang upside down when there's too many people around.
You are seeming pretty settled around the area, especially even turning out for a game of cricket at Hinton Charterhouse, are you seeing a long turn stay in and around Bath?
Yeah we're in the middle of buying a house in Bath. I've got a two year contract now and hopefully I can push on and prove my worth to the club then with luck that can get renewed.
We love the city, my brother lives in Bristol, Fiona's parents live in Salisbury, her brother lives in Gloucester and all my old Hartbury friends are around the area so it's a great base to make.
Even if things don't work out and I have to move on it's great to have a house in the city and it's very beneficial to us.
I love living in the village at the moment, all the guys have been really supportive. Just popping up to the post office and having a chat it's great.
What do you see the full potential for Bath over the next few seasons are?
The management team have done a great job in recruitment this year, they've done a lot of hard work and some structural things have been put in place. Ultimately the club wants to push on, driving and pushing on with what we've got. Where the club goes...who Knows, obviously other clubs are progressing as well. You look at clubs like London Irish bringing in James O'Connor, the players are coming in. It won't get any easier we just have to make sure we can do is to be in the best possible position to compete, which Bruce, Gary and Mike are trying to do.
You're performing great with the United team playing in the 'A' league, finishing top of the table shows there's more commitment towards it this season.
This season there's a really good vibe about the club, people want to play rugby.
When I was at Hartpury playing in the Gloucester 'A' team it wasn't very good. They had a few university guys playing, a few old boys but the full time professionals weren't interested, they just didn't want to bother with the Monday night's.
Now it's a case of the boys wanting to play, wanting to perform. You look at the team that was put out last night, international players not going out there thinking 'why the hell am I playing on a Monday night?' everybody is buying in to it, you've got to get as much game time.
Its been brilliant talking to you and hopefully you'll get Gloucester in the next round of the 'A' league, I understand their game is next Monday.
Yeah hopefully a few Hartpury boys will be out! Cheers thank you.
pictures courtesy of Chris Clemence. @Chris_Clemence
