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A giant new Tuilagi has made his professional debut


Posolo Tuilagi Credit: USAP
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When it comes to rugby dynasties, they don’t come much more famous – or for that matter sizeable –  than the Tuilagis.

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Ever since Freddie Tuilagi first ran out for Leicester Tigers in 2000, the Tuilagi name has become a byword for destructive power on a rugby field. Be it their hard carries or even harder hits, the Samoan family members are to be feared on the pitch as much as they have celebrated off it as good family men and teammates.

And there’s a new Tuilagi off the rank. Posolo Tuilagi is the outsized son of Henry ‘The Butcher’ Tuilagi (6’1, 128kg) and the nephew of Freddie, Alesana, Vavae and England international Manu.

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Very much his father’s son in terms of physique, Posolo stands 6’4 and weighs in at an eye-watering 145kg according to his USAP website profile, although he is listed at 149kg on French rugby database All.rugby. That translates to 23 stone 6 pounds in imperial (328 pounds).

Posolo made his debut for Perpignan this weekend at the tender age of 18, although clearly he already possesses the physical attributes to mix it in senior rugby. The giant teenager was sprung from the bench and came in as a second row, although his side were pummelled 43-8 by La Rochelle, with the game already out of sight by the time he made his entrance.

All.rugby list Posolo as Samoan, although he was born while Henry was playing his rugby at Leicester Tigers between 2003 to 2007. France have already flagged their interest in the enormous teenager, having called him into France Under-18 team to face Italy back in March.

He isn’t the first of the next generation of Tuilagis mind. Fred Jnr came through the Leicester Academy system as No.8/loosehead. The 6’3, 120kg son of Freddie Tuilagi made eight appearances for Leicester Tigers before spending a couple of seasons with Colorno and London Scottish respectively. The 25-year-old is listed as playing for Chinnor RFC in the RFU National 1 League.

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Fred’s brother Brian also came through the Leicester Tigers academy before moving to Newcastle and then Saracens.  The 6’3, 110kg back row is currently playing for London Scottish, having previously made 12 appearances for Dax in the ProD2 back in 2016/17.

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Red and White Dynamight 1 hour ago
'Bit unfair': Bulls boss Johan Ackermann's vow before All Blacks clash

“kicked out”. Safas clutch so desperately to their string of victim pearls that excuses are always at the ready to explain away their own poor management decisions. SARU threatened their SANZAR partners for years that ‘because of viewership numbers’ that they were owed a bigger slice of the broadcasting rights pie. Aus and NZ quite rightly told them to FO, SANZAR was an equal partnership. Notwithstanding that each partner brought their own strengths and weaknesses, certainly a winning record completely escaped SA teams as part of their ‘package’. OFS were chopped, and early, despite being 1 of the more attractive SA teams to watch. Still the concentration of SA players from 5 teams to 4 had little discernible improvement on teams performance. In fact, SA teams were - by far - the least successful partner. Only 1 Champion SA club whereas all 3 origin Aus teams won and all 5 NZ teams have won. SA teams had a 22% win rate in NZ - so noone was turning up to watch them - whilst NZ teams had a 50% win rate in SA. When Covid pandemic hit the entire World and, NZ for 1 closed borders in and out, obviously this impacted an International competition and whilst a trans-Tasman lite-Super comp returned eventually, SARU used this opportunity to scream “we’ve been kicked out”. The reality was a temporary solution that would have soon corrected itself. Of course everyone knows the Safas innately clutch desperately to being a victim - ‘noone likes us, we dont care’ - and everyone outside of SA knows that the truth is found elsewhere. After only a few seasons of turning up to matches with teams full of development players in the URC/Champions Cup, those partner nations and their fans are already sick of the moaning and whinging that inherently accompanies all things Sth African. SARU are probably still kidding themselves that they will enter the 6Nations and that they will be “kicked out” of the Rugby Championship. What a bunch of big babies.

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