'He’s a good friend and I'm devastated': Joe Heyes

Joe Heyes has admitted he is “devastated” for England prop rival Will Stuart after the Bath tight-head was ruled out of the Six Nations with a torn Achilles.

Stuart sustained the injury in the Champions Cup victory over Munster last weekend, leaving England with a substantial hole to fill.

The 29-year-old was used as a second-half replacement by Steve Borthwick during the autumn internationals as part of his explosive ‘Pom Squad’ bench with Heyes the preferred starter.

“I’m very upset for Stuey, incredibly upset,” said Heyes. “I wish him all the best for his recovery – it’s a dreadful thing.

“We get along really well. In the changing rooms at Pennyhill, we’re usually the last out talking about history. It’s an opportunity for some lads to fill some big shoes that he has left but he’s a good friend and I’m devastated.”

Sale’s Asher Opoko-Fordjour, who is also sidelined until mid-January with an elbow injury, is the likely next cab off the rank having been handed a start by England against Argentina last month.

It is fortunate for England that Heyes, who will return for Leicester against Leinster on Friday night after a week’s rest, has emerged in the way he has done as a Test tight-head over the past six months.

“I didn’t really expect to have as many opportunities as I did to start,” said Heyes. “They were some really cool opportunities to get. Playing against the All Blacks was very special in the autumn and the Fijiians so it was overall a pretty amazing experience and I really enjoyed it.

“I’m not taking any of it for granted. I know what it was like not being anywhere near the squad and I know the pain I felt and I don’t want to go back there again.”

It is certainly a far cry from the 2024 summer tour to Japan and New Zealand when Heyes was so fed up with the game he was making plans for what came next after rugby.

“I had a horrible time,” said Heyes. “I hated it – I hated rugby, I just didn’t really enjoy it, it became a bit of a job to me, a bit of a chore. It just became quite labour intensive for me which it shouldn’t have done.

“I’d had a pretty rough season at the Tigers – we finished eighth. I had a neck issue. I had a calf issue and I wasn’t enjoying the rugby in the club. Then I went on that tour and didn’t feel like I deserved to be there and that brought a lot of self-doubt.

“I was on the other side of the world and I couldn’t really chat to my mum and my dad like I would do back home.

“I didn’t really feel part of the team – that was on me – and I spent a lot of time in my room playing Assassin’s Creed.

“It was an incredibly challenging time.”

The way out of his trough was a conversation with the then-Tigers coach Michael Cheika on the club’s pre-season tour to Portugal.

“I had a chat with Cheika and I just said to him: ‘I don’t enjoy rugby and I don’t enjoy gymming.’ It was the first time I’d met him and I just wanted to hear what he had to say,” explained the former Nottingham Forest youth team goalkeeper.

“He just said: ‘You can gym when you want. You can get your headphones and come in at 6am if you want, you don’t have to gym with the team. If that’s what makes you a better player then you can do that.’

“I was like: ‘wow, OK. This guy cares about how I want to function throughout the day.’

“Then with rugby, I had come in with all the stuff that I wanted to get better at which was a page with 12 or 13 things on.

“And he just said: ‘why are you worrying about 12 or 13 things? You can just be really good at three or four things.

“He just simplified things and condensed everything down.”

Head uncluttered, Heyes enjoyed a fine season for Leicester which was followed by a breakthrough international summer in Argentina and then a mightily impressive autumn which included that precious victory over the All Blacks.

“It was the feeling that I’ve wanted for so long,” he said.

“It was worth the wait. I’m incredibly grateful for all the struggles I’ve had, because probably I would have just kept on dawdling my way through and hoping something would happen.”