LONG READ Ben Loader: 'Gloucester want to be a team that fights for everything' as European champions loom

The Champions Cup has its critics – and yes, Europe is not what it used to be – but it would take a stone-hearted soul not to feel the crackle when the holders Bordeaux-Begles take the field at a packed Kingsholm on Friday night.

A rejuvenated Gloucester in their atmospheric backyard will make for a memorable start to the kings of Europe’s hat-trick quest. Bordeaux, with their galaxy of stars, should have too much for the Cherry and Whites but it is the sort of occasion European club competition was created for.

“It’s an incredible opportunity,” said Gloucester’s in-form wing Ben Loader.

“Luds (Lewis Ludlow) said this morning that it’s going to be like a chance to play a Test match. They’ve got players of Test quality across the park. You watch them in Champions Cup finals over the last couple of years and they’re incredible. But they’ve got to come to Kingsholm and beat us and the chance to go up against them is super exciting.

“It’s going to be a huge challenge. Their quality is well known but if we didn’t think we could win, then there would be no point in us going out there.

“I hope Kingholm is going to be bouncing. I think it’s going to be rocking so I’m looking forward to it.”

For Loader, the evening will deliver an unlikely reunion from his mini rugby days. He took his baby steps in the sport in the same Reading Abbey team as Tom Willis, now back row bulldozer-in-chief for Bordeaux.

“We had a couple of quality players but Tom was a standout as I’m sure you can imagine,” he recalled.

“It was tag rugby but for Tom the difference between tag and contact wasn’t massive.”

There are obvious comparisons to be drawn with last season and we feel like we’re in a much better place.

Then there is the prospect of sharing the same field with Louis Bielle-Biarrey who he brackets with Cheslin Kolbe as the best wing in the world.

“His quality is pretty insane but as a winger, these are the guys you want to test yourself against,” he said.

It isn’t easy for anyone to keep up with Bielle-Biarrey – although as the owner of a Yamaha XSR 700 which he will occasionally “open up a little bit” around the Cotswolds, Loader has a taste for speed himself – but in try-scoring terms at least, he is matching the French flier this season.

Three in the first three Prem games of the season are reflective not only of his own sharp start but also that of Gloucester, the league leaders. After trailing in eighth and only just squeezing into the Champions Cup it is quite a turnaround.

“There are obvious comparisons to be drawn with last season and we feel like we’re in a much better place,” said Loader.

“We were disappointed to lose at Leicester last Friday night but while there was a lot of stuff which we weren’t happy with to get two bonus points and to finish the game the way we did was good. With the league the way it is and the competitiveness of all the teams, getting those two bonus points could prove crucial towards the end of the season.

“We want to be a team that fights for everything and I think we’ve seen quite a bit of that in the first three games.”

The signings of Wales duo Dewi Lake and Jac Morgan plus the World Cup-winning South Africa second row Jean Kleyn have proved transformative.

“Going into battle with a guy like Dewi leading you is amazing,” said Loader. “He and the other new guys really bring that experience, that fight and that hunger while also fitting into what we feel like we’ve built here.

“They’re not coming in and trying to rewrite the book, but they’re just adding their quality.”

It was too good and too interesting an opportunity to turn down. To test myself against international-quality players every week and also to play with some of the best Springboks was pretty cool.

Loader, who came through the London Irish academy, was part of the England under-20s squad that reached the final of the Junior World Championship and played for the national side in a non-cap game against the Barbarians in 2019 under Eddie Jones. The Exiles’ financial meltdown in 2023, though, sent his career in an unexpected direction. South Africa.

“I had just signed a three-year renewal with Irish so I was very settled and then everything went bang,” he recalled.

“We had played the Stormers in the Champions Cup that season and we had gone over to Cape Town and played over there. We lost but I had a good game.

“A few things just fell into place whereby they were in the market for a winger and remembered me from that game.

“Someone from the Stormers reached out to me and just said: ‘Look, if you’re interested at all, let’s have a conversation.’ At that time, I was looking elsewhere within the Premiership as well and weighing up the options.

“I did chat to a few people, including Jamie Roberts who had done a stint out there at the end of his career and he really encouraged me to take the opportunity, because it’s not a route many English boys are able to go down. They have such a wealth of talent out there that it’s almost like they don’t need to look outside.

“It was too good and too interesting an opportunity to turn down. To test myself against international-quality players every week and also to play with some of the best Springboks was pretty cool. I think it was great for my rugby and great for life experience as well.

“I didn’t know what to expect, but everyone was so welcoming, so friendly and really took me in at a time where it was pretty dark, losing Irish, the club I had been at my whole professional life.”

He spent two enjoyable years in Cape Town before signing for Gloucester last season.

You go for a coffee the day after a game and if you play well, they’ll tell you and if you haven’t played well, they’ll tell you as well.

“One of the massive draws was the history of the place,” he said. “The club is so much part of the city. That’s something that I found in Cape Town – rugby is the main thing there and it feels like the same here.

“The fans are so passionate. You go for a coffee the day after a game and if you play well, they’ll tell you and if you haven’t played well, they’ll tell you as well.

“The city really lives and breathes Gloucester rugby.”

Loader comes from a talented sporting family. Younger brother Danny – who goes under their mother’s surname Namaso – is a Cameroon football international who started in their recent win over Cote d’Ivoire.

It has been a while since the 27-year-old has been mentioned in international rugby conversation but with the Cherry and Whites going well and his Gloucester attack coach James Lightfoot-Brown involved with the England A team, he has an advocate for a possible call-up against Argentina A next month.

His numbers this season – five line breaks, 193 metres made, 109 post-contact metres and nine defenders beaten – are better than those of Tommy Freeman.

“Obviously the ambition for all young English players is to pull on the white jersey but I think my focus is mainly about staying on the pitch and performing well for Gloucester. If I do that week in week out, then whatever comes will come,” said Loader.

A decent game against the best in Europe on Friday night would help push his case.