LONG READ Ben Muncaster: 'My friend took his own life, I am 100% an advocate for mental health in rugby'

Ben Muncaster is a picture of muscular, roaring defiance, the emotional tone-setter in the Edinburgh back-row playing the rugby of his life. He’s a full Scotland international now, and a ball-carrying, ruck-burgling, song-singing fulcrum with massive ambitions.

He talks of his desire to become a “Scottish rugby legend”, to follow his eight countrymen embarking on rugby’s ultimate voyage this summer and one day wear the fabled red of the British and Irish Lions.

He also talks about hidden grief; a tragedy which shook his community and left him looking more closely at the game he loves.

Several years have passed since a former schoolmate from Loretto took his own life. Muncaster is eager to speak about his friend, as visibly upsetting as he finds it to relive the ordeal. He fights through the tears and steadies a faltering voice because, the way he sees it, if we don’t have these discussions, nothing will change.

“I am happy to talk about it because I think that’s the whole point,” Muncaster says. “There’s a massive stigma around mental health. Men are just terrible at talking about their feelings.

“My pal was an overachiever. He was good at everything. I played rugby with him, he could sing, he could do everything.

To have gone to the ceremony, you can’t really put into words the sadness, the whole feeling of the room. You do try to celebrate their life but it is so sad.

“He had gone down to London and I didn’t really speak to him for a couple of years and then I heard of his passing. It was extremely surreal. To have gone to the ceremony, you can’t really put into words the sadness, the whole feeling of the room. You do try to celebrate their life but it is so sad.”

The most recent available data for Scotland shows 590 men died from probable suicide in 2023, up more than 30 from the previous year, with an average age of just 47. These numbers continue to climb. The terrible spate of lost human life has often been described as a ‘silent epidemic’.

Until recently, you wouldn’t have imagined a rugby changing room as a place of great vulnerability. The game is awash with tales of athletes afraid to speak about their fraying mental health. How many of England’s 2003 icons waged their own battles in troubled silence, and only now, two decades on, felt able to air their stories? Excellent work is being done across the sport but culture change does not happen overnight.

“It’s 100% apparent in rugby,” Muncaster goes on.

“It is maturing. If I was to go through something, I’d know full well I’ve got a good set of mates who would be willing to make all the time for me to help.

“But I still do think in rugby and men’s sport there is a massive pride factor and ego factor. Almost the fact you can never admit defeat in a way, having that mindset will be quite counterintuitive if you are going through mental health problems, and it’s that acceptance and awareness of when someone is struggling.

“I try to think of it as, not necessarily just trying to come up with solutions for your mates who are struggling, it’s just about being there for them no matter what.

“Whether they just want to offload whatever is on their mind, just being there to listen. Stuff like that is extremely important. That is something I am an advocate for, 100%, because a lot of people do go through it.”

It seems trivial to flit back to the business of rugby tactics and URC play-offs but in the here and now, Edinburgh have a job to do. And a bigger job than they ought to be facing on the eve of their final league fixture.

When one thing doesn’t go our way, instead of chilling out and moving on, we will compound it by doing something else – another mistake or penalty – and it has that snowball effect and ends up completely f***ing us.

Beating Ulster at the Hive on Friday night is essential to claw their way into the top eight. Even then, sitting two places and two points beneath the cut-off, it mightn’t be enough.

Frankly, Edinburgh should not be here. Too many points have been spilled from winning positions; too much of the maddening inconsistency which has long plagued the club.

Edinburgh should have taken five points when the Sharks and their Galacticos rumbled into town, but claimed only one. They shipped a last-gasp try to lose in Treviso, failed to beat Zebre Parma twice and foundered on the road in Wales.

“All the games we almost had in the bag,” Muncaster reflects. “We had massive control of those games and let them slip through compounding errors.

“When one thing doesn’t go our way, instead of chilling out and moving on, we will compound it by doing something else – another mistake or penalty – and it has that snowball effect and ends up completely f***ing us.

“The silver lining to that is, we went up against the Sharks and won the physicality battle against half the Springbok team, and wound up losing in the last minute.

“There are so many positives to take from that but we need to learn to close off games.”

Edinburgh’s squad, laden with Test regulars, was not assembled on a shoestring. Contrast those sickening defeats with statement wins over Munster in Cork and the Stormers and Bulls at home. The pedigree is obvious. Failure to reach the play-offs for the third straight season would represent grave underachievement.

“We should be in that top eight, I couldn’t agree more,” Muncaster says.

“We know we can beat absolutely anyone when we get our game plan right.

“It’s about getting our nines and 10s to orchestrate our forwards around and put us in the right areas of the pitch.

“The last couple of weeks in training, we’ve been working on scenarios where if we make a mistake, we have to move on and think about the next job.”

I have tried not to get too wound up early in the week. I am getting my tactical and technical aspects solidified to then allow me to buy into that emotional state when we get to Friday night.

You get the sense Muncaster relishes these days, when the pressure cranks up and the stakes soar. Ian McGeechan might call him a Test match animal. He’s won player of the month awards, international recognition and serious praise from his coaches this season. His Scotland debut against Portugal in the autumn was an arresting experience.

“Without my family, I’d be nowhere near where I am, and to have seen them all when I walked out onto the pitch and sung the national anthem, it’s something I’ve dreamed of all my life. I just couldn’t hold it together.”

This emotional intensity is always apparent with Muncaster. The pep and the snarl are his calling card as much as the carry and the tackle. He’ll be effervescing again this weekend, the blindside prong of the back-row trident.

“I have tried not to get too wound up early in the week. I am getting my tactical and technical aspects solidified to then allow me to buy into that emotional state when we get to Friday night.

“I do love that side. And I think in these games, I’m pretty sure Lawrence Dallaglio once said, when it gets to a certain standard most teams will be quite similar in ability, but it’s about who wants it more. I pride myself on being emotionally up for these games and maintaining that consistency.”

On a night when Edinburgh’s margin for error is nil, all of Muncaster’s courage and class will be needed. A powerhouse in the trenches and, more importantly, a sensitive and self-aware ally for his team.

If you, or someone you know, is battling mental health problems, Samaritans can help. You can contact them using this link.