Sport

Vickery forced to retire

RUGBY: FORMER ENGLAND captain Phil Vickery has been forced to follow medical advice and retire from rugby with immediate effect…

Fri Oct 29 2010 - 01:00

RUGBY:FORMER ENGLAND captain Phil Vickery has been forced to follow medical advice and retire from rugby with immediate effect. The 34-year-old prop has been in severe pain since damaging his neck while captaining Wasps against his old club Gloucester on September 25th.

Vickery successfully recovered from four major back and neck operations during his 15-year professional career – but this time the risk of serious injury was too great.

“I’m not afraid of fighting back or proving people wrong but there comes a stage when you have to listen and trust in the experts and it is based on medical reasons that I have been forced to retire,” said Vickery.

“I will look back on my career with a lot of happy memories. I feel privileged to have been part of some amazing teams in Wasps and Gloucester, to have worked with the best coaches in the world, and to have played against and with some of the best players in the game. As well as Wasps, I will miss playing for England dearly.”

READ MORE

The news has come as a major blow for Vickery, who had been targeting a place in England’s World Cup squad and wanted to extend his contract at Wasps by another year. “My love and passion for the game is still there, which is the most disappointing thing for me – I wanted to end my career playing with Wasps,” he said.

Vickery retires with 73 England caps and five Test appearances for the Lions, three of them against Australia in 2001 and two versus the Springboks in 2009. Although he missed the 2003 Grand Slam campaign through injury, Vickery returned to play a key role in England’s World Cup triumph in Australia.

A third back operation in 2006 led to his departure from Gloucester after 11 years at Kingsholm but he found a home-from-home at Wasps, who were confident his career was not over. Vickery helped Wasps win the Heineken Cup in May 2007 and the Premiership title in 2008.

Vickery captained England to the 2007 World Cup final and then represented the Lions again in 2009, making his last international appearance in the third Test victory over South Africa.