Nowell targets Euro progression
By Mark Stevens
15/12/19
Three games, three victories.
It’s been the dream start to Exeter’s latest Heineken Champions Cup campaign, but Chiefs winger Jack Nowell insists there is still plenty to do if he and his team-mates are to achieve their goal of advancing further within the competition.
Successive wins against La Rochelle, Glasgow Warriors and Sale Sharks have helped to position the Devon club top of the pile in Pool Two at the halfway stage of qualification.
Never before have Rob Baxter’s side started a European season so well, but with a return leg against the Sharks on the schedule for this afternoon (1pm) at Sandy Park, Nowell is looking to play his part and help the Chiefs advance into the last eight for only the second time in the club’s history.
“We’re doing alright,” he said. “It’s obviously a big weekend for us as we’ve never been in this position before. It’s a competition in which we’ve always wanted to do well, but for one reason or another, we’ve not really achieved anything.
“We’re top of the group now, we’re in a good position, but we also know how things can change very quickly. The big thing for us this weekend is picking up the win. It was close last week [against Sale], but it’s a competition we are all very excited for.”
Advancing in Europe is something everyone at the Chiefs is looking to achieve, particularly given their impressive domestic form in recent years.
Success in the Champions Cup would also help to erase some of the disappointment of what has been a frustrating six months for the 26-year-old England and British Lion star.
That frustration began back in June when he was forced out of the Gallagher Premiership Final against Saracens. Sadly, Nowell could only watch on in the final quarter as the Chiefs were pegged back by the Londoners in the end of season showpiece.
The knee and ankle injuries sustained in that fixture almost but pay to the Cornishman’s involvement in this summer’s Rugby World Cup in Japan, but England head coach Eddie Jones was happy to stick by his man and keep him as part of his 31-man squad that travelled to the Far East.
Nowell was making decent progress in his rehabilitation, that was until he burst his appendix during a training camp in Italy. Again, there were huge doubts over his World Cup involvement, but he continued to battle away and he boarded the plane alongside club colleagues Henry Slade and Luke Cowan-Dickie to Japan.
Although Nowell sat out the opening Pool games against Tonga and the USA, he was named on the bench for England’s third outing against Argentina. Introduced late on in Tokyo, it didn’t take him long to make an impression, scoring a try in the 39-10 victory.
Sadly, that would be Nowell’s only involvement in the tournament as a hamstring injury, plus the selection decisions of Jones, meant he was restricted to a watching brief for the remainder of the trip.
“I had lots of emotions,” he said. “Angry, upset, frustrated. Personally, I know I did everything I could, so did the physics, and so did the coaches. Unfortunately, rugby doesn’t always go your way and my body wasn’t letting me do what I wanted to do. At the same time, I feel very privileged to have gone with the team to Japan. I had the ten minutes against Argentina - and to be amongst the boys for that time, and to have those aspirations we had win a World Cup, it was massive for me.
“Anyone who knows me, though, the big thing that drives me is being able to play in those big games with this club. Playing for England and being involved with England is massive, but that doesn’t come around if I’m not playing well here at the Chiefs. It was a great honour to go to the World Cup and to also play in the Six Nations, but it means a lot more playing with guys that you’ve grown up with at your club.
“Maybe a highlight for me was being in the final with the club back in June, but again it was a massive disappointment for losing it. It was a game we felt we could have won, so I’m still searching for my highlight. Hopefully, my big highlight is coming this season.”
Indeed, trying to get the Chiefs to this season’s Heineken Champions Cup Final in Marseille will be a key objective for the ambitious Nowell, who back in 2017 scored in Exeter’s Premiership Final victory over Wasps at Twickenham.
“Where we are in the Heineken Cup, we don’t just want to be getting out of the group stages,” he added. “As a club we want to be playing in semi-finals and finals. We’ve been in the last four Premiership finals, we’ve won it, so we don’t want to now go and let ourselves down now. For me, it’s all about getting to those finals and getting to those big games.”