Win or lose at Eden Park on Saturday, skills coach’s most fervent wish is for his life-threatening ordeal to improve medical procedures
lenty of people have overcome adversity in their rugby careers but Andrew Strawbridge’s story is in a league of its own. England’s new assistant coach, back on tour in his native New Zealand, almost died from sepsis in a Samoan hospital a few years ago, his condition so grave his wife was told to prepare for the worst. He ended up losing the sight in his right eye but, thankfully, is still around to retell the tale.
His own nightmare began as he prepared to board a flight to assist with Samoa’s preparations for the 2015 Rugby World Cup. “I had a little graze on my eye and picked up an infection at the airport – the superbug. By the time I got to Samoa, I was feeling pretty crook. I got taken to hospital and sent home with some oral antibiotics.
He still counts his lucky stars that an experienced Kiwi medic happened to be in Samoa with his wife, who was on secondment there as a judge. “He came and helped, which is why I’m still alive. That was a pretty grim setup in the ICU there. They had high mortality rates, particularly in children. I’m here because people worked really hard with some pretty average equipment to keep me alive.
He was also advised his outlook on life could alter appreciably. “I had to see a psychologist because when you nearly die several times they want you to talk to someone. He was a really good man and explained to me how I might view things slightly differently, wouldn’t suffer fools gladly and be a little more forthright in telling people that. The ‘no shit, Sherlock’ approach.”
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