Rugby league was Ben Bamber's first love. Photo: Getty Images/Nathan Stirk
Just three miles down the road from Salford Community Stadium. , there is an industrial estate in Irlam that contains a Kingsland Drinks warehouse. This is where, less than two years ago, Ben Bamber, from Sale's second row, spent his nights stacking cases of wine.
Bamber's shifts ran from 6:00 pm to 6:00 am, although he often worked overtime as his father-in-law started on the morning shift. When he returned home to Flixton, he would sleep until about 3pm, get up, say hello to his family, “cook dinner for breakfast” and then leave again. On weekends, he found work elsewhere. “I did a bit of scaffolding and moving houses and stuff like that,” Bamber told Telegraph Sport in his first interview with the newspaper. “Going over to DFS and doing some work for my dad. These are long and hard days. This meant getting up at 3am, driving to Birmingham and working on heavy machinery.”
Bamber is now mixing him up with the likes of James Ryan (not that he knows who was in Leinster's second row) and the 22-year-old has appeared on England manager Steve Borthwick's radar. Second row with Bamber's gifts – 6ft 8in, 20th, with nimble hands and feet – a rare breed indeed. So why was this physical specimen working the night shift stacking cases of wine? To explain this, we need to go back a few years.
Bamber grew up obsessed with rugby league and never even watched a union game until he was 18. He was registered with the club of his childhood. , Huddersfield Giants, where he came to the attention of Alan Tait, a former Lions and Scotland centre, who was scouting rugby league prospects on behalf of the Scottish Rugby Union.
“I spotted Ben playing for Huddersfield and his size caught my eye,” says Tate. “You just don’t see 18-year-olds that size, and you could see he had the skills for the union.” Unfortunately for Tait, Bamber was not of Scottish heritage, so Tait recommended him to his old Newcastle teammate Pat Lum of Bristol Bears. Bamber initially rejected the offer to cross codes, but when the Giants switched their third-year academy to part-time he changed his mind. “I actually thought I wanted to become a full-time rugby player,” Bamber says. “Driving along the M62 every day to play reserve after work is probably not for me.”
Bamber rarely boasts occurring combination of sizes and skills. Photo: Getty Images/Nathan Stirk
So Bamber began his union education in Somerset, but almost immediately underwent shoulder reconstruction. After regaining fitness, he went on loan to Dings Crusaders and was called up for the England U20 squad, but injured his other shoulder. He couldn't take a break and didn't like the experience, so he left. “It all happened quite quickly, I joined Bristol and suddenly I was in a professional environment,” says Bamber. “I thought, 'What is this?' It was completely new. That's why I left. I just didn't want to do it anymore. I just wanted a normal job, but then I quickly realized how much better it was to not have a normal job.”
It was then that Bamber's agent, Tom Beattie, contacted Mike Forshaw, Sale's then defense coach and former league player, to arrange a trial in March 2022. Before the Premiership Rugby Cup game, Sale's director of rugby Alex Sanderson told Bamber that he was receiving a permanent contract. “It was mega,” says Bamber. “To be honest, I thought I couldn’t do anything else, but now I’m doing it for a club located just five minutes from my house.”
Bamber's education really accelerated in the 2022-23 season when he was on loan at Sale, where he was voted fans' player of the year. Another upper body injury in the summer allowed him to focus on his fitness. By the end of pre-season he had gained 10kg of muscle mass, while knocking 50 seconds off his Bronco fitness mark, giving him the opportunity to break into the first team. Considering where he was two years ago, the smile is almost always on his face.
“It's what gets me through the crap of pre-season training,” says Bamber. “As bad as it is, you just think I’d rather be doing this than stacking cases of wine from six in the evening until six in the morning. It's hard. I keep telling the guys: “You are living the dream.”
Sanderson can wax lyrical about any of his players, but his manly love for Bamber knows no bounds. “I don't know where his ceiling is, but we're still a long way from it, especially once he masters the dark art of set-pieces,” Sanderson says. Tate is also keeping an eye on Bamber's development. “I’m not surprised because he had all the tools,” Tate says. “I met Steve Borthwick a couple of weeks ago at the Falcons game and he mentioned Ben and said he liked him.”
Bamber still has room to grow when it comes to the “dark arts of scenery”; Photo: Getty Images/Darren Staples
Bamber represents England and the Lions with ambition and absorbs as much as he can from experienced fringe players such as Jonny Hill and Kobus Wiese, but he is the opposite of a rugby player. . Heading into Sale's Champions Cup match against Leinster, he had no idea who Ryan, the 59-cap Ireland international, was, but he believes ignorance can be bliss.
“For me it's simple a bunch of guys. I can prove I’m right,” says Bamber. “I spoke to the coaches before we went to Leicester in pre-season and they had a good team and I thought, 'So what?' Better not to know. If I play well against them, it will benefit me well. You want to play against the best teams and the best players, but it doesn't matter what they've done before. If they are good, I will find out on the field.”
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