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Schoolboy goalkicker Corey Domachowski ready for World Cup debut at prop

By PA
Corey Domachowski of Cardiff celebrates with teammates after scoring the team's first try during the EPCR Challenge Cup Round of Sixteen match between Cardiff Rugby and Sale Sharks at Cardiff Arms Park on April 01, 2023 in Cardiff, Wales. (Photo by Dan Mullan/Getty Images)

Corey Domachowski readily admits that any suggestion of playing prop as a schoolboy would fill him with dread.

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A former centre and goalkicker at his local rugby club, a future in the front-row could not have been further from his mind.

But Domachowski is now preparing for his first World Cup as one of three loosehead props selected by Wales head coach Warren Gatland.

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“I was playing for Rhondda Schools as a number six or eight, but Chris Jones (coach) was on at me for years to play prop,” he said.

“I would go home home to my mother and cry ‘I’m not going to play prop’.

“At my local club, Gilfach Goch, I always played number eight or centre and I also used to kick goals.

“I converted to prop in my first year of youth rugby at Gilfach. We didn’t have a loosehead, and we had some good players in the back row.

“I put a bit of weight on at the time, and I just wanted to play with the boys. It took off from there, really.

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“It was probably the best decision of my life. I was a bit gutted I couldn’t kick at goal any more, but I am not an outside-half, centre or back-rower.

“But if we ever have a penalty goalkicking shoot-out, ‘Gats’ knows the score!”

Domachowski moved to Cardiff, making his debut against Glasgow in 2016, and a dominant display against European Challenge Cup opponents Sale Sharks last season thrust him into Gatland’s thoughts.

Barely a month later he was named in an extended World Cup training squad, and his Test debut followed when Wales took on opening warm-up opponents England at the Principality Stadium.

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“I take myself back to the middle of last season and if someone had said I would be in this position now, I would have laughed in their face to be honest,” he added.

“I am not here to make up the numbers, and that is the same as everyone else. There is a lot of competition.

“We all know why we are here. We want the number one jersey.

“I have probably taken a lot from the first two caps (against England and South Africa), more than anything in the rest of my career.

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“I was a bit frustrated from the England game where I felt we weren’t able to get the scrums we wanted. They probably played a bit smart, noticed we (Domachowski and his fellow Cardiff prop Keiron Assiratti) were both debutants, and used it to their advantage.

“Then we came up against the best pack in the world in South Africa, and I am not hiding away from the fact we came second-best. It was a big test, and we have just got to take learnings from it.”

The day of Wales’ final 33-strong World Cup squad announcement began with Domachowski attending his 88-year-old great-grandmother’s funeral.

Then came the jubilation of gaining selection, but he also found time to speak with his friend and team-mate Assiratti, who failed to make the cut.

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“I said to him from where he was at the start of the year – Cardiff asked him to cover hooker at one point – and now he is a Wales international,” Domachowski said.

“Sometimes, you have probably got to take a step back and realise how far you have come.

“He is a great player. You don’t get gifted international honours if you are not good enough.

“I am sure he will bounce back from it, take it as motivation, hopefully use it to his advantage and push on for the Six Nations.”

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J
JW 1 hour ago
Does South Africa have a future in European competition?

I rated Lowe well enough to be an AB. Remember we were picking the likes of George Bridge above such players so theres no disputing a lot of bad decisions have been made by those last two coaches. Does a team like the ABs need a finicky winger who you have to adapt and change a lot of your style with to get benefit from? No, not really. But he still would have been a basic improvement on players like even Savea at the tail of his career, Bridge, and could even have converted into the answer of replacing Beauden at the back. Instead we persisted with NMS, Naholo, Havili, Reece, all players we would have cared even less about losing and all because Rieko had Lowe's number 11 jersey nailed down.


He was of course only 23 when he decided to leave, it was back in the beggining of the period they had started retaining players (from 2018 onwards I think, they came out saying theyre going to be more aggressive at some point). So he might, all of them, only just missed out.


The main point that Ed made is that situations like Lowe's, Aki's, JGP's, aren't going to happen in future. That's a bit of a "NZ" only problem, because those players need to reach such a high standard to be chosen by the All Blacks, were as a country like Ireland wants them a lot earlier like that. This is basically the 'ready in 3 years' concept Ireland relied on, versus the '5 years and they've left' concept' were that player is now ready to be chosen by the All Blacks (given a contract to play Super, ala SBW, and hopefully Manu).


The 'mercenary' thing that will take longer to expire, and which I was referring to, is the grandparents rule. The new kids coming through now aren't going to have as many gp born overseas, so the amount of players that can leave with a prospect of International rugby offer are going to drop dramatically at some point. All these kiwi fellas playing for a PI, is going to stop sadly.


The new era problem that will replace those old concerns is now French and Japanese clubs (doing the same as NRL teams have done for decades by) picking kids out of school. The problem here is not so much a national identity one, than it is a farm system where 9 in 10 players are left with nothing. A stunted education and no support in a foreign country (well they'll get kicked out of those countries were they don't in Australia).


It's the same sort of situation were NZ would be the big guy, but there weren't many downsides with it. The only one I can think was brought up but a poster on this site, I can't recall who it was, but he seemed to know a lot of kids coming from the Islands weren't really given the capability to fly back home during school xms holidays etc. That is probably something that should be fixed by the union. Otherwise getting someone like Fakatava over here for his last year of school definitely results in NZ being able to pick the cherries off the top but it also allows that player to develop and be able to represent Tonga and under age and possibly even later in his career. Where as a kid being taken from NZ is arguably going to be worse off in every respect other than perhaps money. Not going to develop as a person, not going to develop as a player as much, so I have a lotof sympathy for NZs case that I don't include them in that group but I certainly see where you're coming from and it encourages other countries to think they can do the same while not realising they're making a much worse experience/situation.

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