If the rugby gods do beautiful symmetry then Ben Youngs’s decorated career will end at the Allianz Stadium, Twickenham in a Premiership final. It was the game in which it all started for England’s most-capped men’s player when he came off the bench against Gloucester as a 17-year-old schoolboy.
To complete the circle 19 years on for his beloved Tigers in what would be his eighth Premiership final would represent the perfect full stop.
He has been one of the good guys of English rugby, a cheerful, upbeat energy-giver for club and country.
Scripted send-offs are rare but after Youngs’s announcement that he is calling time on rugby at the end of the season, the fairytale finish is still possible. Leicester have moved into second place in the table with four games of the regular season left, having turned over Bristol at Ashton Gate last weekend.
It was a big win, secured with six minutes left when Youngs wound back the clock to put in a superb cover tackle on Harry Randall and snuff out Bristol’s last chance of a comeback. His contributions come in last-quarter cameos these days as Michael Cheika’s wise owl half-back ‘closer’ but he still puts it all in for Leicester.
Why wouldn’t he? It is his club.
While it would have been financially tempting to squeeze out one more season abroad, Youngs has chosen to turn down Racing 92 and other offers from Japan meaning Leicester will be both his beginning and his end.
Youngs’s loyalty is perhaps not surprising. Leicester is in his blood. His dad Nick was a Tigers scrum-half before him, his brother Tom a Tigers captain. Still, though, the one-club man remains something to be cherished in rugby.
There are plenty of options for top players domestically and globally. Supporters cherish those who choose to reject those temptations.
Youngs played his junior rugby in Norfolk for Holt, where a mural of him celebrating the 2016 England Grand Slam adorns the outside of the clubhouse, and then North Walsham but, spotted by Leicester’s chief scout Dusty Hare, the Tigers did not waste time in luring him to the East Midlands. His nickname Lenny, given to him by his East Anglian cousins, travelled with him and has stuck ever since.
It hasn’t always been a straightforward journey on a personal level. Life for the Youngs family changed forever when Tom’s wife Tiff contracted terminal cancer. Ben sacrificed his place on the 2017 Lions tour to New Zealand to be with them and their daughter Maisie.
To start and finish his professional career in Tigers’ stripes is as it should be. This weekend he will play his 333rd game for the club. Add in 127 for England, two Tests for the Lions and a turn for the Barbarians and it has been the most fulfilling of careers.
It hasn’t always been a straightforward journey on a personal level. Life for the Youngs family changed forever when Tom’s wife Tiff contracted terminal cancer. Ben sacrificed his place on the 2017 Lions tour to New Zealand to be with them and their daughter Maisie.
He also had to deal with dyslexia and a heart condition. But Youngs overcame all his challenges to set an England cap record which will take some beating.
He played in a remarkable four World Cups – including the 2019 final – and under four England head coaches.
Tigers Fam, @BenYoungs09 has a message for you… pic.twitter.com/Vh7yRIuZmk
— Leicester Tigers (@LeicesterTigers) April 22, 2025
At international level, he evolved from the sniping whippersnapper who scored a wonderful solo try on his first Test start against the Wallabies in Sydney, to a game controller who became England’s box-kick king under Eddie Jones. That was not a title which sat comfortably on his shoulders. At heart, he was an instinctive attack-minded rugby player, a ruck-side gap sniffer who loved to use his acceleration to split a defence.
Ask him which was his favourite game for England and, in purely stylistic terms, he would probably tell you it was the crazy Super Saturday showdown against France in 2015. Needs must though and he was able to evolve his game as the game evolved.
His flexibility and consistency was what kept his nose ahead of Danny Care in the battle to be England’s starting scrum-half. That, and his internal drive, the strength of which was disguised by the sound of his infectious chuckle.
If Owen Farrell was the hard-nosed driver of standards through that period, Youngs would often provide the levity off the field. He is a people person who knitted England squads together for his 13-year international career.
His warm and engaging personality has reached a wider audience over the past year through the hit podcast ‘For The Love of Rugby’ which he and Leicester clubmate Dan Cole produce each week.
Leicester head coach Michael Cheika name-checked Youngs as one of the side’s key off-field leaders after the Bristol game. It is why the club wanted him to go on for another season but he has decided this will be it.
Youngs is such a natural communicator you wonder if his post-rugby future may lie in punditry.
That is for the future though. For the time being he has a season – and a career – to finish with Leicester.
His influence is felt in different areas now. His pace has waned. He christened the dummying base-of-a-ruck try he scored against Exeter in January his ‘show and slow’. But the rugby brain is still as sharp as ever.
Leicester head coach Michael Cheika name-checked Youngs as one of the side’s key off-field leaders after the Bristol game. It is why the club wanted him to go on for another season but he has decided this will be it.
Are this edition of the Tigers the best Youngs has played with? No. The side he joined with Alesana Tuilagi, Julian White, Lewis Moody, Martin Corry and Geordan Murphy that embarked on an annual trip to Twickenham for the Premiership final were an awesome ensemble.
The current Leicester crop do not have the same aura. They do though have a World Cup-winning fly-half in Handre Pollard and an Argentina captain in Julian Montoya and have it in them to produce a big performance when it counts as they showed at Ashton Gate.
The race for a semi-final place is a tight one but three out of Leicester’s four remaining matches are at home including bottom-of-the-table Newcastle on the final weekend of the regular season.
The Tigers have their fate within their own grasp. They have another motivation too now. To send loveable Lenny off into the sunset in the manner his epic contribution deserves.
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I've said some silly things about him thru his long, successful career. Probably more out of jealousy than much else! Hope he enjoys a long, comfortable retirement, barring the weekly podcast of course!
I taught Ben when he was in his primary school years. He was an ambitious and fun-loving boy with a massive talent and passion for all things rugby! Always with a smile on his face, his understanding and vision when playing rugby was exceptional. I was very lucky to have taught and coached this amazing man. Well done, Lenny - you are a legend!
I’m an Italian rooting for Benetton Rugby of my home town Treviso, but I’ve always admired - when I’ve had the chance to see him playing either for Leicester or for England - his good, no nonsense rugby-playing and of course his sportsmanship, on and off the field. You could see miles away he was a real gentleman despite this rough and tough game. Chapeau !
Wish him all the luck for his future.
Classy player. Model of consistency.
Playing under 4 different national coaches is very impressive.