Before Ollie Sleightholme made his England debut this summer in New Zealand, the team’s captain, Jamie George, asked Sleightholme’s father, Jon, to send him a message which could be read out in the team meeting. One part of that message explained that while Sleightholme snr was immensely proud, he felt something greater than that. “Proud as a word doesn’t do it justice. What I said in that message was that I felt really privileged, because we were joining a club of fathers and sons that had played for their country. That just feels very special to be a part of,” Sleightholme snr says.
Jon Sleightholme won 12 England caps and scored four tries in the mid-1990s, including the only try in England’s win over Ireland to wrap up the 1996 Five Nations title at Twickenham.
It was his first England try, scored in the same corner where his son would also score his own first try for his country 24 years later.
“You know where you scored your first try and don’t forget these things. It is a ‘pinch yourself’ moment.” Mind you the current pre-match build-up at Twickenham, with its full-on laser show and pyrotechnics, has come on a little bit since the mid-1990s.
“My dad was nudging me before kick-off last weekend with the laser show and the razzmatazz. He’s a Yorkshire bloke and he said, ‘wouldn’t have happened in [my] day’. I agreed. The Barbour brigade wouldn’t have been happy with that back in the 1990s.”
Sleightholme’s ‘exceptional pace’
Ollie might have Yorkshire in his blood but he is Northampton born and raised, signing a two-year contract extension in recent weeks to stay with the club he grew up watching, whose academy helped to develop him, the team his father joined in 1997 and his younger brother, Frankie, also played for before joining Ealing Trailfinders.
There was no push for Ollie to be immediately signed up to minis rugby, no deliberate move for him to follow in his father’s footsteps. He was athletic, wanted to try everything, and “had a huge competitive streak from a young age”.
That included cycling, competing in races as a junior rider for Team Milton Keynes. A bit of cricket. Athletics, too, with Sleightholme, unsurprisingly, training as a sprinter. “Exceptional pace” was one quality Steve Borthwick mentioned when calling Sleightholme up for the summer tour after he had topped the Premiership try-scoring charts with 14, scoring in the final to help Northampton win the league title. Sevu Reece, the All Blacks wing, is still chasing after Sleightholme after getting burned in the summer.
When he was seven years old and a friend was heading off to train at Northampton Old Scouts Rugby Club, Sleightholme wanted to go along as well. “He never looked back,” notes his father. Too young to remember watching Jon’s final years with Northampton, Ollie did end up scouring YouTube for a clip of Sleightholme snr being blasted out of the way by Jonah Lomu during the 1996 Hong Kong Sevens, when Lomu was part of a frankly outrageous New Zealand side that included Christian Cullen and Eric Rush.
When Lomu lined up with the forwards for the kick-off, Jon thought he had escaped the prospect of a one-on-one tackle. Then, at the first scrum, Lomu moved out to the wing opposite him, picking up speed from 30 metres away. “I was left in a pile. He went over two more of our players and scored in the corner. And my young boys thought that was hilarious. There was a lot of mickey-taking.”
From 13, when Ollie became part of Northampton’s developing player programme, the other sports were dropped. The difference between the kids who make it and the ones who wonder what might have been, Sleightholme snr believes, can come down to dedication, work ethic, looking after themselves.
“He works really hard, he is such a grafter with his skills, his strength and conditioning. From a very young age he was so dedicated and focused on his craft. That kind of effort and energy, coaches recognise that. It will stand you in better stead.”
‘He’s a tough, angry man’
While he can spot “little quirks and mannerisms” watching his son play that can make it sometimes feel as though he is “looking in the mirror”, the two notably differ in one area; Ollie’s growing mullet. “There’s no way I would have gotten away with it in my day,” adds Jon. “You can get away with all sorts of weird hair-dos these days. Mick Skinner could do that, but who is going to argue with Mick Skinner?” It’s a fair point.
Sleightholme snr puts the mullet influence down to Ollie being in New Zealand last summer with England, a place which is “right up his street” as an “outdoorsy guy” who loves fishing and hiking.
The family could not travel to New Zealand in time for his debut which has made the last few weeks all the more special, with Sleightholme scoring three tries so far. Defenders are certainly finding him hard to subdue. “He’s a very tough man to bring down, he’s an angry man. You don’t want to get on the wrong side of Sleights,” adds George Furbank, Sleightholme’s team-mate at club and country, with a laugh.
What has been clear so far is that Sleightholme has not been overawed by the step up to Test rugby. You can look out on Sunday for his father being “twitchy” in the stands, playing the game from his seat. The only message he now gives to his son, otherwise trying to stay out the way unless Ollie needs him, is to underline what an honour it is to wear the England shirt. “I didn’t know my last cap was my last, you just don’t know, sometimes,” adds Jon. “You have to go out there and enjoy every single moment.”
