Scotland on Sunday--REPORTS

Philip is unlucky No.13

IAIN MORRISON

WHATEVER his other faults, former Scotland coach Matt Williams did what Australians are renowned for and promoted young players with an almost religious fervour. Some players had scarcely thrown their school bag into the bin than they were back in front of a blackboard trying to memorise the lineout calls and back row moves of the Scotland squad.

In his first international against Wales in Cardiff last year Williams selected three young debutants. Ally Hogg continues to impress at the highest level and was about one millimetre away from scoring the winning try against France back in February. Chris Cusiter is set for New Zealand and has every chance of winning a Lions cap once he remembers what it is like to run forward as well as backwards. And Tom Philip has disappeared off the face of the earth.

If he didn’t have bad luck the young centre would have no luck at all because after damaging his cruciate knee ligaments one year ago Philip has endured not one but three separate operations in a desperate bid to regain something approaching full fitness.

Williams originally had to twist Frank Hadden’s arm to select Philip for Edinburgh just to get him some game time before that Cardiff debut. The centre played in every match of the Six Nations and, while the team struggled horribly, the young midfielder did all that was expected of him and then some.

Disaster struck on the summer tour to Australia where he suffered the same injury that befell Simon Taylor and Marcus Di Rollo. But while Taylor made a brave comeback midway through this year’s championship, Philip is at least six months away from taking to the field again.

"It’s not about my knee," he explains. "I think I could play on my knee tomorrow, although it would be painful. It’s about my back."

The youngster has been troubled by his back and groin - the two problems may well be related - ever since his days of amateur rugby with Hawks. He explained to people his problems, but all medical staff were united in being able to find nothing obviously wrong with him.

The player is not blaming the authorities, he even had a scan on the troublesome groin which showed nothing untoward, and a hernia operation before Christmas helped the situation but only marginally.

In exasperation Philip went to a London specialist who operated on his back two weeks ago, fusing the bottom two vertebrae together and adding a bone graft from his hips to lend the entire area added stability. The surgery was an attempt to sort a problem that can probably be traced to a teenage accident since Philip suffered a stress fracture in his vertebrae as a 14-year-old and, according to his surgeon, that old injury has been exacerbated by intense exercise ever since.

"I just thought that, being out with my knee injury, I had to get this back problem sorted out because it was going to have to be looked at sooner rather than later," said Philip last week, finally able to walk two weeks after the operation.

"It was really upsetting for me not being able to explode away, which is what my game is all about. I couldn’t really get past half pace.

"The surgeon said that my vertebrae had degenerated so they looked like those of a 40 or 50-year-old man and for a 21-year-old that is not healthy. They injected dye into the vertebrae to check if they had any cracks and it just leaked out everywhere.

"The bottom two were out of line and sliding against each other. While a lot of people have the problem and live with it, if you are in a big collision as a rugby player goodness knows what could happen. I needed it fixed if I was going to get back and play at any level of the game again."

Almost inevitably there were those who, with the medics unable to find the root of the problem, suspected that it was a mental rather than a physical issue which can only have exasperated the youngster even more.

"I’m not the kind of guy to make up injuries," he says. "I have had broken noses and broken hands, I’ve always played with pain," and perhaps now former critics might just realise how much.

"But the trouble was that I am young, fit and looked healthy on the pitch. The injuries didn’t look like they were hampering me much but even when I was playing in the Six Nations I wasn’t fully fit and I couldn’t produce the stuff that I knew I was capable of. My lack of pace and ability to explode into contact lessened my confidence and I realised that it was eventually going to get me dropped."

After his meteoric rise to the top of the game Philip has experienced an equally fast fall in the last 12 months and, while the old saying about what goes up must come down bears true, no-one deserves the sort of crash landing Edinburgh’s young centre experienced.

His confidence has never been as robust as a physical frame that earned him the nickname "Tank" and, with the darkest days behind him, Philip can now admit that there were times during the last year when he was "way, way down" before adding, "I still am up to a point."

At least now with his latest operation, the third in the last 12 months, offering some hope of full recuperation he is able to see some silver lining. The operation is similar to the one that both Ian Botham and Andy Gomersall had, so there is every hope that Philip will once again don the national shirt, although he is realistic, ruefully admitting, "there are no guarantees".

While his Edinburgh team-mate Di Rollo is filling the outside-centre slot against the Barbarians, it would do both club and country the power of good to have both him and Philip fighting for the No 13 shirt.

Meanwhile Philip is at least free from the agony he felt for two days following the operation that has left a red-raw nine-inch "zip" at the base of his spine.

Like everyone else he will tune into the Lions tour this summer but, unlike everyone else, he will reflect on what might have been. "I have played against Gavin Henson a few times," he muses, "and it would be nice to do so again. It is frustrating seeing these guys who were on the same level as me (a year ago) go on and achieve things while I am out of the game.

"I am sure that the operation will help but whether it will stop the pain altogether I will have to wait and see. I am sure that I will play again and I am determined to get to the same level that I was at before. I can do a lot more than I have shown so far and I only hope to get another chance to prove it."

Given that he ran through brick walls before the diagnosis, Scottish rugby fans will be wishing the youngster a successful comeback so that the only pain in Philip’s life is the stuff which he would be handing out to any opponent foolhardy enough to stand between him and the try line.

This article was posted on 15-May-2005, 08:22 by Hugh Barrow.