“It was a bit of a rollercoaster to be honest with you.”

That is Cardiff Rugby and Wales flanker James Botham’s assessment of his first year in international rugby back in 2020.

Botham, having broken into the Cardiff team in the two years prior, was a beneficiary of Wayne Pivac’s desire to blood some younger players during the hastily organised Autumn Nations Cup.

Botham impressed in his first outing in a Wales shirt, starting three matches at both blindside and openside, and standing out for his work rate and physicality.

The next year’s Six Nations offered Botham a chance to soak up a new environment, appearing three further times – all from the bench – as Wales won the title.

Having then started all three of Wales’ summer internationals against Canada and Argentina, it seemed as though Botham would be a fixture in the Wales squad for the foreseeable future.

However, the Cardiff forward would have to wait a staggering 932 days until he pulled on the red jersey again.

‘It was radio silence’

“That was a long period of time,” Botham admits.

“In my head, I said to myself, ‘I just want to get to Wales camp and give everything and try and cement a position if I can.’

“In terms of feedback after I was dropped, it was radio silence really. I’m not one to ring people up and ask why I haven’t been picked.

“It was a case of keeping my head down and playing regularly for Cardiff and then hopefully they see it.”

Even a change of coach did not help Botham. When Pivac was replaced by Warren Gatland in 2022, the returning coach called up a large number of players to ‘test’ them at international level.

Botham was not one of them.

“I think everyone needs a bit of communication in that way,” Botham adds.

“Obviously, there’s right and wrong communication, but just to know that you are on the radar. It would have been nice to have that.

“If it’s complete radio silence, it puts you in the mindset of ‘am I done?’ You start questioning yourself and you can get into a bit of a spin.

“I kept my head down, though, and managed to control what I could control.”

Injury Woe

Still, Botham could not get a look in until last year. But the flanker was not just unlucky in terms of international honours, he also had to deal with injury issues halting his momentum at key times.

His eventual return to international rugby, a start against Scotland in the first round of the 2024 Six Nations, would end with the flanker on the treatment table.

Botham had sparked a potential Welsh comeback with a try, only to hobble off with a knee injury one minute later.

“I wouldn’t say that I’ve changed anything with my game to get back to the level,” Botham explains.

“I just stuck to my own processes, try and train well, be top of the tests. Keeping my head down and not sulking about it was probably the main thing.”

Aborted Stag Do

Having been initially left out of Wales’ summer internationals with South Africa and Australia, Botham was handed a late call up, scuppering some pretty big plans.

“I had to cancel my stag do!” Botham jokes.

“I was meant to be off to Ireland with my mates, so we hastily rearranged things and had a small one instead.

“When I arrived in camp, I was two days off my stag do. The coaches were asking me how much running I had been doing since the season finished.

“I’m not sure if the other boys did a Bronco or what but if they did, thankfully they got it out of the way before I arrived!”

Good Performances, Bad Results

Despite not being in the initial squad, Botham impressed on tour, starting the South Africa match before making an impression off the bench in the first test against Australia.

His good form earnt him a starting berth in the final test, playing the full 80 minutes as Wales played perhaps their best game of the year.

Despite the good performances on tour, Wales have failed to win a match in 2024 and have now lost 12 test matches in a row – a record for the country.

Botham’s performances, though, have been impressive. More starts came in the Autumn Internationals, including a mammoth effort in a losing cause against double World Champions South Africa.

Botham completed 21 tackles, made the most dominant tackles of anyone on the pitch, and scored a try.

“I definitely felt some pride in my performance but still gutted about the result,” Botham says.

“It’s a strange one to be honest. I said at the time that there is going to be a lot of negativity out there, people taking shots at us for the sake of it.

“We’ve got a real good group of lads, and you can see in camp that we are all pulling in the right direction.”

‘It will happen’

While it is difficult to see where and when Wales are going to turn around this losing run, what is clear is that players like Botham are well aware of the criticism of the team.

Recent weeks and months have seen pundits debate whether this is the ‘worst ever’ Wales team, and those voices are heard by the players in camp.

“I think everyone deals with the negativity differently,” Botham says.

“Some lads do definitely get bogged down by it all, others are able to let it wash over them a bit.

“Nine times out of ten, the comments are from people trying to get a reaction. We just try and keep our heads down.

“There have been so many teams in the past who have been in a similar situation to us, where people write them off, and then suddenly something clicks, and they start winning. You see then that everyone moves on to another team to target with the negativity.”

Botham, though, is confident that that ‘click’ moment is not far away for Wales.

“It will happen,” Botham insists.

“We’ve got a lot of boys who have not played a whole lot of rugby but are getting more and more experience.

“Obviously, the results haven’t been going our way but the way the boys regroup after setbacks has been really good to see. The more we play together and improve together, the better we will be.”

---

If you want to read more pieces from Sportin Wales, why not read to our monthly magazine here or subscribe to the magazine and newsletter at https://sportin.wales/subscribe/.

Our podcast is back for the new season and our co-founder Alex Cuthbert is in charge! You can find all the episodes here or the video versions on our YouTube channel.

You can also keep track of our pieces and videos on our socials at @Sportin_Wales on X or Sportin Wales on Instagram and Facebook.