Trevor Leota

Almost twenty years ago, Trevor Leota was helping Wasps become champions of Europe, but today the 46-year-old grandad is helping people in a different way, as a mental health worker determined to help halt the rise in youth suicide.

In a half-way house helping those with mental health problems on the occasionally mean streets of western Sydney, there’s a Samoan support worker who’s familiar to nearly every English club fan of a certain vintage. And, in fairness, far beyond that too, as the bleach-blond head on the full-figured frame of the former hooker was famed the rugby world over, known for being the equivalent of a human brick-wall for any unsuspecting attacker who decided to run down his channel.

Trevor Leota might not be the first person you expect to see as a mental health care support worker, but that’s perhaps only if you don’t know him, as he was among the pioneers when he set up his own School of Hard Knocks in the UK more than two decades ago.

And while he has more than 200 appearances for Wasps, Heineken Cup and Premiership winners’ medals, thirty caps, including two Rugby World Cups, on his rugby resume, perhaps his best work is being done quietly as you read this.

It’s always been something of a white-knuckle ride on and off the field for Leota, but the now 46-year-old is a passionate and vocal advocate for the mental health of youth in the Polynesian community on the east coast of Australia.

At the forefront of his thinking is youth suicide and mental well-being. Each day in Australia up to seven kids are lost to suicide with the rate even steeper in the Polynesian and First Nations populations.  “I never really knew how huge a problem mental health and youth suicide was until I started doing this sort of work after coming back to Australia from Canada,” explains Trevor, from his Brisbane home in Regents Park. “It’s a huge thing, and if it’s not addressed in the right way and talked about, it can fester and get a hell of a lot worse.

“For me it’s been a bit of a wake-up call,” he continues. “When I lived in Canada I knew that the suicide rate was horrendous there (up to five lives lost to suicide each day) but after coming back here I saw that the rate amongst the kids from the Pacific islands was just as bad – pretty much double the community average.

“That was a huge shock and I’m just glad that I’m in a position where I can make some sort of difference, no matter how small.

“I like to treat the people that I work with as family – tell them the truth and if they give me shit then I will come back to them just as hard, throw a bit of shit at them with a smile on my face.

“A lot of the kids out there think that there isn’t anything out there for them,” he adds. “Some feel that there isn’t anything there if they don’t make it in sports, whether that be rugby or whatever.

“But that’s far from the case,” he continues. “Kids just don’t realise that there  is so much opportunity out there for them and if I can help in a small way then that’s great.”

This is all a long way from his time at Wasps where he broke just about every rule there was on how to prepare for a rugby match and yet, more often than not, came up with the right result.

A lot has happened in his life since then, some not all that flash, but he still has a positive attitude to life that doesn’t always correspond with his bank account.

At Wasps, Kentucky Fried Chicken, pints of rum and Coke, too much time at the ‘after match’, and, for that matter, the ‘after training’, meant that he was often up for a good time, not a long time.

A famous story from his time at Loftus Rd had the club’s S&C boss Paul Stridgeon moving in with him in the lead-up to a cup final to make sure he steered well clear of the KFC until after game day, with his wife and children on holiday in New Zealand.

But there is no doubt that when he was on, the Samoan was as dangerous as anyone in the game.

His coach at Wasps at the time, Warren Gatland, believed he was the best No.2 on the planet on his day, despite the unusual approach.

Not many would doubt that he was at his most dangerous in the run-up to the 2004 European Cup final against Toulouse at Twickenham.

A mixture of some tough love from Gatland and a bit of focus on his diet (said to be the Atkins diet) saw his weight drop to around 125kg (after pushing 150kg earlier in the year) enabling some staying power to go with the odd nuclear explosion.

Through it all Trevor still has great memories of his time at Wasps. “It was awesome bro, just awesome,” he says. “The place felt like home right from the very start. The people were great, the fans were great and I ended up staying there for close to a decade.

“We won a few trophies along the way – two European Cups and some Premierships – so it wasn’t too bad.

“I got to play with some awesome people like Lawrence Dallaglio, Simon Shaw and Josh Lewsey.”

Trevor Leota and Lawrence Dallaglio joke around with the trophy after winning the Heineken Cup Final in 2004.

The Wasps connection came about through his cousin and then Manu Samoa team-mate ‘Inga the Winger’ Tuigamala. “We were on a tour of England, Scotland and Wales in 1995 with Samoa and ‘Inga’ wanted to know if I wanted to have a crack at playing some footy in the UK and if I would be interested to have a run at Wasps,” says Trevor. “It sounded like a bit of an adventure and the money sounded good so we were able to put together a deal that worked for me and right from the start the place had a great family feel about it.”

Trevor recalls how impressed he was with the impact that team-mate Lawrence Dallaglio had on the field. “Lawrence was massive in that team,” he explains. “A real workhorse and on top of that just one of those real hard buggers when he crossed the stripe.

“He was an integral part of the family there at Wasps at the time but away from the rugby he was a totally different person.

“When it came time to play he could flick the switch and get himself into the game zone.”

Trevor went head-to-head for the starting hooker spot for much of his time at Wasps with England No.2 Phil Greening. “It was good having Phil there with all his England experience but it wasn’t much of a battle – I started most of the time,” says Trevor, all deadpan before laughing heartily.

But after close to a decade together, just like his marriage, things turned a bit sour, with Wasps’ decision not to award Trevor a testimonial season after almost a decade of service the major sticking point. “Yeah, it’s a pretty complicated thing to explain but I felt let down not getting a testimonial after all I had done there,” he says. “After all, I had knocked back selection for the Rugby World Cup in 2003 to stay and play club but that’s something that can’t be changed. Staying and playing at Wasps was a decision made to provide for my family and on that front I have no regrets.”

The grass on the High Veldt of South Africa seemed to be so much greener and, after 202 games for Wasps, he joined the Cheetahs.

Big boys were in ample supply in that side, coached by Rassie Erasmus, and including Springboks Ollie le Roux, Os Du Randt, Juan Smith as well as Naka Drotske, and a Super Rugby season and a Currie Cup victory followed. “It was Naka’s final season and I worked essentially off the bench but that said it was a great experience to play in South Africa and to get the chance to play and work with all those guys.”

From there, after such a long time with Wasps, the only consistency was the inconsistency, as the roller coaster continued with time at French club Mont de Marsan who were in the Top 14 at that stage and then a coaching stint back in South Africa in Cape Town with SK Walmers, a club not far from the coloured housing precincts, that played in the Western Province senior club competition.

Throw in some time helping to run an elite sports academy in Dubai with former Socceroo great – and distant cousin – Tim Cahill and it’s been one hell of a journey.

Not that it finished in Dubai. Edmonton in Canada was the next stop before the caravan finally headed back down under, to the country of his birth, Australia.

Spending time with his grandchildren and watching his son Isaiah, a pretty handy scrum half emerging on the scene in Australia, brought him back to Sydney and now Brisbane.

Even now, three years shy of his half-century, Leota Sr is not completely done with playing. He turned out for West Harbour’s third-grade side when they were light on troops at one stage in the 2021 season in Sydney, only for the campaign to be cut short by the pandemic in Australia.

Trevor Leota lifts the trophy in front of his team-mates after their victory over Gloucester in the Zurich Premiership Final in 2003.

Since his move to Brisbane in the New Year he has linked up with Easts, where he is helping out with some skills coaching and defence technique.

Isaiah, meanwhile, is following in his father’s globetrotting footsteps, and has joined Italian second division club Verona and remains hopeful of impressing enough to open a few doors where the big money is: France. “Isaiah has settled in well in Italy and is really enjoying playing some footy in a different country,” adds Trevor. “He scored a couple of tries in his first game but covid has seen the comp shut down for a bit which isn’t great but he’s making his way over there.”

Isaiah’s not the only footy player in the family with daughter Sharelle, 27, playing rugby league in Auckland and, according to Leota, she is a big hitter.

Although Trevor was born in Australia, he was brought up in Auckland by his grandparents with his mother and father constantly away working.

It was the wrong side of the tracks and as he freely admits he hung out with all the wrong people. “We probably made some dumb decisions along the way in those times but it’s all part of growing up and being left to our own devices,” he says.

But the lessons he learnt off the field still weren’t as painful as those he had in the Auckland back yard with his uncles. “They used to take us outside and make me run the ball straight at them and I’d get smashed,” he recalls. “They taught me the (tackling) technique and as my grandfather would say to me, ‘if you don’t care about your body in rugby you will go a long way’.

“That’s just the way I like to play the game – nothing bad about it, but now they get red cards for that kind of tackling.”

At school, he came under the guidance of former All Blacks coach Graham Henry who was then principal and First XV coach at Kelston Boys’ High in Auckland.

Perhaps hard to believe, although he was known for having good hands, butTrevor was a pretty handy fly-half then and pushing for higher honours showing a good kicking game and an eye for a gap. “He (Henry) came up to me one day at school and just said, ‘Trevor you know I reckon you are better off at hooker,” recalls Trevor, “and it all sort of started from there.

“I can remember thinking to myself, ‘damn, I quite like getting my hands on the ball and avoiding the scrums and the rucks and mauls’.

“But it was the right call and things went from there.”

Rugby was the outlet that was important to him and it seemed to open the right doors at the right times too.

At one stage he headed back to Australia after being scouted by the Manly Sea Eagles, staying in a house that was run by the mother of rugby league bad boy John Hopoate. “I loved the one-on-one hitting and physical confrontation that that game brings to the table,” explains Trevor.  “I can remember guys like (NRL great and Kanagaroo) Mark ‘Spud’ Carroll helped us out with settling in and being impressed with guys like (NRL legend) Cliff Lyons who used to smoke like a chimney and still go out and win games.”

But rugby and a promise to his grandfather that he would one day play for Manu Samoa saw him back in New Zealand and putting his hand up for the Auckland Blues.

Selection in the Manu Samoa side for the 1995 Rugby World Cup in South Africa was the springboard that saw initial interest from Wasps boss Nigel Melville and the rest, as they say, is history.

It says something about his value to the Manu Samoa side that of his thirty Tests he started in 27 of them, playing in another RWC in the UK in 1999.

The RWC in Australia in 2003 could have been his third but he opted to stay and play with Wasps to cover for the fourteen players that the club had provided to a variety of nations at that time. “I can always remember my first game for Samoa and my grandfather telling me that he wanted me to play for Samoa,” he says. “He told me it should never be about the money it was about your heritage and your family.”

Most players come away from their time in the professional game with a nest-egg of some sort but it must be said that Trevor Leota is a richer man who continues to help and to give.

Story by Mark Cashman

Pictures by Brad Kanaris

This extract was taken from issue 17 of Rugby.
To order the print journal, click here.