KEY POINTS:
When Jonny Wilkinson fell to the ground in agony during England's first World Cup training session it would have been entirely understandable if he had burst into tears and pummelled the turf in frustration.
Yet so many times has this remarkable sportsman, now 28, had his hopes raised
only to see them crushed, that he has become almost Zen-like in his attitude to injury.
"I completely rolled my ankle, heard a load of noise and was in real agony. I pretty much resigned myself to the understanding that that was probably it," Wilkinson said of his mishap two weeks ago.
"But when I was lying there I asked myself how I would feel if that was it, having had 10 weeks of giving absolutely everything to have just 45 minutes of a training session - and it wasn't something that bothered me.
"It meant accepting that I'd done my best, that I would go home and attack the next bit as well as I could.
"It's amazing what happens to you when you stop trying to play God. It's amazing what can come round when you deal with just what's there."
Things were different four years ago when the peerless first five-eighth began his painful and exasperating slide from the peak of the sport.
In the aftermath of his World Cup heroics he underwent complicated surgery to alleviate a nerve problem in his shoulder then suffered a series of seemingly unconnected injuries and ailments that kept him out of the national team for three years.
A blood clot in a bicep, knee and ankle ligament damage, groin strains as well as appendicitis and a lacerated kidney meant he was unable to take on the captain's role he was handed by former coach Andy Robinson.
It even cut short his Lions tour to New Zealand after he had strung together a few problem-free months.
It all seemed so unfair, all the more so for Wilkinson's being one of sport's true gentlemen, but with each new setback he grew more accustomed to dealing with the situation.
Famously obsessive in his approach to the game, he was equally determined with his various spells of rehabilitation and eventually realised he had undergone "a 180-degree spin" in his thinking that helped him cope with the latest injury.
"Worrying about what the scan was going to show, there was just no need, it was going to show what it was going to show. I think I was just more ready for that," said Wilkinson.
"Even if I was talking to you at home now I wouldn't have said it was a bad scan result, just the scan result.
"In the past I've done my knees and sat there willing it to be one thing not the other, but not with this one. That's not a cop-out in any way, it doesn't mean I care any less, it just means I was able to sit there and accept it was a bad start."
It was a bad start shared by England, as without Wilkinson they laboured to a 28-10 win over the United States before their 36-0 humiliation by South Africa.
After spending most of that fortnight with his foot in a bucket of ice, Wilkinson recovered enough to be named in the team to play Samoa in Nantes on Sunday.
The ultimate team man, though, he has no time for talk about him being the catalyst for a change in England's fortunes.
"It never is just down to one player," he said.
"It's down to a shift in attitude, mentality and approach and the interaction between the players on the field."
But England fans, and anyone with an ounce of compassion, will hope that Wilkinson survives the next few days to ensure he is one of them.
- Reuters, Independent
