Manu Tuilagi

Manu Tuilagi’s full name is Etuale Manusamoa Tuilagi. He was named after Manu Samoa, the Samoan national side, because his brother Freddie was picked for their 1991 World Cup squad the year he was born. Five of his brothers — Freddie, Henry, Alesana, Anitelea and Sanele Vavae — went on to play for Samoa. The youngest of them played sixty Tests for England.

Centre at Bayonne, 1.85m and 108kg. For fifteen years he has been the most physically intimidating midfielder in the northern hemisphere.

Born in Fogapoa, Samoa, he came to the UK to join his brothers and started playing in 2004 at Rumney RFC in Cardiff, where Freddie was at the Blues. He moved to Leicester at fifteen and into the Tigers academy. In June 2010 he faced deportation after it emerged he had entered the country on a holiday visa six years earlier and never left; he appealed and was granted indefinite leave to remain.

He played against South Africa for Leicester at Welford Road in November 2009, aged eighteen, and Leicester won. He was a first-team regular the following season, and England capped him against Wales on 6 August 2011. He was banned that year for punching Chris Ashton in a semi-final.

Leicester gave him a championship in 2013 and two losing finals. Sale took him in 2020 specifically so he would stay in the Premiership and remain England-eligible; an Achilles injury meant three matches that first season. He started the 2023 final, lost 35-25 to Saracens, and won the 2020 Premiership Cup.

Sixty caps, fifty-one starts, twenty tries. A Grand Slam in 2016, another Six Nations in 2020, a World Cup final in 2019 and third place in 2023.

Bayonne signed him in March 2024 on two years and extended him in October 2025.

The body has cost him whole seasons and always will. What he still does is run a hard, straight line at a defender’s chest, which is not a fashionable skill and is very hard to defend.