Joe Marler’s advice helped ‘hot-head’ Kyle Sinckler cool down

In his previous season with Harlequins, Kyle Sinckler had been cultivating a reputation as a bit of a hot-head.

This season, though, he appears to have turned it around. Today, the Lions tighthead spoke of how an intervention from a few of his international heroes and a chat with elite sports psychologists has helped cool him down.

Asked what the turning point for him was, Sinckler said: “I think it was when Joe Marler sat me down and said, ‘You’ve got to stop it’.

“And probably the one thing I’ve never touched on is we played Wasps away last year and I came on at half-time for Adam Jones and I was fuming that we were playing so badly and I could’ve been sent off about two or three times. James Horwill and Jones took it upon themselves to tell me after, ‘Look, you’ve got to stop it because it’s all about you’. That’s how it comes across, it’s all about me, and it’s always me starting the fights and costing the team.

“Those guys have gone out of their way to speak to me and they didn’t have to and they just said you’ve got a lot of talent but if you don’t sort your image out and sort yourself out [you will be in trouble].”

Although he has never started any of his eight Tests for England, 24-year-old Sinckler was one of the Lions’ stand-out performers in their opening tour match, against the New Zealand Provincial Barbarians, and starts against the Highlanders tomorrow alongside Quins and England team-mate Marler, as well as Ireland captain Rory Best, who starts at hooker.

“I’m just grateful those guys were happy to talk to me because that flicked a switch there and then,” Sinckler added, before explaining that he has also spoken with sports psychologists at his club and with the England team as well.

He added: “I was lucky enough to go on tour to Australia with England that summer. Eddie [Jones] took a chance on me as I’d only started two or three games for Harlequins.

“We’re lucky at Quins as we have a great psychologist in Pieter Kruger, who works with South Africa. And at England we’ve got Jeremy Snape as well.

“It’s a part of maturing as well. I’m still growing, still becoming a man and learning from my mistakes.”