wallaby; Former captain Michael Hooper reveals why he left

An updated Michael Hooper has revealed why he left the Wallabies earlier this year and also stepped down as captain as he prepares to return to the Australian team this weekend.

Hooper withdrew from the Wallabies ahead of Argentina’s first rugby championship test in early August due to mental health issues and says he knows there will be difficult days as he prepares for a European spring tour.

The 30-year-old explained why he pulled out of the tour, saying “it was an easy decision because I was wrong” just a few months after he became a father.

“I’ve been playing this game for a long time,” said Hooper from Australia’s training base in France ahead of this weekend’s match against Scotland.

“There have been big changes in my life this year and I think a lot of things went through my head that came out in Argentina. Argentina was not where I needed to be or where I could figure out all these things.

“I wanted to be close to my family and I wanted to be in a place where I could spend time on the things I needed to spend time on.

“This does not mean that I am sitting now fully recovered. It’s not like that at all, it’s just that at that moment I needed to be somewhere else, and it wasn’t Argentina.

“I’m very happy to be back. I’m also a realist, knowing that the last time I was here, it didn’t quite work out. I’m returning to this position because I want to be here.

“I’m sure there will be really good days, and there will be days when the reality of travel and rugby and all that is going to be difficult. I think it’s part of the whole journey and what we’re doing.”

Australia’s most prolific rugby captain says the decision was compounded by the fact that he was overseas and began to look at life from a different perspective, knowing he had other people to worry about.

Hooper devised a plan to return to the field the moment he landed in Sydney, but those plans fell through as he adjusted to life away from the game.

He said the pressure on himself didn’t work and that Rugby Australia supported him throughout the process, making it easier to move away from a career that was set on a tight schedule.

The indefatigable striker is ready to take on Scotland this weekend, but he won’t have a C next to his name and James Slipper will be in charge of the tour.

He will be asked about this in the coming months, but right now he just wants to support Slipper after everything he did for him while he was on the sidelines.

“He supported me for a long time and was a wonderful person throughout my captaincy,” said Hooper.

“He got my maximum support in everything he needs.

“He told me he wanted me to come back and enjoy my rugby and compete. He understands that it is good for the team if I am doing well, first of all mentally, but also physically.”

Hooper said talk of captaining a team at the World Cup next year was premature given that his recent hiatus has shown how fleeting the sport can be and that Australian rugby fully respects his decision to step down from the captaincy for now.

“We specified these things, and there were no subpoenas from anyone,” he said.

“It’s a very moving, moving thing.

“In the end, the decision to go on this tour and not have the level of responsibility that I had before seemed quite natural, so I could focus on myself.”

Hooper has spent the last 12 weeks working with therapists and reading a lot to get his head in order, which is far from what he would have done at the beginning of his career.

“As a young man, I considered asking for help as a sign of weakness,” he said, thanking his wife, family and friends for their support.

“You want to feel like you did it, but of course I didn’t.

“I am at a time when employers as well as the general public supported me in this decision. We live in a time when this material is being heard more and more.

“I look back on that period and it’s part of being human. It was a great time in my life and I was lucky to have such support.”

Originally published as Former Wallabies captain Michael Hooper reveals why he left