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15th June 2023
01:09pm BST
"My leg was painful and was getting worse as the game went on. I tried to go on but I got a second contact on the same leg. It's a lot better now. I was worried that my season was finished but, thankfully, it is better now. It's okay. "The staff were worried and even me. I was not sure if it was broken, or not, because it hurt me so much during the game. I got a knee on the chest, too. But everything is okay now."These Fijians are made of hardy stuff. La Rochelle are made of hardy stuff. Will Skelton, Jonathan Danty and Botia all looked badly dinged up in that semi-final win but expect all three to be involved on Saturday night at Stade de France. [caption id="attachment_288969" align="aligncenter" width="594"]
Levani Botia of Fiji is tackled during a match against Tonga at the 2012 Gold Coast Sevens, Australia. (Photo by Chris Hyde/Getty Images)[/caption]
"The hardship continued for me [in Suva, Fiji's capital city]. I didn’t have bus fare and that time the bus fare was $1.20 so I had to think wisely how I would cater for my expenses. "So every day after lunch I used to put on my shoes and walk [15 kilometres] to Suva from Nakasi for training, with $1.20 in my pocket for my fare back. My dream was bigger than what I have with me."He was playing away steadily but had to get a job to help out paying his way. He got himself a job as a prison officer but the role was flexible enough to allow him to keep chasing that rugby dream. "My professional rugby started with the wardens [sevens] team. I did a half-day work at the prison and a half-day of training in the afternoon and every weekend I would play [with City Eagles] and start again from Monday to Friday." Further complicating matters for Botia, in a rom-com way, was the fact that Emele Veivuke, now his wife, was not a fan of rugby. Fiji has lots of young men that dream of nothing else and it can get in the way of them getting those 9-5 jobs. Emele was conscious of that but believed her Levani was working steadily as a prison officer and not chasing clouds. That all changed when his double life was revealed in 2011. Levani had told Emele he had to go to Nadi, on the east coast of Fiji, for a workshop. That weekend, she turned on the TV and saw him playing for Fiji at the Pacific Games in New Caledonia. "I was so upset and angry with him," she recalled. Once the truth was out, though, and the couple sat down for a proper chat, Emele realised that not only was rugby his aching aspiration, it was an achievable dream. She was fully on-board and they were now a team. Three years later, now an established sevens star with Fiji, Emele and Levani had another big decision to make. [caption id="attachment_288968" align="aligncenter" width="1280"]
La Rochelle head coach Ronan O'Gara with Levani Botia before the Heineken Champions Cup Final, at Aviva Stadium in Dublin. (Photo by Ramsey Cardy/Sportsfile)[/caption]
"I was surprised when I got the call [from Sireli]," says Levani Botia. "He was asking me to come for a medical and a trial with La Rochelle. I've loved it ever since arriving here. I will do everything I can for this club, and these people, every chance I get to play."In 10 seasons, Botia has racked up 180 games for La Rochelle, logging just shy of 11,000 competitive minutes and 10 times that in training and prep. He played left wing, right wing and centre in his his four seasons in France but started getting run-outs as a flanker from 2017 on. Romain Sazy and Uini Atonio are two of the long-term Stade Rochelais veterans, along with Botia. 2017 was the season that two talented, hungry young players arrived - Gregory Alldritt and Pierre Bougarit. That was also the season Tawera Kerr-Barlow arrived from New Zealand. Those six players would be key in this club's climb. After two 9th place finishes, in their first seasons back (2015 and 2016), the club topped the regular season standings in 2016/17 and advanced straight to a semi-final, against Toulon, at Stade Velodrome in Marseille. That game was a tight and tense as you can get before Anthony Belleau broke Stade Rochelais hearts with an 80th minute drop goal. La Rochelle missed out on the league playoffs, the following season, and Jono Gibbes arrived from Ulster in 2018. A season later, Gibbes stepped into a Director of Rugby role and Ronan O'Gara, fresh from two Super Rugby titles as Scott Robertson's assistant at Crusaders, came in as head coach. As we know now, Ronan O'Gara has achieved legendary status for the third time in his rugby career - Munster, Ireland and La Rochelle. He is fondly regarded in New Zealand, too, after a trophy-laden spell as assistant to Scott Robertson's Crusaders. On May 20th, O'Gara led Stade Rochelais to their second, successive Champions Cup. Still seething over what he perceived as disrespect in the lead-up to the match, the Cork native declared, "We're seen as the little team but that's about to change." Botia is not the only La Rochelle player to speak in warm, awed tones about O'Gara. He says:
"There are a lot of things I have learned from past coaches but Ronan is a little more different from all of them. It's more specific and across all different areas. Sometimes we will try to get something done and think it is right but he'll say, 'No, it's still wrong'. He gives us a lot of time, and work, to learn everything, especially most of us who have played a long career but we still have more to learn from him."O'Gara inherited a really good squad. He has not only made the great, he has made them one of the greatest success stories in club rugby since the game turned professional. He has also helped to transform Levani Botia into a consistent, world-class operator. "He believes in me," says Botia. [AUTHOR'S NOTE: I had almost hit 'publish on this article when I realised I had not fully explained how incredible a rugby player Levani Botia is. The man would be warmly welcomed into any rugby side, the world over, as a centre and yet is even better as a back-row. He is a dump-truck to shift off the ball, a breakdown demon, one of the best offloaders in the game, a go-to guy for game-changing plays, attack and defence, and still able to shift it for a guy who is in his mid 30s.]
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