Alex Mitchell was looking to build on a breakthrough season when, one Thursday morning this summer, he encountered a problem most people would find incredibly disconcerting.
‘I woke up and I couldn’t really move my neck,’ Mitchell, the Northampton and England scrum-half, tells Mail Sport matter-of-factly.
After a campaign which had seen him win the Premiership title and become his country’s first-choice No 9, Mitchell’s complaint came out of nowhere. It forced him to miss all four of England’s November Tests.
‘I rang the club doctor and she said to come in. The problem was I wasn’t sure if I could drive as I couldn’t look over my shoulder,’ Mitchell says.
‘I was in a lot of pain and sweating while I was driving. I was ready to pull over and ask someone to come and pick me up. But I made it in the end and got some treatment and painkillers. The first week was horrid. I just couldn’t move.
‘I was in a heap. I did the first four or five…
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