Ben Youngs to retire at end of season

[FKAS]

From the Tigers website.

Ben Youngs will retire from professional rugby at the conclusion of the 24/25 season.

The Leicester Tigers scrum-half made his 332nd senior appearance for the club as a replacement in the Easter Sunday win over Bristol Bears.

Youngs debuted for the senior team in February 2007, against Argentina, while still a member of the club’s Academy programme, before becoming the youngest-ever league representative for Leicester Tigers when he debuted in the Premiership against Bristol two months later.

“The time will come to thank everybody who has helped me achieve what I have but, that’s for when it comes to an end. For now, it’s about finishing this chapter of my life with some more success. I’m not done just yet.”

Of his 332 appearances, 238 have been in the top-tier of English club rugby, placing him just outside of the top ten for all-time appearances in the competition, while he holds the club record for most European appearances with 84, including 78 in the Champions Cup.

Youngs is a five-time Premiership winner, and three-time runner-up, as well as a three-time Anglo-Welsh Cup winner and, in the 2014/15 campaign, captained the club in the absence of club captain Ed Slater.

Ben Youngs
In almost two decades since his senior debut, he has amassed over 500 games while representing Leicester Tigers, England, England ‘A’, England Under-20s, England 7s, the British & Irish Lions, and the Barbarians, as well as non-capped sides for both Tigers and the Lions.

He featured in four Rugby World Cups (2011, 2015, 2019, 2023) and the 2013 British & Irish Lions tour of Australia. Youngs was selected as part of the 2017 Lions squad but withdrew from the tour of New Zealand for personal reasons.

Youngs retired from international rugby at the conclusion of the 2023 Rugby World Cup as the most-capped senior men’s Test player for England with 127 caps.

On 365 occasions in his 524 matches over the past two decades, Youngs has been included in matchday squads alongside Leicester Tigers teammate and close friend Dan Cole for club, country and the Lions. Cole is second on the all-time list for England appearances with 118.

Ben’s career also saw him play for Tigers, England and the Lions with brother Tom, who retired from rugby in 2022. Their father, Nick, also represented both Leicester and England between 1981-88.

In 2021, the Youngs family became the first to reach a combined total of 600 appearances for Leicester Tigers, which now totals 692 after Ben’s 332nd appearance in Round 14 of the 24/25 Gallagher Premiership. Nick made 145 senior appearances for the club in seven seasons, while Tom made 215 appearances between 2006-21.

Since retiring from international rugby, Youngs, alongside clubmate Cole, he started a podcast, For The Love of Rugby, in January 2024.

In September 2024, he began working as Head of Performance Sport with his alma mater, Gresham’s School, to help to nurture high-performance athletes across a range of disciplines at the Norfolk education institute.

Team Appearances Starter Replacement Tries Conv. Pens. Points
Barbarians 1 0 1 0 0 0 0
B&I Lions Test 2 1 1 0 0 0 0
B&I Lions Tour Game 5 2 3 2 0 0 10
England Test 127 95 32 20 0 0 100
England Under-20s 15 9 6 4 0 0 20
England 7s 2 1 4 0 13
England XV 2 1 1 0 0 0 0
Leicester Tigers 332 250 82 43 1 6 235
Leicester Tigers 7s 1 5 25
Leicester Tigers ‘A’ 14 12 2 4 6 2 38
Leicester Tigers XV 22 15 7 4 0 0 20
Grand Total 523 385 134 83 11 8 461
Speaking about his decision to retire at the end of the season, Youngs said: “It’s a bittersweet feeling really. Obviously, I’m sad at the thought it’s coming to an end but I’m excited about the rest of this season, excited about what this group can do.”

“That’s the strange part, I’m using the ‘r’ word [retirement] but it isn’t over today, there is still plenty of rugby left this season and that’s what is at the front of my mind. I’m not done, let’s not write the obituary just yet.

“I have spent two decades of my life here at the club and I have been lucky to be a part of some incredible moments along the way, enjoyed so much success and made memories that will last a lifetime.

“It’s all I have known in club rugby, the green, red and white, and all I’ve wanted to know. The idea of playing against this club wasn’t ever an option for me and so, for me to be able to finish a one-club player will be one of my greatest achievements.

“The time will come to thank everybody who have helped me achieve what I have but, that’s for when it comes to an end. For now, it’s about finishing this chapter of my life with some more success. I’m not done just yet.”

[TheNomad]

Congrats on a great career Young Ben

[Insouciant]

Ben Youngs' retirement interview on his and Cole-y's 'For the love of rugby' Youtube channel

[Insouciant]

Ben Youngs' retirement interview on his and Cole-y's 'For the love of rugby' Youtube channel

Congratulations to Ben. Hopefully he has an equally long career as a youtuber, if you haven't watched the content on FTLOR it's excellent.

[Oakboy]

I certainly agree with his comments about the lack of a marketable structure for the spread of club fixtures.

[Slater582]

Borthwick’s perceived lack of empathy is the most damning accusation. When Borthwick, having been Eddie Jones’s assistant at England, coached Leicester, Youngs writes: “I met Eddie for a coffee. He wanted to talk about how things were for Tiff and [Youngs’ brother] Tom and whether he could do anything to help. He wanted to know how I was doing emotionally. It was strange that my club coach, who I saw every day, never asked the same question. Unbelievable, actually. What sort of man management was that? What sort of basic human decency, even? I guess if it wasn’t written on a data sheet, Steve didn’t compute.”

Youngs is dubious of the “one-dimensional rugby” they played at Leicester, but he still praises Borthwick as “a very good coach. You certainly don’t go into a game in any grey area. You know what your job is and what the gameplan is, and he’s very thorough.”

Borthwick sometimes consigned Youngs to the bench for key games with Leicester . “There were obviously aspects of my game he wasn’t a fan of. I never got to the bottom of it because he’s not someone you could sit down and go: ‘What do I need to do?’ You don’t get that empathy, that dialogue.”

Not sure that appraisal of Borthwick will come as a surprise to anyone.

[Puja]

https://x.com/donaldgmcrae/status/1971117164402020800

Borthwick’s perceived lack of empathy is the most damning accusation. When Borthwick, having been Eddie Jones’s assistant at England, coached Leicester, Youngs writes: “I met Eddie for a coffee. He wanted to talk about how things were for Tiff and [Youngs’ brother] Tom and whether he could do anything to help. He wanted to know how I was doing emotionally. It was strange that my club coach, who I saw every day, never asked the same question. Unbelievable, actually. What sort of man management was that? What sort of basic human decency, even? I guess if it wasn’t written on a data sheet, Steve didn’t compute.”

Youngs is dubious of the “one-dimensional rugby” they played at Leicester, but he still praises Borthwick as “a very good coach. You certainly don’t go into a game in any grey area. You know what your job is and what the gameplan is, and he’s very thorough.”

Borthwick sometimes consigned Youngs to the bench for key games with Leicester . “There were obviously aspects of my game he wasn’t a fan of. I never got to the bottom of it because he’s not someone you could sit down and go: ‘What do I need to do?’ You don’t get that empathy, that dialogue.”

Not sure that appraisal of Borthwick will come as a surprise to anyone.

Empathy provision is currently outsourced to Kevin Sinfield, I believe.

Mind, not sure the mercuriality of Eddie would be great either. I had a boss like him once - he'd be utterly shitty and overly strict with you and then act surprised that you took him seriously because it was clearly a joke, and then there'd be something that he said where it it was clearly kidding because it was outrageous and completely beyond the pale, only for it to turn out he was serious as a heart attack.

Puja

[Epaminondas Pules]

Well colour me shocked on spreadsheet Steve

[FKAS]

Yeah hardly surprising that Steve is #REF! when it comes to the touchy feely bits. It's always felt like he's selected his coaching teams with that in mind. Walters and Sinfield fulfilling that role initially.