European Cup: Gerry Thornley on the fascinating career of Jim Williams, the original hard-but-fair player, who has proved an inspired capture for the province.

When the home team was read out before the ACT Brumbies played the Lions in Canberra in the summer of last year, the name of Jim Williams received the biggest roar. Likewise he was afforded a huge ovation when he went off injured after about 50 minutes. That ACT fell apart a little without his leadership was almost secondary. Somehow, that apparent cult status told you that this guy was a bit special.

The watching then-Munster coach Declan Kidney, doing some extra curricular work as he travelled around Australia observing the Lions, liked what he heard. Kidney also liked what he heard when beginning negotiations with Williams. This was no mercenary seeking a last pay-out from the twilight of his career. He couldn't help feeling Munster were about to strike gold, that the player would make an impact. And so it has proved.

If anything, Williams has become even more influential than John Langford, his Aussie predecessor, mate and chief protagonist in the move from the Brumbies to Munster and today he leads Munster in their latest search for their Holy Grail that is the Heineken European Cup.

That this was decided by his team-mates is all we need to know about the esteem in which his leadership is held by his peers. That he's also assumed iconic status amongst the Munster supporters is testimony to the enduring excellence of his performances.

Wherever he's gone, Williams seems to have generated a popularity amongst supporters and respect from his peers. Why? "One, he's genuinely a nice person, there's no doubt about that," says coach Alan Gaffney. "He's just an absolute gentleman off the field, and indeed on the field, where he plays the game very, very hard.

"But I just think a lot of it revolves around the fact that he's such an honest player. You see with Jimmy what you get. Jimmy goes out, performs every game, gives his all, walks off the field drained and you know he couldn't have given more in that particular game. You mix that with the fact that he is genuinely a bloody terrific guy, I think they're the two major reasons."

Embittered by the way he was jettisoned for the Lions series as his old ACT mentor Rod Macqueen supposedly sought more long-term development of players, while nonetheless affording John Eales a fairy-tale ending, captaining Munster only adds to the fresh challenge Williams clearly needed when he joined the province.

"After winning the Super 12 final with the Brumbies I had another option of a year but I definitely needed a new perspective on my rugby career," Williams says

It's been what he's expected, "and a little bit tougher as well".

"In the Southern Hemisphere you don't get the variety as you do with the Heineken Cup. You play New Zealand and South African sides and you get to know what they do and what to expect.

"But here, from season to season, there's a great variety. It certainly does make you change your game, to a certain extent, and playing in different conditions as well."

Oh yeah, the Aussies do go on about their weather. "Aw mate, I love the fast track and the hard ground. It's just a joy to play in those conditions, 25 degrees on a beautiful summer's day. I mean, you can't really beat it.

"But back home I think the game turned professional a little bit quicker than it did here. They get a lot more support off the field and that helps the team on the field. They can concentrate on what they're doing. I think Ireland is still a couple of years behind. As for the rugby on the paddock, there isn't a vast amount of difference."

Williams' intriguing rugby story is further evidence that players who miss out on youth academies and the like shouldn't necessarily be bypassed for ever. The youngest child of eight born to Anne Williams, he was born in a small farming town 200 miles west of Canberra called Young, and left school to join the army at 16.

"My main motive was to get out of home, to get out of Young. I'd had enough of going to school and wanted something different. I didn't really want to go on to higher level school or university. I just wanted to get out of town and joining the army was the best way of doing it."

Rugby League took preference until he was posted up to Brisbane when he was 21. He returned to Sydney in March 1994 and joined Warringah but injuries to his shoulder, knee and hamstring limited him to four games that year and he decided to have a season with West Hartlepool.

"It was certainly an experience, to say the least. The Australians and the English don't really get on, either on or off the paddock when it comes to rugby, so we had our differences. But it was a good learning experience.

"I certainly did enjoy myself to start off with and I think it did make me a better player."

Back at Warringah he famously cites the 1996 Sydney Grand Final as the moment he decided to switch from wing to back-row after the mauling he took from David Campese. "He more or less won the game for Randwick. I was marking him and he set up two tries."

Ironically, Gaffney was coach to a Randwick backline incorporating not only Campese but Chris Latham, Jimmy Holbeck, Adam Magro, and George Gregan.

"Mate, I think he's under-estimating himself in that game," responds Gaffney to Williams' self-effacing critique of himself. "I do remember that game very clearly and Jimmy was one of Warringah's outstanding players that day on the wing.

"If Jimmy hadn't been playing that day I think Warringah would have been beaten by considerably more than they were. This is not being patronising, this is a matter of honesty."

On the strength of his performances for Warringah at numbers six and eight, Williams was offered the chance of a Super 12 contract with the Brumbies by Macqueen, from which he would go on to win 14 caps for the Wallabies in his 30s, and claim a Super 12, a Bledisloe Cup and a World Cup. Not bad for a late developer.

"First and foremost", he owes a debt to Macqueen for instigating his representative career, and then to current Australia coach Eddie Jones, who took over from Macqueen at ACT, for "developing me into the player I am now".

"He definitely had a lot to do with it, getting my mind right, getting my attitude right throughout the '98 season and following on from that getting me in the right condition."

Nonetheless it required some shock therapy from Jones to convert Williams on the road to professionalism, the then-ACT coach entering the Warringah dressing-room after a game and publicly berating Williams for his lack of conditioning.

"I remember it quite clearly," said Jones yesterday, speaking from an island off the Gold Coast where the Australians are in camp.

"I just thought at that stage he needed a few facts. He was really treading water in terms of his career and he just needed to know what he had to do to become a professional footballer. He took the advice on that day and all credit to Jimmy."

Needless to say, Jones isn't remotely surprised that Williams has filled the captaincy niche in Munster. "He's the sort of player people can relate to very quickly. He's a personable sort of bloke, plays the game hard, enjoys it off the field, he likes having a beer.

"That's the nature of the guy, that he trains hard and plays hard. He's a modern footballer with old-fashioned attitudes."

Hmmm, sounds familiar. And à la Claw and Gaillimh, gentleman Jim Williams has no regrets about not taking the game seriously. Likewise, it probably has contributed to his longevity.

In lots of ways then, to the manor born.