San Diego Legion and former English rugby star Chris Robshaw will make USD debut Sunday

When members of the San Diego Legion rugby team recently went surfing, one of their own soon went hobbling out of the Pacific Ocean.

He’d been lashed by a stingray, an assault painful enough to make even a professional rugby player wince. “He got a bit teased for it, like in any sports organization when somebody gets something like that,” Legion flanker Chris Robshaw said this week. “But, he’s fine.”

So it goes. Plagued also by a pandemic-driven relocation to Las Vegas, two players each breaking a leg and food poisoning that marred a road trip, to say nothing of centerpiece acquisition Robshaw dislocating a shoulder in his Legion debut after missing a few games and practices because of breaching COVID protocols in England last October, it’s been that kind of the year for the fourth-year franchise that had known mostly success.

Sunday afternoon, though, will serve up an opportunity for local rugby enthusiasts to celebrate.

The Legion will finally play at USD’s Torero Stadum, the home site it vacated because of pandemic complications, and for the first time since March 2020, local fans can attend a Legion game.

In Robshaw, they’ll get a much-awaited close look at a former English national team captain whose signing with San Diego occasioned newspaper headlines in London last June.

“I can’t wait to go to Torero, can’t wait to go there and play there,” Robshaw said of San Diego (5-7) facing Los Angeles (9-2) in a 3 p.m. Major League Rugby match, his third consecutive contest. “It’s been a long time. So, I look forward to getting there and getting involved.”

Despite the many challenges to his first season in the United States, Robshaw said he’s enjoying life immensely with wife Camilla Kerslake, their infant son Wilding and the Legion’s players and staff.

“Mentally, I feel in a good place,” he said. “For me, that was one of the reasons for trying a new experience both on and off the field. You get a little bit stale. I was with the same club for 16 years. I just felt like I needed a change. I wasn’t quite ready to call it a day, and I wanted a change and to test myself in a different environment.”

He has taken up surfing, managing this week to stand up for the first time, and counts the restorative benefits of coastal activities among the perks to swapping London life for a San Diego adventure.

“That is one of the reasons why we chose San Diego,” he said of coastal living. “Because instead of going in an ice bath and being in miserable rain back home in England, you sit on the beach and have a swim in the sea. It helps physically but also mentally. For me, it’s a big part of recharging the body. It’s a brilliant tool. For me, it’s definitely been a factor.”

Availing himself further of San Diego’s charms, Robshaw attended a recent San Diego Opera concert with Camilla and went to Torrey Pines Golf Course for the first round of the U.S. Open.

He has embraced the San Diego-L.A. sports rivalry, noting that one day after the Legion will attempt to upset the league-leading Giltinis, who drubbed them two months ago in the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum, the Padres will try to knock off the blue-blooded Dodgers in the East Village.

(And if the Padres should need an anthem singer this summer, Camilla would seem qualified. Trained in opera and classical music, she has sung the English and American anthems before NFL games in London.)

The celebrity Robshaw attained in England, where he captained his country’s team in 66 international matches, hasn’t accompanied him to San Diego. Other than the occasional English tourist or transplant, he reported going unrecognized.

He would be identified if he crossed paths with two other transplants from her Majesty’s land: the Duke and Duchess of Sussex, with whom he and Camilla are on speaking terms. The couple have met Prince Harry several times through the game, when he was the patron of England Rugby, reported Hello magazine.

Robshaw has helped plant the Legion’s flag on the global rugby scene by making the San Diego franchise known to his more than 500,000 followers on social media. The mainstream media’s coverage? Also helpful.

It’s a mystery whether Robshaw can lead the Legion to its first league title.

He’s far from the first professional sports star to wash onto San Diego’s shores in the twilight of his career. The Legion’s hope is that he produces more like Rickey Henderson, the baseball Hall of Famer who retained his penchant for getting on base and stealing bags after joining the Padres at ages 37 and 42, than he does Johnny Unitas and Bill Walton, the football and basketball Hall of Famers who were limited by knee and foot injuries after coming to the Chargers and Clippers, respectively.

“I feel OK, I do,” said Robshaw, who turned 35 earlier this month. With Robshaw also under contract next year, there’s ample time for the Brit to rekindle his career, if he can.