Louis Rees-Zammit reveals Taylor Swift message which preceded sudden Chiefs axing as Wales star rekindles ‘love’ for rugby
Wales and Bristol Bears wing Louis Rees-Zammit and popstar Taylor Swift.
Louis Rees-Zammit may have rubbed shoulders with the stars in the USA but the Wales speedster does not regret giving up on his NFL dream.
After making the decision to leave rugby in January 2024 and attempting to transition into American football, a sport he has loved since childhood, he returned to the 15-a-side code earlier this year.
Having gone through the NFL’s International Pathway Program, Rees-Zammit attracted the attentions of several teams and eventually joined the then-defending Super Bowl champions, the Kansas City Chiefs.
The Chiefs’ superstars
They were headlined by superstars Patrick Mahomes and Travis Kelce, who is now engaged to pop icon Taylor Swift.
Rees-Zammit is used to playing in front of over 70,000 people but this was a level above in terms of media profile and the attention placed on him, as evidenced by the message he received from Swift.
“I didn’t get to meet her but I did get a signed letter. At the time, it was ‘heard you’re doing really well for the Chiefs, keep it up and hopefully get to meet you soon’, but obviously that turned out different,” he told TNT Sports.
It was a completely new experience for Rees-Zammit in terms of his life and career, and ultimately he could not quite adapt to the demands of the sport.
“The days were definitely longer, purely because of how much analysis you’ve got to do. It’s such a mental game, you’ve got to run through over 100 of your own plays, you’ve got to analyse your opponents to see what kind of defence they’re kind of working with each week, and then how you’re going to implement your game on that,” he said.
“It’s a very confusing sport.
“It’s like me playing rugby from age seven, they were doing that from seven so I was trying to play catch-up with some of the best athletes in the world. I’m going in there with no experience trying to compete with them.
“I was kind of playing with a rugby ball two or three months before coming back and I was starting to love it again, and then I made a decision.”
Rees-Zammit’s Bristol deal
After announcing that he would be returning to rugby union, Bristol Bears came in for Rees-Zammit and the Welshman joined the English side on a 12-month deal.
The early signs have been positive despite the Bears’ inconsistent start to the PREM season and an injury which has seen the 24-year-old miss the matches against Exeter Chiefs and Gloucester.
Rees-Zammit certainly believes that his stint in the NFL has made him a better player and has improved aspects of his game.
“Before I left, I thought my physicality wasn’t up there when I was playing with the likes of George North because previously I was getting away with just being fast and trying to run around people, and ultimately it hasn’t always worked,” he said.
“It was just being more aggressive. You can probably see me now running through contact and being a lot more explosive.”
