What Andrew Porter now makes of his Brodie Retallick and Antoine Dupont ‘accidents’, and the ‘almost embarrassed’ rejection that ‘took him to 131kg’
Ireland prop Andrew Porter has reflected on last March's clash with French star Antoine Dupont, inset
Andrew Porter has become the latest Irish rugby star to publish his autobiography, following in the footsteps of retired scrum-half Conor Murray and national team head coach Andy Farrell.
Murray’s Cloud Nine book was the first to hit the shelves, a publication that has ruffled several feathers last month with his scathing criticisms of the Munster set-up, with Porter and Farrell now following suit with the release of their respective Heart On My Sleeve and The Only Way I Know tomes.
The abrasive Porter found himself in the eye of two media storms in recent years following his involvement in incidents that left All Blacks lock Brodie Retallick with a broken cheekbone and French scrum-half Antoine Dupont with ruptured cruciate ligaments.
With Ireland winning that 2022 match in Wellington to clinch the Test series 2-1 against New Zealand, Porter was singled out in the aftermath by Kiwi critics who felt he should have been red-carded for what had happened.
“He knew that it wasn’t malicious…”
Three years after that collision, Porter has insisted it was an accident. “The other thing I can remember from that final Test was my clash of heads with Brodie Retallick, which earned me a yellow card,” he wrote.
“Brodie was carrying the ball when I went in for the tackle and because we were so close, I hadn’t had time to get down to the ball, so we clashed heads instead. Off I went to the sin bin for 10 minutes.
“Thankfully, Cian Healy came on for me, a guy who is so experienced: he made sure that they didn’t put three tries past us while I was serving my sentence. There is nothing worse as a player than feeling you have let your teammates down, but Cian made sure that didn’t happen.
“I only learned that Brodie’s cheekbone was broken after the match. I sent him a message to see if he was okay and he was very understanding. He knew that it wasn’t malicious and that accidents can happen.”
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Thirty-two months after that situation with Retallick in New Zealand, Porter again found himself in the crosshairs after French star Dupont hobbled out of the March 2025 Six Nations match against Ireland in Dublin.
Porter and Irish lock Tadhg Beirne were involved in the incident, with Fabien Galthie describing their actions at the breakdown as “reprehensible”.
There was no case for either Irish player to answer, but the comments by the France coach left Porter’s wife, Elaine, on the receiving end of some horrible social media threats.
“When Antoine Dupont was injured during our Six Nations clash with France, Tadhg Beirne and myself came in for some terrible abuse on social media,” explained Porter.
“I can’t speak for Tadhg, except to say he is a fantastic player and a complete gent, who would absolutely not injure someone intentionally. Neither would I. That’s not the kind of player either of us is. There was no malicious intent from either of us and seeing a player go off injured is always tough.
“When France’s head coach complained about the Dupont incident, some French fans turned their attention to Elaine. Threatening messages poured in, full of abusive comments and general malice, and that made me so angry.
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“Social media can create a distorted reality, and it’s a tough place to be in. I’ve tried to shut myself off from it – there’s nothing worse than seeing something written about you after a tough game.
“It doesn’t bother me anymore, but I hate to see it bothering the people I love. Elaine left social media for a while after the French game, when she got some nasty messages about our unborn son.
“I also remember that following the New Zealand game in the World Cup, someone messaged her to suggest that she divorce me. Thankfully, she hasn’t decided to act on that yet.”
Now 29 years old, chapter three in Porter’s book recalls the Leinster rejection he suffered as a 16-year-old and how he promised what was said to him at the time would never be said to him again.
“It was 2012 and I was standing in front of the Leinster under-16s coach, John Fogarty, head hanging,” he remembered. “The disappointment was crushing. I thought that the trials for the team had gone well.
“I’d given it my all in my position and thought I’d given a good account of myself. Worse than being knocked back, for me, was that I was really upset about it. In spite of him trying to soften the blow with encouragement, it was hard not to show him how devastated I was.
“I’d worked so hard for this, building myself up physically and eating well, so to find that, irony of ironies, I wasn’t big enough was gutting.
“I slunk off the pitch to the dressing room to lick my wounds. For a while, I looked blankly at the grubby rubber matting of the changing-room floor, negative thoughts chasing through my head… I let my thoughts circle for a bit, agreeing that yes, I wasn’t up to the job and that I’d been hard done by, but then I made a decision: no one would ever tell me that I wasn’t big enough again.
“After everything I had been through over the past four years [Porter’s mother Wendy died when he was 12], I wasn’t going to give in. Not now. And so I set myself the task of showing John – showing myself – what I was really capable of.
“When you get criticism, no matter how positive it might be, it’s easy to let it get to you. In Six Nations: Full Contact, John Fogarty said that he could see how devastated I was at his assessment and that he wanted to look out for me because of that (By now, John was Ireland’s scrum coach).
“I was gutted at the time, because when someone puts the problem out there clearly, and doesn’t beat about the bush about it, it’s tough.
“At the same time, though, it makes the goal clearer. So when John said, ‘I’m sorry, you’re just not big enough,’ I was almost embarrassed that he’d said it to me. I knew that I still wasn’t the best rugby player, but it was the size issue that got to me.
“I’d gone from being the biggest kid in the class to the smallest, then had done everything in my power to make myself bigger. I took the criticism to heart. But I also thought, ‘So that’s what I need to do. That’s what I need to go after’.
“I was determined to get myself to a place where no one could say that to me again. That’s what took me to 131kg in 2016. With John’s words in my mind, I worked hard and ate even harder to make that weight.”
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