Two days earlier, in January 2025, Sadie\u2019s Bordeaux-Begles were playing Lyon<\/a> at their Chaban-Delmas citadel. A scrum went down and Sadie, the near-140kg tighthead, felt a jolt in his neck. He had no pain and no symptoms. \u201cIt\u2019s a prop thing\u2026 carry on,\u201d he thought. At the next set-piece, the cracks struck again. Three of them this time. Bigger. The kind of sensation that makes your heart drop. Sadie went to stand up and couldn\u2019t lift his neck. He describes feeling as though his head was loose, like a bottlecap which hasn\u2019t been tightened, rattling around precariously at the top of his neck. This wasn\u2019t a \u2018prop thing\u2019 anymore.<\/p>\n \u201cI was supposed to fly out to South Africa<\/a> the next day to join my wife. The game was a 9pm kick-off and when I got home, I phoned her at 1am and said \u2018listen, I can\u2019t travel, something is not right, I have to go for scans \u2013 cancel the flight\u2019.<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019d been sent home with a neck brace, and when I got out of the shower, went to dry my head and had that same feeling, tat-tat-tat in my neck. I phoned the doctor at quarter to two in the morning. That night, everything runs through your head. My wife phoned me and, I\u2019ll never forget, kept me on WhatsApp call the whole night while I was home alone.\u201d<\/p>\n Sadie was sent to a military hospital the next morning where a break was ruled out. There was still no diagnosis. He pushed for answers and was in hospital again the following day for an MRI scan and a dynamic x-ray. That\u2019s where the mood changed.<\/p>\n \u201cThe doctor got my results and said I was going to see the neck specialist ASAP,\u201d Sadie remembers. \u201cNow you get the cold feeling running through your body. This guy is so busy you need an appointment months in advance \u2013 I sat outside his office for four hours so he could rush me in that day.<\/p>\n Mate, that\u2019s not growing back. You were 2mm away from death.<\/p>\n \u201cHe looked at me with a straight face and said \u2018are you okay?\u2019 Yeah, no problem, I can pick up bags, do whatever. I\u2019d taken my neck brace off to show him I could move my head and that\u2019s when he told me to put it back on right away.\u201d<\/p>\n At the top of the neck, the C1 and C2 vertebrae connect like pieces of a jigsaw puzzle. They support the head and facilitate its movement. Sadie interlocks his massive fingers to show how they come together. He\u2019s learned a lot about spinal anatomy this past year. Ligaments effectively strap the bones in place. Just like the great Springbok Steven Kitshoff<\/a> before him, Sadie had snapped one of these ligaments clean off.<\/p>\n \u201cOkay,\u201d he said to the specialist. \u201cHow long does it take to grow back?\u201d<\/p>\n The medic\u2019s eyes widened. \u201cMate, that\u2019s not growing back. You were 2mm away from death.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cI was in complete shock,\u201d Sadie says. \u201cThe only thing I could think of was, \u2018the same as Kitshoff?\u2019 It was exactly the same thing. Two weeks earlier, we were in the training centre and the boys were asking me, because I\u2019m South African, what had happened to Kitshoff. I\u2019d told them the chances of him playing again were not positive. Two weeks on, I get the same news.<\/p>\n \u201cThe specialist told me I would have to go for an operation, take some bone from my hip, put it in my neck, and put two screws in my neck. He said \u2018at the moment, if you get a massive smack, you are dead; whiplash, you are dead.\u2019 I asked him when we were doing the operation. I had to drive my car\u2026 anything could happen, a guy could smack into you from the back.<\/p>\n \u201cHe said \u2018I\u2019m going on holiday for three weeks and I\u2019ll see you when I get back.\u2019 What? Mate, you just told me my life is in danger, now you\u2019re going to see me in three weeks? I got a real taste of life right there.\u201d<\/p>\n Sadie phoned Niritha. The prop, hunched over his steering wheel in the hospital car park. His wife, alone in the unfurnished house they may never be able to make a home. The tears flowed freely.<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019m in shock, crying in the car. My career is done. I called Yannick Bru<\/a>, our coach, straight afterwards, told him I appreciated everything he\u2019d done for me, given me this massive opportunity to play for Bordeaux and put me in a group I never thought I\u2019d be part of.\u201d<\/p>\n Jake White didn\u2019t believe one word coming out of my mouth. His doctor was telling him my chances were slim.<\/p>\n Then, something remarkable happened. Bru spoke to Laurent Marti, the Bordeaux president and financial power behind the superclub. They loved Sadie\u2019s work and wanted to keep him, busted ligaments and all. Astonishingly, they hatched a plan to buy a prop with a severely damaged neck out of his new contract.<\/p>\n Back at Loftus, Sadie says Jake White was incredulous. The Bulls supremo smelled a rat. No club would spend this kind of money on a tighthead in such career-threatening peril. Sadie sent the Bulls doctor his scans and the verdict was grim. Yet Bru and his team were confident he would play again.<\/p>\n \u201cYannick asked me to stay on. I said, \u2018my neck is broken, the same as Kitshoff, the chances of me coming back are slim\u2019. Yannick didn\u2019t care. The same neck specialist had done a Bordeaux prop before, a Georgian who they say came back even stronger, like a monster.<\/p>\n \u201cHe told me to go to South Africa and sit down with the Bulls CEO. Now I\u2019m scared. I\u2019m wearing the neck brace, worrying about turbulence on the plane. Jake White didn\u2019t believe one word coming out of my mouth. His doctor was telling him my chances were slim. But in France, everyone is telling me I\u2019m going to be okay, the physios have done it before, the specialist and rehab guys are in Bordeaux.<\/p>\n \u201cA long battled started. Laurent Marti said \u2018if you want to stay, let\u2019s make it happen\u2019. There was no doubt in my mind. The Bulls wanted me to have my operation in France<\/a> and do the rehab in Pretoria. Eventually, Laurent said \u2018what do you want?\u2019. They told him the amount and he paid it. And I was out of my contract.\u201d<\/p>\n This whole ordeal forged an extraordinary bond between athlete and club, player and coach. Sportspeople often talk of playing for something bigger. \u2018Family\u2019 values and culture buzzwords are touted liberally by organisations the world over. In Sadie\u2019s case, the rhetoric carries true, tangible meaning.<\/p>\n \u201cKnowing what they did, you go the extra mile for them,\u201d he says. \u201cYou know when you wake up in the morning, the club is a place you want to go, somewhere you want to be. That\u2019s how I feel about Bordeaux.\u201d<\/p>\n When he went back in for his pre-op meeting, Sadie\u2019s neck specialist was in buoyant mood. He\u2019d operated on 16 rugby players with the same injury and 14 were back on the field.<\/p>\n \u201cI told him I would do anything he told me,\u201d the prop recalls. \u201cI will sleep on the couch in here, I don\u2019t give a rat\u2019s ass.\u201d<\/p>\n The first, and gravest, hurdle was the procedure itself. Another cold blast of reality between Sadie\u2019s eyes.<\/p>\n He said there\u2019s a 50-50 chance you might die on the table. When I\u2019m putting the two screws in your neck, if I touch the spinal cord, you\u2019re done. If I touch the arteries, you are bleeding out on the table.<\/p>\n \u201cHe said there\u2019s a 50-50 chance you might die on the table. You\u2019ve got two arteries taking blood to your brain and then you\u2019ve got the spinal cord. When I\u2019m putting the two screws in your neck, if I touch the cord, you\u2019re done. If I touch the arteries, you are bleeding out on the table. My wife is seeing this doctor for the first time and is crying. We know it\u2019s a big operation.<\/p>\n \u201cThe operation was supposed to be 80, 90 minutes. Four-and-a-half hours later I\u2019m not out and no-one is talking to her. She didn\u2019t speak much French. In France you can book in to hospital and get your own bed. They are telling her to get out of the room, he\u2019s not coming to this room.<\/p>\n \u201cShe told me she started praying \u2013 \u2018please God, let me just see him\u2019 \u2013 and as she finished, I came back through the emergency room doors and the doctor said everything went well.\u201d<\/p>\n After some convalescence, Sadie was sent for rehab. A legendary local physiotherapist called Luc Senegas became his sensei. Senegas specialises in cervical and lumbar spine rehabilitation. He is ex-military and to the uninitiated, his methods sound eccentric. Stricken rugby players swear by him.<\/p>\n \u201cHe\u2019s an amazing fella,\u201d Sadie says. \u201cI would get in at 8am, and he would have me lie on a mat with my head on a pillow, and \u2018pick\u2019 my whole body up with my head, hold it for six seconds and relax. Ten reps, eight sets. Okay, sweet.<\/p>\n \u201cBut you get so tired. I wasn\u2019t able to train at all and I had picked up a load of weight. I was 15kg heavier, over 150kg. You start sweating, everyone looks at you like you are struggling, you feel you are worth nothing, you are so far off getting back to rugby.<\/p>\n \u201cI do the 80 reps and think I\u2019m done for the day. He tells me that was the warm-up. Then he just started building it.<\/p>\n \u201cHe averaged about 400-500 reps a session and I saw him five times a week for nine weeks. My wife came along with me to help me count the reps, because sometimes you do so many that you forget, and you start getting angry. She kept pushing me. She is the reason I am back on the field.<\/p>\n \u201cLuc would put your neck backwards, put weight on your neck in a scrum position, did side bridges against the wall. The rep counts got higher and the weights got heavier. I could easily pull 70-80kg with my neck. Luc measures your neck every week and can see it growing. I went from a 51cm circumference to 60cm.\u201d<\/p>\n On week nine, with over 100 hours of rehab complete, Senegas called Sadie aside. He had one more obstacle to clear. Get through this, and he could return to rugby. Sadie\u2019s heart beat a little faster.<\/p>\n \u201cLuc told me, \u2018you are going to flip upside down, do a handstand and then lift your hands\u2019. I looked at my wife, who was there with me, and told her this guy was crazy. There is no way, six months post-op, I am going to do this.<\/p>\n \u201cI was heavy. Proper heavy. I couldn\u2019t run, the club wanted me gymming to get as strong as possible in the shoulders and the neck and I just couldn\u2019t drop the weight. I was getting so negative.<\/p>\n \u201cI went down, did the handstand, and I lifted my hands. He looked at me and he said \u2018you\u2019re done. Your rehab is done, you can play again.\u2019 I still had two months left on my programme. \u2018You are done, mate, I promise you. If you can balance 150kg on your head, you don\u2019t have any problems.\u2019 I am forever grateful to him. Even today, he sends me messages and programmes, and he has started working with the scrum coach at Bordeaux.\u201d<\/p>\n Sadie missed Bordeaux\u2019s glorious run to the summit of Europe. He returned to play in August, eight months after the cracks in his neck. He has dropped nearly 15kg and is the lightest he\u2019s been since school. You can\u2019t survive in Bordeaux\u2019s beautiful chaos without an engine. Not when Matthieu Jalibert<\/a> is plucking rabbits from hats, or Damian Penaud<\/a> and Louis Bielle-Biarrey<\/a> are lancing defences out wide.<\/p>\n \u201cYou never know what\u2019s coming with \u2018Jalib\u2019, and when they make a line break, you can just walk back to the halfway line,\u201d he laughs.<\/p>\n You never see anyone talk about our pack, it\u2019s always the backline in the media. If you do the job, you can give the ability to Louis or \u2018Dams\u2019 or anyone<\/p>\n Yet the destructive scrummaging which set Sadie apart as a kid from an unfashionable Western Cape town, earned him prominence at the Sharks and the Lions and ultimately a ticket to rugby\u2019s great, unrelenting hamster wheel in France, has never dimmed.<\/p>\n In Bordeaux\u2019s two Champions Cup matches against Northampton<\/a> and Bristol<\/a> last month, Sadie touched the ball once. The scrum penalty count with the South African on the field was six-one to the champions. He put Danilo Fischetti<\/a>, Italy\u2019s premier loosehead, in the bin within 20 minutes of their 2025 final rematch.<\/p>\n \u201cYou have to be fit if you want to play UBB\u2019s style because at training they push three or four minutes of continuous ball in play and you have to have a certain number of metres.<\/p>\n \u201cYou will not see the props getting much ball because the plays are designed for the stars to get it. You know if there is a certain play you have to hit that breakdown no matter what and it has to be quick. So when you get the ball it\u2019s almost a special moment for the props.<\/p>\n \u201cThe forwards said before Northampton, \u2018we know we have x-factor backs, what about us? We can do it as well. We are not only there to clean the breakdown and make their plays.\u2019<\/p>\n \u201cIf you can get the set-piece right with the boys we have in the backline, it\u2019s a special combo. We lacked that at the beginning of the season. Now we are getting the system in place. You never see anyone talk about our pack, it\u2019s always the backline in the media. If you do the job, you can give the ability to Louis or \u2018Dams\u2019 or anyone \u2013 they will do the damage.\u201d<\/p>\n There\u2019s a strange resonance to Sadie\u2019s story, and how it intertwines with Kitshoff. A gym obsessive, he\u2019d scrapped his way to a professional deal with the Stormers<\/a> in his late teens. The \u2018Spicy Plum\u2019 was waiting for him. And salivating.<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/GettyImages-2102844207-1024x683.jpg.webp.webp\")
Carlu Sadie<\/a> joined Bordeaux-Begles from the Sharks<\/a> in 2023 through a link with coach Yannick Bru<\/a> (Photo by ROMAIN PERROCHEAU\/AFP via Getty Images)<\/p>\n![\"Springboks](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/GettyImages-1729609364-1-1024x576.jpg.webp.webp\")
Two-time world champion Steven Kitshoff was forced to retire following a similar neck injury (Photo by Ramsey Cardy\/Sportsfile via Getty Images)<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/GettyImages-1235901139-1024x693.jpg.webp.webp\")
Sadie played for his boyhood team the Stormers, as well as the Lions<\/a> and Sharks in South Africa. (Photo By Ramsey Cardy\/Sportsfile via Getty Images)<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/GettyImages-2256900235-1024x683.jpg.webp.webp\")
Sadie has dropped down to around 135kg and is flourishing in the Bordeaux system (Photo by Michael Steele\/Getty Images)<\/p>\n