After all of the hoo-hah on 2nd May with the Big Barnes RFC Lift, I received another video of someone doing the Big Lift. No biggee, you might think, 1000’s of people did, so why is this one so important?

Well this one is important because it was done by Paul Hagan, whom many of you will not have a clue about, but to those of us who joined Barnes RFC in the early 90’s he was one of us, a legend in green and gold, and his recent story is one we should all be aware of.

This is Paul’s Big Lift video: https://youtu.be/7_d_YJojZhM

And this is his story.

When I played for Barnes first of all in the early 90’s, I met a charming, funny northerner call Paul Hagan, he came in on the influx of Reading Uni guys I knew like Rich Johns, Wyn James and Gary Mazzotti. He was sexy, had a glint in his eyes, a quick sense of humour and was a bloody good rugby player. He slipped into Barnes rugby life very quickly and, in the blink of an eye, Paul Hagan became part of the Barnes RFC family.

Whilst he moved away after a few years, our memory of him always lingered, he had accumulated many friends in his time at Barnes. Several years ago, I became aware that Paul was very ill indeed. During the Big Lift, his wife Kate got in touch, and told me the full story:

“It’s been 6 years now – the kids were 7 and 10 when it happened. It’s utterly heart-breaking to think that the man you knew, intelligent, humorous, professional, doting father, wonderful husband is now so reduced. Just after his 50th birthday, in February 2014, Paul was at the gym on a static bike in a spin class. He wanted to take part in the Marmotte (section of Tour de France mountain climb). He was training hard, and during the class a he had a very large heart attack. The gym had a defibrillator, and they managed to save his life. He was put in a coma in ICU, and three days later he was brought out of the coma and by the end of the week was in the Cardio ward due to come home.

On night seven he collapsed and had stopped breathing. 11 rounds of CPR brought him back to life, the whole incident lasted nearly 30 minutes, and this meant that due to the lack of oxygen going to his brain he was left with a severe brain injury.

Two months in Brighton hospital, followed by two months in our local hospital, allowed the teams to get Paul starting to eat, walk and talk again.

At this stage, Paul was still too injured to come home, so then spent two years at a rehab centre specifically for people with acquired brain injury. During this time, Paul was fully supported in learning how to do things differently (i.e. eat, drink, walk, talk etc…). We were then able to bring him home with full-time care, and he still needs support with every aspect of his life. We managed this for three years, but after this time it became apparent that the children and I had no break or ability to live life other than supporting Paul and living with his carers.

We decided that we needed to adjust the way we lived and (after a year of working with Social Services) found a beautiful apartment for him to live in with round the clock care. It’s like a retirement village, but with extra support.

That was all going well, all things considered, until the recent lockdown. Obviously, he’s vulnerable, so we have had to reduce all his activity, which is very difficult. In the days before COVID -19 he was able (with support) to swim, pitch and putt, go to the gym and even rock climb (would you believe!)”.

Kate says that Paul would love to hear from anyone that remembers him. It would be lovely if they could email her and then she will be able to read them to him.

Kate wasn’t sure about the details of Paul’s playing days, but she does remember that he used to get into an awful lot of trouble on a regular basis with Kenny Worrall – let’s be honest, who hasn’t!

Captain Kenny leant me recently his photo album and journals from his two glorious years as Captain, between 1991 and 1993, from which it is clear that Paul was core to the team’s success and was a key part of Barnes RFC leading the charge up the leagues at that time.
Kate did say that she did go and watch Paul playing a number of times at Barn Elms, but mostly spent time in the Red Lion with all of us getting drunk, hence the fuzziness of the details!

They were brilliant days.

Please do spare a thought for Paul, Kate and his family and let Kate know how you feel. Kate is looking forward to receving your messages and reading them to Paul.

This is Kate’s email address: katehagan@tiscali.co.uk

Onwards Paul, Onwards Barnes!

Rhino x