Dreaming of 'different ability' sport
Northampton Saints Wheelchair Rugby stars Steve Montgomery and Gerry McCrory on sporting success, the London Marathon and a world where the word 'disabled' disappears
Imagine a world where the word ‘disability’ disappears and people just talk about sport.
For Gerry McCrory it is a dream, but one he thinks could become reality.
“If you think how things have come on in the last eight years, then in eight, maybe 10 years, from now I think the word disability will disappear and it will just be sport.
“What sport is on tonight? Wheelchair rugby. Wheelchair tennis. I would love the word disability to go away.”
Gerry, the captain of Northampton Saints Wheelchair Rugby Team, spoke to me while sat next to Steve Montgomery, another of the stars of what has become a highly successful team.
The pair believe disability sport has moved forward leaps and bounds since the Olympic and Paralympic Games came to London in 2012.
But there’s that word again. Disabled.
“I personally don’t like the word,” Gerry said. “That’s nothing against anyone who uses it, because that’s the word that is there.
“One of our team mates, Casey, said he sees it as a different ability, not a disability. That hit me like a slap in the face, I love that.
“We’re human, we play sport, we’ve just got a different ability to you.”
Success at the Saints
Their different ability has seen Gerry and Steve help Northampton Saints to a string of successes.
After winning the Championship division of the Wheelchair Rugby 5s (WR5s) competition, Saints clinched an inaugural Premiership title in 2022.
They followed that up by finishing as runners-up in the very first international WR5s tournament, narrowly losing to arch-rivals Leicester Tigers in the final.
The paid describe the game as “frantic and fast,” and “a crazy game of chess” where tactical blocks help marauding ball-carriers break lines of defence.
“Essentially, you need to get the ball from one end of the court to the other,” Steve said.
“You have to bounce the ball every 10 seconds and you have to score within 40 seconds.”
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When asked about the tackling, he simply added: “You just bash each other, like bumper cars”.
The 54-year-old suffered a spinal cord injury following a fall in 1996, but only started playing sport after wondering into a wheelchair rugby session about six years ago.
“I’m not a sporty person,” he said. “But I fell in love with it on day one. Everyone was so welcoming. You are like a little family and you look after each other.
“You’ve got to want to do things. The two sports I do now - racing and wheelchair rugby - I never thought, going back six or seven years that I would enjoy them as much as I do.
“It’s really good to seek out taster sessions, and have a go at things.
“Most of the sessions I have been to, people have been so friendly - it’s such a nice environment. Just go out and get involved.”
Gerry found wheelchair rugby while looking to find a way back into sport.
He had always played rugby until he lost the lower part of his leg. A replacement prosthetic has allowed him to walk normally, but activities like running and rugby had been out of the question.
Again, a visit to a Saints’ taster session changed everything.
“When I was playing rugby, I used to lace on a pair of boots and away I went,” he said.
“Now, I’m putting my wings on my chair and away I go. It’s no different.
“One of the things that drives that home more, is that at Saints we are treated as one club right down from the top.
“One team. One club. If you are wearing that badge, you are a member of Northampton Saints. That’s it. It doesn’t matter if you are male, female, disability, able-bodied.
“If the badge is on your chest and you’re playing a game, you are a member of Northampton Saints.
“For me, at 47, soon to be 48, disabled and thinking I was never going to get back into playing sport again, that was the icing on the cake.”
Racing with the London elite
For Steve, rugby was a route into what has now become his second sporting love: wheelchair racing.
Despite only taking up the sport just over a year ago, he has clocked a sub-18 minute parkrun and lined-up alongside the elite athletes at this year’s London Marathon.
“I’m still not sure how that happened,” he told Running Tales, before revealing the opportunity came after he entered the London Big Half and was told he could have a crack at the elite qualifying time for London.
“I was just within 20 seconds to hit that time, so suddenly I was on the start line with the likes of David Weir.
“It was absolutely fantastic. I got a time of two hours 34. At the end, I was absolutely beat up.
“I was so, so tired and in such a lot of pain, but I did it.”
The power of sport
Gerry said he is in awe of what Steve has achieved, pointing to it as an example of what sport can do for people.
“Sport is everything in the process of adjusting after a serious injury,” he said.
“But even for able-bodied people, just after the stress of work, it makes such a difference to get out for a run, go to the gym, even if you have a punchbag in the backyard and just go out swinging.
“If you come back to the rugby, we’ve had three or four guys that said if they haven’t have found the club they wouldn’t be here anymore. It’s saved their marriages, been life-changing.
“That is just the power of sport.
“The wheelchair rugby club came around at the right time in my life. I was extremely lucky to fall in with this bunch of people.”