Last week, I was fortunate to catch up with Reds lock, Charlie Brosnan. Like myself, Charlie was born in the country and made his way to Brisbane to go to school, where he followed in the footsteps of his father into rugby.
We had an awesome conversation about a bunch of things, including how the Reds are tracking ahead of their tour of Japan and Italy, how things are going with new coach Vern Cotter and what he loves most about being based at Ballymore full-time. I hope you enjoy reading our conversation as much as I enjoyed having it!
heat during training at the moment!
[Laughs.] Yeah, the last couple days have been very hot. I wouldn't say we're loving it.
We’ve loved the last two weeks of rain. It’s been nice having a cooler preseason overall, because normally, it’s as hot as it has been last couple of days, it's very muggy and you definitely feel the difference.
I usually avoid the rain. Today, with the sun out though, I was lucky to have an umbrella while I was watching field training.
[Laughs.] Yeah, I did see that. Yeah, I wish we were that lucky. Looked nice under that umbrella.
Everyone looks like they’re going all in while training at the moment. The intensity and the work rate looked very high to me. What’s one of the things the team is looking at ahead of the Japan tour?
Yeah, it's been good. Everyone's buying in, obviously, we have new coaching staff, and new expectations.
One of the big things that we're gonna bring as team is a high work rate, with a lot of fight. And I think everyone's buying into it and that's gonna be our edge over opposition teams, to try and go a lot deeper into the competition this year, and hopefully win it.
I’ll buy into that! I’m excited about 2027 already.
What are you looking forward to the most about the tour?
Yeah, we just had a meeting about it, actually. I love the culture in Japan.
Everyone's very nice and it's a very clean place and it’s very trustworthy over there. Yeah, the culture I'm looking forward to. And Italy, once again, the food, I love the Italian food. And just exploring a new part of the world that I've never been to.
What does a “day in the life” of a Queensland Red look like today? In other words, what training and other activities have been on the schedule?
Yeah, so a normal day for us looks like… we've got medicals from 7 AM till 8 AM, where if you've got any troubles, you go see the physio. But if not, you normally head upstairs and review training or watch footage of games or something.
And then we go into team meeting at 8 o'clock and then we've got a unit, the unit meetings from 8:30 to 9:30am, then we've got a strapping block where we prepare to get ready for training. And that normally goes for about half an hour. And that's another time slot where can work on your skills and get ready to train and then we're out on field from anywhere from an hour to 2 or 2 1/2 hours.
After field training, we normally come back in, ice bath and do your recovery and shower, then we have lunch, then after that, we're in the gym. Then we've got gym for about an hour and a half, and that normally takes us to about 2 o'clock, and then after that, you do your recovery again, your sauna, ice bath, pod pools, and then after that you've got time to go up in your free time to go and watch more footage of training and whatnot. But then if you don't do that, you're done for the day.
What do you love most about being at Ballymore full-time?
Oh, I just love being around the group of boys we've got here and the coaching staff. It's a good environment to be around.
As much as we get stuck in and work hard, we don't take ourselves too serious and we have a joke around. It’s fun to be around.
Can you tell me about your rugby journey. Jim told me that you grew up in a town named Thallon. What first inspired you to play Rugby?
Yeah, so I grew out on a farm six hours west of here and Thallon is our closest town. And so I went to school in a town called St George. That's the biggest major town, apart from Thallon. I went to school there from prep to year 6 and I played rugby league in town, as it was the only thing available there.
So I played that from under 5 to under 9s maybe. And then I went away to boarding school, I went to Churchy and that's when I played my first game of rugby union. My dad went to Nudgee and he played rugby... He played for the Kobe Steelers in Japan for a couple years and he also played Australian under 20s and under 23s, I think.
So I'd always wanted to follow his footsteps and then I played rugby union from year 7 to year 12 and then came into the academy from then. And yeah, now I'm in the top squad full time now.
You’ve represented your country in the junior Wallabies! How did you find that experience?
Yeah, so I played for the Junior Wallabies last year, and we actually went on a tour to Italy. I’d say it's a very, very special thing to represent your country. Like it means a lot to me to represent your country and your family.
It's obviously a very special thing and to sing the national anthem for the game, it means a lot. That’s something I'll always treasure.
What’s your favourite thing to do that has nothing to do with Rugby?
I've gotten into golf since I finished school and I love it. I’m a member out at Nudgee and I try and play out there at least once a week or as much as I can, I love it.
What’s your favourite post-game feed?
Oh. That's a tough one. I would say, oh, it's such a common one. Maccas, McDonald's. Yeah, that's always a fan favourite.
Thanks for making time to catch up in the middle of a busy day Charlie. All the best with the trip to Japan next week and the tour to Italy! Make sure you smash that guy named Louis!
Of course, anytime. No, it's always good to catch up.
And we'll make sure we try and get stuck into Louis for you.
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