IT’S ALL IN THE NAME
HIS NAME reads like a rugby fan’s bucket list. Leicester Ofa Ki Wales Twickenham Fainga’anuku. A birth certificate that tells you: pack your bags, we’re going on a road trip.
But while he is the second oldest of three brothers and two sisters, he is the only Fainga’anuku kid with a name that bears explaining. “I’m trying to figure out if it was right place, right time or if my old man had a bit too much to drink!” he laughs of his former Tonga prop father, Malakai or ‘Ta’u’, picking his names.
“It’s everything to do with Dad’s experiences at the 1999 Rugby World Cup. And obviously for people who come from the small nations of Tonga or Samoa in the Pacific, to attend a World Cup was something so big. Then they had their famous victory over Italy (in Leicester) – I remember watching it back and it was funny to see the old man all puffed out! – and it kicked off from there. They played Italy on the
