LIST: Four Lions contenders who worked jobs you didn’t expect

Whether before, during or after their careers, the players we worship on a Saturday afternoon’s bread and butter is sometimes earned away from the beautiful game.

So, here are our pick of the Lions contenders that you probably didn’t know could turn their hand to a field that isn’t covered in grass and painted with white lines.

Before securing a professional contract, the future England superstar served an apprenticeship under his Granddad as a painter and decorator. The 24-year-old, who likes keeping busy, hasn’t ruled out a return to the trade when his rugby days are done.

After secondary school, the Scotland star pursued an apprenticeship for three years as a stonemason, in a business owned by a family friend, whilst his rugby developed. Pocketing £300 per week, supplemented by £50 in his hand from Falkirk Rugby Club, Russell is now one of the pre-eminent stand-offs in world rugby and certainly one of the most exciting.

The Ireland and Leinster tighthead-prop to this day helps to maintain the family’s dairy farm of about 50 or 60 acres. His father, James, also had a slaughter house and his own butchers shop before working for other butchers.

This is the picture that illustrates the heights Williams has scaled to reach international rugby, starting off as a scaffolder. It wasn’t work for the faint-hearted, with Williams rigging scaffolding “over the top of a blast furnace, 300 feet from the ground” back in Wales.