Sometimes a whole lot of things need to go wrong before greatness can happen. And, boy, did they go wrong for former Springbok star Ashwin Willemse. In a tell-all book, the retired rugby player reveals how he went from stealing his granny's fudge money to dealing in drugs, being arrested for murder and, ultimately, trying to kill himself, before reaching stardom.On June 7 2003, when he made his debut for South Africa in Durban, alongside Percy Montgomery and Bismarck du Plessis, few could have known what this young rugby talent had left behind in Caledon, the Overberg, Western Cape, town where he grew up."I knew I was becoming my own best client," the retired Bok says in his autobiography, Rugby Changed My World, in which he reveals his youth as a drug dealer.story_article_left1The book is due for release tomorrow .Willemse reveals startling details of a teenage life of self-destruction. He was a fragile and insecure young man, desperate to be noticed. R ugby would become his saviour.The semi-detached government house of his grandmother, Ouma Maria, was home for up to 10 relatives and two dogs at any given time. Food was scarce and sometimes the breakfast staple of mealie meal would have food colouring stirred into it to help the children bear the monotony.But while he speaks with fondness of the positive influence of his grandparents and his mother, Gustava, he also says: "It needs to be said that if the Lord was praised in the front house, the devil often found a welcoming atmosphere in the shack at the back."While still at school, the young Willemse joined a gang and got his first tattoo. School became "an optional extra" and when he did go, he would be "doped up". Even though at intermittent stages throughout school, the young Willemse shone as an athlete and at schoolboy rugby, he never quite got the recognition he wanted.He candidly reveals how desperate he was to join one of the notorious gangs."This became my obsession. I wanted to become a member of the 26s, knowing very well that I'd have to go to jail to achieve my ambition."Willemse, with his then torturous hang-ups about poverty, would later reject an opportunity to attend Overberg High, "the white school on the other side of the railway line" because he did not want to rely on hand-me-downs.The book is a remarkably honest account of not just humble beginnings, but of the deadly path he set out on as a teenager.Today he can say: "I am ashamed . .. that the dark underworld of gangs, drugs and violence was once my home."Drugs are an evil, he says, that all communities should fight against. His life changed after he was arrested with two other youngsters following the murder of a local drug dealer.full_story_image_vleft1Someone else confessed to the murder, "then, all of us, all the suspects, were released. I knew then, if I didn't know it before, I had to get out of the gangs. Also, give up drugs."It was time for rugby - and he set off on a new course, one that would bring him the recognition he so craved.Years later, when Willemse took to the field for a Super 12 game years later, the policeman who had arrested him was running down the sidelines as a linesman ."Today I look at my own life and wish I had made better decisions," he says.He had a rough start, but he ended it in fine form - South African rugby player of the year, South African newcomer of the year and players' player of the year.Around age 21, Willemse, by then starting to make a name for himself in rugby circles, called up the man he believed was his absent father.He had simply hit the phone book and dialled number after number until he eventually got to speak to the man who had until then been a mystery to him. "I cried like a baby. I think in those few seconds, around 20 years of anguish poured out of me. I heard my father down the line: 'It's OK, boy, it's OK. All is OK. Daddy's here.'"block_quotes_start When Jake White called me to come and meet him at Newlands prior to the Junior World Cup, I asked my grandmother for her advice on what I should do block_quotes_endAfterwards he thought that was strange, it coming from a man he had never met."He knew when I had made my provincial debut and all about the Sevens team I'd played for under Chester Williams," says Willemse.Willemse encountered one more hurdle - a persistent groin pain whose treatment left him hooked on painkillers just as his professional rugby career started to take off. He feared that extended bouts off the field would cost him his contract.While he was back home in Caledon recovering, he received a phone call. "When Jake White called me to come and meet him at Newlands prior to the Junior World Cup, I asked my grandmother for her advice on what I should do," says Willemse. She told him: "Go, my child, I will stay on my knees so you can stay on the field."White, who has previously commended Willemse for his heart for the game, became a father figure of sorts to the young rugby player.Finally, someone believed in him...