Max Malins didn’t feel nervous. He laid the foundation. Exclusive use of the Majorcaroof terrace is guaranteed. An overzealous restaurant manager recruited as an accomplice. A phone stuck in a flower pot to capture the important seconds in which he would ask his partner Ella to be his wife.
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As the pair gazed out over the sunlit hills of the Balearic island, Mullins plucked a diamond ring from his pocket and began what can best be described as a harrowing descent to earth. His right leg jerked as if it had been hit by a cattle stick. His knee was buckling like a rotten tree. For the beat, it looked like Mullins was chained, up to his ears, to the concrete. When the video was uploaded to Instagram, the boys returned Saracens had a field day in the comments.
“I recently did it again at home and my knee did the exact same thing,” says Mullins. “I just think my knees are shot. Stepping backwards isn’t my thing.”
The proposal required careful planning and a fair amount of espionage. Ella has a large following on social media, but remains a private person, perhaps shaped by her days as a young reality TV cast member. Made in Chelsea. Malins set his stage on the terrace of La Residencia Hotel, with a beautiful view of the landscape and restaurant below.
“I had to arrange to do it before the service when I knew no one would be in the restaurant. It wasn’t until an hour before the proposal that I went to see the place where the nerves started. This lady showed me on this terrace like, ‘Look how beautifully we did this, what do you think?’ There’s this guy laying out red and white petals and candles in the shape of a love heart. In my head I’m thinking ‘oh s**t, this is too much’. Maybe we get rid of the candles and don’t have a loving heart. I was on the floor wiping the petals from the love heart shape.”
The couple first connected four years ago via Instagram. Mullins was a fan of TV programs about socialites. Ella knew nothing about rugby, but through her work in corporate finance she was invited to watch the 2023 Calcutta Cup match at Twickenham. Mullins scored two tries. Ella was unmoved.
“I don’t think she even remembers it,” he says. “She claims that her eyesight was so bad, and I was on the wing on her side, that I was the only player she could see.
I look back and I never really feel like I played my best for England. A lot of my playing time has been on the wing which I wouldn’t say is my natural position.
“She came with some of her colleagues. She was the only girl. They were like, ‘why don’t you text Max?’ They sent me something funny from her phone. We had a previous very dead conversation. After that she wished me luck, and we decided to go out for a drink the next day, which was very urgent, neither of us even thought about it, and we haven’t been apart from each other since. That was Sunday, I went to see her on Tuesday, she came to the game the following weekend and it kind of developed from there and suddenly.
“The beauty of it is that I can play as good or as bad as I do, and she doesn’t really have a clue. When I come home to her, it’s all the same. I like that aspect of it. She doesn’t know a single mistake I’ve made.”
Mullins’ relationship blossomed. The wedding is set for next summer in Suffolk and will be a joyous affair. His relationship with England However, the jersey he wore on 22 occasions is far more complex.
There were flashes of euphoria – the double against the Scots was particularly high – and moments of immense disappointment. Eddie Jones once fired Malins from camp for displaying “bad body language” in the team locker room. Mullins was stunned.
His last match was against Chile, the kind of Turkey shot at the World Cup where players outside the first line of 23 hide in nothing. Either way, Mullins had a frustrating day. And that’s why his thoughts are contradictory. The pride of climbing a peak that so few conquer, reconciled with the regretful knowledge that he could not justify his considerable talent in the Test arena.
“I look back and I never feel like I played my best for England,” he says. “A lot of game time has been on the wing, which I wouldn’t say is my natural position. I’m very proud to have 22 games – it doesn’t feel like I’ve played that many.
“That performance vs Chile will probably always hang over me. I could play well and still not get a chance in the later games, but it always remains that I never played my best rugby in an England shirt which is tough. You’re playing at the highest level, it’s everything you’ve dreamed of and you don’t feel like you’ve ever had the best things on the field.”
The end of the World Cup was a strange form of purgatory. Mullins knew after Chile that he was toast for the knockouts. But there’s no place for a fearsome ‘sapper’ in a rugby team, not when the biggest prize in sport is a team goal.
I just remember we had to go back for dinner on Tuesday night and I honestly couldn’t eat dinner in the dining room. I had to go to my room.
“The selection for the World Cup was probably the highlight of my career, but then it brought the biggest challenge of my career. You get your chance and you don’t play at the level you want to, and I haven’t been seen in an England shirt since.”
“The pre-season was the biggest and most intense I’ve done. Every session you have to do your best to make sure you get on that plane. Mentally you never switch off because you’re always thinking ‘okay, what can I do?’
“There was a bit of a break after we played Chile when we got a few days off. I spent some time with Ella, we stayed in a hotel in Le Touquet with Ben Earle and his partner Josie, and we had the best few days. All that pressure and intensity, we were able to relax.
“Going back to camp after that was the hardest. I just remember we had to go back for dinner on Tuesday night and I honestly couldn’t eat dinner in the mess hall. I had to go up to my room. That’s when I realized how exhausted it was.”
“You’re in it 24/7. You still have to do your best, put a smile on your face, be a team man, but at the end of the day you’re part of it, but not on game day. I wasn’t the only one. I’m sure a few others struggled. You’ve got to take it on the chin, I guess.”
If anything positive has come from Mullins’ exile in England, it is the serendipity he now feels. He consciously removed himself from the international rat race. The mental clamor that can peak in a player’s head has long since subsided.
“Before, when you’re playing games and you’ve got camps coming up, it’s in your head that you want to get into that England squad. Obviously, I absolutely loved it, but I feel like maybe the time has passed. I’m not holding on to that, am I going to get into that team? It’s kind of freed me in that sense, but I’d like to play again in that sense. I’m kind of in a position to not really expect to be able to play my best stuff and that’s all you can do.” to do, but I’m certainly not holding my breath anymore.”
The dawn of a new era with the Saracens offered an additional impetus. After 15 fruitful years at the helm, Mark McCall has stepped down and Brendan Venter, an innovator and disruptor from South Africa, has returned. Venter’s summer schedule was radically different from what the players expected.
“It feels like we’re turning a page, but we’re not starting from scratch,” says Mullins. “This year we just went straight into 15-on-15 in the pre-season, dug straight into the rugby side of things. Partly to learn how Brendan wanted us to play the game and build our game plan from the ground up. That was really refreshing. Everyone loved it; we weren’t sitting on Wattbikes or cross trainers.
From now until the end of my career, I will play a lot more at 10 than in previous years. It’s a position I love and the coaches want me to cover.
“We will be very practical in our game as Saracens always have been. We are not shying away from wanting to be the most physical team in the world, we are building a game plan of how we want to play in each half, what that looks like with our kicking game and we make that clear to our nines, 10s and 15s – what we call generals.”
Mullins spent much of pre-season running at fly-half, where he first broke through as a Sarries youth product, before moving into a back three. The great Owen Farrell is nearing the end of his legendary career. Fergus Burke is out of contract in 2027 and is attracting serious interest. Mullins will see plenty of action at quarterback for the Saracens.
“From now until the end of my career, I will be playing a lot more at 10 than I have in previous years. It’s a position I love and the coaches want me to cover. My parents and friends have always said it’s my best position. I was pushed out of there first because Owen was tight and I needed playing time elsewhere.”
“Whether it’s attacking or defending, at 10 you get a lot more touches, it doesn’t depend on how training goes how many balls you get. You’re always on and always active.”
The role is perfectly suited to Malins’ skills; the way he sees images develop, identifies space and cracks in the opponent’s armor. His fingerprints are on the more attacking sets. His sharp vision can be said more. McCall once compared him to a young Beauden Barrett. Throughout the game, offense trumps defense and it takes more than one creator to pull the strings.
“Teams go with two playmakers, 10 and 15 or 10 and 12,” Mullins says. “You have to have at least two minds for the 10 in that back line. The offense is so dominant because of the emphasis on always having options on both sides of the arm, creating two sides in the attack, with the 10 on one side and your 12 or 15 who can lead the other side, be the eyes, the vision and see that space. That’s the ability to communicate big things in that space. That’s the key, and that’s where you need your two playmakers.”
Mullins will relish this responsibility. A position to be made, and a wedding to be planned. Freed from the pressure of the past, his future promises happiness.
