WHEN growing up in the valleys of Wales, rugby is more than just a passion — it’s in the blood. So to get the chance to play for your region before going on to representing your country it is like a dream come true.

Yet going through a serious injury at a pre-season tournament, that dream became more like a nightmare for one-time capped fly-half Matthew Jones.

The Bridgend-born number 10 could only watch from the treatment room as James Hook emerged from playing The Gnoll with Principality Premiership side Neath to becoming the new star of Welsh rugby.

But even though he was released by Sunday’s EDF Energy Cup opponents, Ospreys, the 24-year-old is looking to do more than show his former employers what they are missing out on.

The return to the Liberty Stadium in Swansea for the Worcester Warriors stand-off is about helping the man who handed him his only senior Welsh cap to date — Mike Ruddock — and the team his has assembled at Sixways progress to the semi-finals of this Anglo-Welsh competition.

“To go back to Swansea will be a special moment for me,” he said. “People talk about it being a big game just for me, I just see it as a big game for the whole team that could settle how the group goes.

“I don’t feel I have anything to prove when I go back to Ospreys, it is not the game that always stuck out for me. I just want to put on a good show for the Worcester fans and get the right result.”

Jones, one of a number of Worcester’s Welshman heading for the unforgiving cauldron of the Liberty, has fought his way back to the top.

A knee injury at the Cwmtawe Sevens two years ago brought about a brief exit from the coal-face of top flight rugby. Spells with National One sides Moseley and then Doncaster saw him recapture that sparkling ability that led Ruddock to call on his talents once again.

Having signed a two-year deal at Sixways in the summer, Jones believes that he has come back stronger than before.

“Once you have had a taste of success in the past, top level rugby and at such a young age, to have an injury and not get that opportunity as you would like was a blow,”Jones said. “But I have dug in, believed in myself and if I kept working hard felt the chance would come again.

“It was very hard what I have been through. The Welsh public love their rugby, it is everything to them, and I was chuffed to bits with the way things were going at Ospreys before my injury.

“It was a frustrating time after my injury, I was disappointed to be out and it was a long road back and a lot of work to get back in and not to get the chance was a shame.

“If you get injuries it gives the opportunity to somebody else and James Hook came along and took it with both hands and has not looked back. But I still think I have got a lot to offer and I plan to show that. It’s always about the way you bounce back, that is what matters.”

Since his time at the Liberty, the Ospreys have built a star-studded side. International pl-ayers are bursting at the seams for the region dubbed the Chelsea of Welsh rugby.

New Zealand legend Justin Marshall may have made the shock exit from Swansea, but with the likes of wing wizard Shane Williams, the mercurial Hook and the superb Ryan Jones to mention a few there are dangers for the Warriors all over the paddock.

“Across the park they have total class and international stars, but we have not got to be overawed by the task ahead of us,” Jones added. “We just have to make sure that across the pitch we take the game to them like teams have done against them recently.

“One moment of magic could set us going and we have all got to make sure we hit the heights after what happened at Sixways last season.”

Having tasted international rugby before his injury, Jones wants to get back to the top of the tree.

“To play for your country is everybody’s dream in Wales,” Jones said. “To get the call-up came as a surprise when I did get selected, but I was so pleased.

“It was then that I knew all the hard work I had put in and all the setbacks I had overcome had been worth it.

“I want that again but first and foremost is Worcester and this Sunday and getting a right result.”