THE moment where Bathurst's Aiden Stait realised he was on the verge of signing for a major French rugby union club was when he found himself on a call with Will Skelton.
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The towering Australian prop, who Stait has drawn comparisons to, gave words of encouragement to the Bathurst player about potentially making the move of a lifetime to Europe.
That conversation with the Wallabies star that helped confirm Stait's decision.
It's still sinking in for Stait that next season he will find himself in the same competition as Skelton when he plays for Top 14 club Aviron Bayonnais.
Stait, 19, put pen to paper on his contract with Bayonne on Friday and will be jetting off for France in around three weeks' time.
The 2022 Group 10 under 18s player of the year made the switch to rugby union to train with the NSW Waratahs and play for Sydney University for 2023, and it didn't take long for him to generate buzz.
"I just expected to play for Sydney University, and I never expected the Waratahs to get involved. When they got involved that was one of the happiest days of my life. I was so grateful," Stait said.
"I just wanted to play some football, whether it was league or union ... and now with this happening I just thought it was too good of an opportunity to pass up.
"I had a Zoom call with the club and they actually passed on a couple of numbers for players I could talk to and ask a bit about the club, and one of those was Chris Talakai.
"I had a 40 minute conversation with him and he thought I'd be silly not to do it, and the one regret he had was not coming over when he was younger because doing so can set your whole life up."
That was when Talakai put Stait in contact with Skelton, who currently plays for Top 14 club La Rochelle.
"We're similar because we'd both made the switch from league to union at 18, and everyone was telling me that the last person to come through with your size, height and physique was Will Skelton," Stait said.
"I'm pulling my hair out, pinching myself every morning when I wake up. It wasn't real to me until I signed that contract the other night. It all just hit me."
Signing with Bayonne feels all the more satisfying for Stait after an unfortunate run of injuries have plagued the start of his rugby union career.
During the pre-season for his debut Sydney Uni colts campaign he suffered a stress fracture in lower back and just days before his round one game he dislocated his left shoulder at training.
Considering he'd had such an interrupted start to his rugby union switch Stait was caught completely off guard by the massive interest his named generated among the Top 14 competition.
"I'd been playing union with Waratahs and Sydney Uni but I'd had a bad run with injuries, which meant I'd only played a couple of games on union this year," he said.
"My agent put my card out there and he said that within a few days he'd heard from a couple of French clubs asking about me. That was awesome to hear.
"The phone call I had about that interest really shocked me, it came out of nowhere. I'd apparently had interest from four clubs in two days and I thought 'How could that happen?'. I was over the moon."
Stait joins a club who are hoping to make their mark in the Top 14 competition.
Bayonne were promoted from Rugby Pro D2 after the 2021-22 season and in their Top 14 return in 2022-23 they managed to finish mid-table.
"They told me a bit about the club on the call I had with them. They're on the up after coming up from division two last year," Stait said.
"They also talked about how things will look for me with accommodation, education and training, which will pretty much be every day once I'm over there."
Stait expects to be flying out around the weekend of July 15 and 16 at the earliest.
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