| Louis Rees-Zammit | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Birth Date: | 2 February 2001 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Birth Place: | Penarth, Wales, U.K. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Module: |
| ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Module2: |
| ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Louis Rees-Zammit (; born 2 February 2001) is a Welsh athlete who plays as a professional American football wide receiver for the Jacksonville Jaguars of the National Football League (NFL). He previously played professional rugby union. From 2018 Rees-Zammit played in the position of winger for the Gloucester Rugby club in the English Premiership, and also at international level for Wales between 2020 and 2023 and the British & Irish Lions in 2021. Then, in January 2024, Rees-Zammit declared his intention to swap rugby for American football and leave the United Kingdom to move abroad to the United States, in order to play in the NFL. Since then, he signed to the Jacksonville, Florida sports franchise.
In March 2024, Rees-Zammit trained and competed in the NFL's International Player Pathway Program. After completing the program, he was signed to the Kansas City Chiefs in the position of running back and trained as a kickoff specialist. However, he did not make the final 53-player team roster for the 2024 NFL season. He subsequently signed to the Florida based Jacksonville Jaguars as a part of their practice squad in a new position of wide receiver.
Rees-Zammit was born in Penarth, Vale of Glamorgan, Wales,[1] and his paternal grandfather emigrated from Malta. Louis comes from a sporting family. His parents were athletes and his brother played rugby union for Llandaff RFC, also his uncle Paul Rees is also a former player who was full-back for Cardiff RFC, Pontypool RFC and the Wales B team. Then, Louis' Dad, Joe played American football in Wales for the Cardiff Bay Tigers and had inspired Louis to follow the NFL from a young age.[2] [3] His Dad and the family supported the Washington Commanders (the then Redskins), and Louis' favorite NFL player growing up was DeSean Jackson.[4] [5] For high school, Rees-Zammit attended The Cathedral School, Llandaff, and played rugby for the school.[6] After secondary school, he had dated social media influencer and YouTuber Saffron Barker,[7] but during March 2024, Barker announced that the relationship had ended.[8]
Due to Rees-Zammit's success on the rugby field, in 2021, he was chosen as the official patron for the British charity Sporting Minds UK, with whom he worked since 2019. He also did sponsorship work for the telecommunications giant Vodafone during the 2021 Lions tour to South Africa.[9]
In his youth, he played rugby at the Cardiff Blues academy and was named in the Cardiff Schools Team of the Decade for the 2020s. He was also a regular in the Wales under-18s youth team, and he qualified for England due to residency. In 2017, he transferred to Hartpury College, the academy of Gloucester Rugby in the AASE Championship, winning back to back trophies. Then, from college, he played for Gloucester United in 2019 before his promotion to the Gloucester professional team. As part of the Gloucester youth team he was in two consecutive Premiership Rugby U18 Academy League finals.[10] [11]
During his six year stint as a professional rugby union player, Rees-Zammit played for the English club in Gloucester, and represented his country Wales, both of which are in the British and Irish Lions team structure, who Rees-Zammit represented once on tour. [5]
Rees-Zammit broke into the Gloucester senior team in the 2019–20 season, becoming the club's youngest ever English Rugby Premiership player at 18 years and 70 days.[12] He also became Gloucester's youngest European player,[13] and youngest European try scorer in the Champions Cup Pool stage in the 2019/20 season.[14] He went on to score two tries against Worcester Warriors during a 36–3 win in December 2019, and later the same month became the youngest player at 18 years old to score a hat-trick of tries in the Premiership during a 33–26 loss to Northampton. His performances won him the Premiership Player of the Month Award in December 2019.[15] [16] On 13 January 2020, Rees-Zammit signed his first professional contract with Gloucester, securing him to the club on a long-term deal.[17] He ended his debut season, the 2019–20 Premiership with 15 appearances for the side and was awarded Gloucester's young player of the year for 2019-20, scoring 10 Premiership tries and 3 Heineken Champions Cup in the pool stage.[18] [19]
With continued form for the English rugby club, Rees-Zammit was selected by British and Irish Lions coach Warren Gatland to feature in their 2021 South African tour, he then scored 2 tries against Premiership rivals Northampton Saints in the game following the call up in May of that year. Although Gloucester did end the season at second from bottom in the table for the 2020–21 Premiership Rugby year.[20]
In the 2021–22 Premiership, he made his first appearance of the season scoring two tries in the Round 4 victory over Sale. Then, Gloucester managed to make it to the quarter finals of the 2022 European Challenge Cup, with Rees-Zammit scoring a try during the loss to fellow English side Saracens F.C.,[21] [22] Gloucester also managed to make it to the semi finals of the 2021–22 Premiership Rugby Cup, albeit losing to the Worcester Warriors rugby team.[23]
During the 2022-23 Premiership Rugby season Rees-Zammit picked up an ankle injury keeping him on the sidelines for 8 weeks until mid February 2023, but he did score a try on his return to fitness when he played a game against Harlequins RFC.[24] At the end of his final full season playing rugby at Kingsholm Stadium in Gloucester, Rees-Zammit had played 13 Premiership rugby union league games by starting for 12, and scoring four tries in 956 minutes, also he featured in one full game of the European Rugby Champions Cup scoring 1 try.[25]
By the time he decided to leave the club in January 2024, he had made 77 club appearances scoring 210 points. He was in the last season of his £225,000 ($285,000) a year contract, and it was due to be renewed by Gloucester. Also, Rees-Zammit had attracted interest from the French Top 14 rugby union league, with Bordeaux and Montpellier offering him big money contracts to leave England and play in France, like other British and Irish international rugby union players.[4] [26] [25]
As a Welsh national, Rees-Zammit initially represented Wales under-18s youth system team.[10] He then received his first full call-up to the senior Wales squad, under coach Wayne Pivac, on 15 January 2020, gaining his original cap for the 2020 Six Nations Championship.[27] He made his test debut for Wales from the bench in a test match against France, which was held at the Stade de France in Paris, France, during October 2020.[28] [29] In continued form, Rees-Zammit went on to score his maiden test try against Georgia on 21 November 2020.[30]
During the 2021 full season, he scored his first 2021 Six Nations try on his full European international debut in a Round 1 match against Ireland on 7 February, 2021.[31] On 13 February 2021, in the Six Nations match against Scotland, he scored two tries, including the winning try, and was named as the man of the match.[32] Wales went on to win the 2021 championship the next weekend giving Rees-Zammit his first Six Nations Championship title. During the tournament, he also won the try of the Championship award.[33] At the end of the 2021 rugby season, Rees-Zammit was nominated for the World Rugby Men's 15s Breakthrough Player of the Year, unfortunately losing to the New Zealand All Black youngster Will Jordan.[34] [35]
After four successful seasons for his club and country, Rees-Zammit would go on to have a more injury prone few years between 20222023. He featured in three of the five of Wales' matches for the 2022 Six Nations Championship, having been dropped for the clash against England. Yet, his success on the field for Gloucester meant he was a part of Wales' losing 2022 summer tour of South Africa. But again, Rees-Zammit went on to miss two of the five games Wales played in the 2023 Six Nations Championship. Afterwards, he was selected for Wales' squad for the 2023 Rugby World Cup competition in France, eventually scoring 5 tries in five appearances, however, Rees-Zammit only started 2 of those matches for Wales.[36] In total, Rees-Zammit scored 14 tries at international level for his country Wales.[37] [38]
As part of the Wales first team, he appeared in season 1 of the Netflix documentary for the 2023 Six Nations Championship.[39]
| Try | Opponent | Location | Venue | Competition | Date | Result |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Llanelli, Wales | Win | ||||
| 2 | Cardiff, Wales | Win | ||||
| 3 | Edinburgh, Scotland | Win | ||||
| 4 | ||||||
| 5 | Rome, Italy | Win | ||||
| 6 | Cardiff, Wales | Win | ||||
| 7 | Pretoria, South Africa | Loss | ||||
| 8 | ||||||
| 9 | Cardiff, Wales | Loss | ||||
| 10 | Bordeaux, France | Win | ||||
| 11 | Nice, France | Win | ||||
| 12 | Nantes, France | Win | ||||
| 13 | ||||||
| 14 |
On 6 May 2021, Rees-Zammit was named in the squad for the British & Irish Lions tour of South Africa.[40] His inclusion made him the youngest Lion selected since the 1959 Lions tour to Australia and New Zealand at the age of 20 years and 93 days.[5] [41] He then made his full test debut and first Lions appearance in the tour's opening provincial game against the club Lions, scoring the opening try after 3 minutes.[42] He was then selected to play against the club Sharks in the following game, again getting on the scoresheet as the Lions became outright winners finishing 54–7 winners.[43] For the Lions' team game against South Africa A rugby team, he was selected as a starter in an upset victory for the host's second team.[44] Then, for the final provincial game of the tour on 17 July, Rees-Zammit came off the bench to score as a substitute during the game against the club Stormers. His final tally for the tour was three tries in four appearances. However, the Lions did lose the test series against the Sprinboks.[45] [46]
See also: List of players who have converted from one football code to another. On 16 January 2024, Rees-Zammit announced that he would retire from rugby union to train in American football through the National Football League's International Player Pathway Program. His training camp took place in the IMG Academy in Bradenton, Florida, and the actual 'Pro Day' took place on March 20th. Rees-Zammit has compared his playing style to that of NFL players Deebo Samuel and Christian McCaffrey of the San Francisco 49ers.[5] [47]
Prior to Rees-Zammit making his professional NFL debut, he was already being considered one of the league's fastest athletes alongside players such as John Ross and Chris Johnson. His top speed was 24.2 mph during a rugby game, which is fast enough to put him into the ranking of all time fastest players in NFL history.[48] [49]
At the IPPP Pro day event, it was noted that since 2013, some 14 players have run a sub-4.30 second 40-yard-dash. Rees-Zammit's secured times of 4.50 and 4.43 seconds in the 40-yard dash. The NFL writer Robert Maadi (AP News) who was covering the trials wrote about Rees-Zammit's disappointment with his dash times, saying he was capable of going faster into the 4.2s, which is the NFL record pace.[50] [51]
On 29 March 2024, Rees-Zammit signed a contract with the Kansas City Chiefs to play running back,[52] and he made his NFL preseason debut on 11 August 2024 for the Chiefs in a 26–13 preseason loss to the Jacksonville Jaguars running six times gaining 22 yards, and catching one pass for 3 yards.[53] He went on to make three pre-season appearances for the Chiefs in the summer of 2024.[13]
During preseason on August 26, the Chiefs re-signed JuJu Smith-Schuster after his stint for the New England Patriots, who took Rees-Zammit's assigned number #9 shirt. Following this, Rees-Zammit switched to the number #49 shirt, the same number as the punter Matt Araiza, until the final cut was made.[54] [55]
On 28 August 2024, Rees-Zammit became a free agent after failing to make the Chiefs' initial 53-man roster during the final preseason roster cuts. Later that day, he joined the Jacksonville Jaguars' practice squad, taking jersey #84.[56] [57] After changing teams, Rees-Zammit also changed positions from a running back for the Chiefs to training as a wide receiver for the Jaguars, a position he prefers due to his size and strength.[58] As part of the squad, he traveled to the UK for the London NFL series in October 2024. On the journey, he had an interview with the NFL commissioner, Roger Goodell, and also met William, Prince of Wales.[59] [60]