Centre Jack Dixon is relishing his latest battle for a place in midfield for Dragons RFC – but insists team success and not personal milestones and achievements will always be his focus.
Dixon starts his 158th game for the Men of Gwent this Sunday as the team head to Italy to face Benetton Rugby (kick-off 2.45pm UK).
The 27-year-old is now only a handful games behind fellow centre Ashley Smith (161) and already stands eighth in the all-time appearance list.
But the centre is not one for stats and instead his focus is on his job for the team and ensuring he keeps a starting spot.
“I don’t look at the appearances - it’s week by week,” he smiled.
“I honestly don’t know how many appearances I am on. Only time will tell on any records.
“I'm just happy to be starting again this weekend. It's going well for me.
“The last two weeks have gone well for us at home and we're looking forward to taking that away to Benetton this weekend.
“There is a lot of competition in the midfield, which is healthy,” he added.
“It’s nice to have a couple of more centres training. It's been good with Sio (Tomkinson) and Max (Clark) coming in and we’ve just signed Steff (Hughes) after he was training with us.
“It’s about recognising what I’m good at, what I can do best for the team.
“In the past maybe I’ve overcomplicated the game. But I know what I do well and what I can do.
“Dai (Flanagan) has come in and I’ve gone back to that. I feel that has worked well I’ve had a good run of games. It’s about carrying on from that.”
Dragons face a Benetton side fresh from victory over Scarlets and always difficult to face at Stadio Monigo in Treviso.
Dixon, though, believes the visitors must focus on themselves to keep recent momentum going.
He said: “Benetton are a very strong physical team - we've spoken that this week.
“We’re just looking to build out on the last two games. We put in some big performances and feel like we are heading in the right direction.
“We've just been focusing on ourselves this week and will try and put another big performance in on Sunday.”
The last two weeks have gone well for us at home and we're looking forward to taking that away to Benetton this weekend...
