'Feels like room is moving': Scotland player overcomes vertigo and eyes win in France

It was the second time the Scotland centre had suffered from the condition but this time the symptoms remained for longer. It affected his balance and vision and meant a frustrating period away from the game.

From being a regular in the Edinburgh team and enjoying a breakthrough at international level, Currie found himself sidelined.

Happily, he has recovered and will make his first appearance of the season on Sunday when Edinburgh take on Castres away in the Investec Champions Cup.

“It feels like it's been a good while since I played a game for Edinburgh and I'm just really excited to pull on the shirt and get back out there with the guys,” he said.

His last competitive appearance was the URC quarter-final defeat by the Bulls in South Africa on May 31, a result that ended Edinburgh’s season. It was then that things started to unravel for the 24-year-old.

Injury, surgery, then vertigo symptoms

Currie was selected for Scotland’s Pacific tour but tore his hamstring in training and had to withdraw. The injury-enforced lay-off allowed him to have surgery on a long-standing knee problem before his bad luck struck again.

“In the summer I had my meniscectomy surgery which I got fixed up and then as I was coming back from that I just started getting vertigo symptoms. The medical team here have been good. It's not that common so we've gone to a specialist to get outside opinions.

“I suppose for me it's felt slow because you're obviously eager to get back on the pitch and when you're not able to do that it can get quite frustrating. The past few weeks I've started feeling better and I've been back to full training and it's exciting to get a chance to play this weekend.”

Currie tried to stay active during the lay-off, doing a bit of gym work and also studying game footage but he admitted there were some tough moments.

“I've had it before - I had it last year and it only lasted about two weeks - and I suppose I woke up in the morning and just felt a little bit light-headed. And then I could feel that my balance was a bit funny and your vision…. when you make head movements, your eyes don't really keep up. I kind of started noticing that so I just flagged it to the physios and it was very much a case of, ‘I know what's happening, I've had this before’. But yeah, unfortunately this one took a lot longer to improve, sadly.

“When it's at its worst you're sitting there and it feels like the room is moving a bit. Early on I suppose I rested but it was quite important that you do actually do things quite early on. You don't want to just sit and do nothing so I got back into gym work. I think it was quite good for me to stay involved. I was able to do analysis work off the pitch. I could look at scrum preview, whatever it may be, to stay in the loop with the rugby stuff.”

It will back into action on Sunday as Edinburgh look to build on last week’s excellent win over Toulon in their Champions Cup opener. They’ve made wholesale changes for the Castres game and Currie can’t wait.

“We want to go out there and we want to put in a good performance and get a win,” he said. “I think the boys played our game plan very well last week against Toulon and we played the conditions well.

“So I think the game plan will be put together to play against Castres and if we execute that then hopefully we can come away with a win.”

Castres v Edinburgh teams

Castres Olympique v Edinburgh Rugby (Champions Cup Pool 2, Stade Pierre-Fabre, Sunday, 1pm GMT)

Castres Olympique: 15. Geoffrey Palis; 14. Christian Ambadiang, 13. Vilimoni Botitu, 12. Jack Goodhue, 11. Adam Vargas; 10. Pierre Popelin, 9. Jeremy Fernandez; 1. Quentin Walcker, 2. Loris Zarantonello, 3. Aurelien Azar, 4. Gauthier Maravat, 5. Tom Staniforth, 6. Baptiste Delaporte (c), 7. Tyler Ardron, 8. Abraham Papalii. Replacements: 16. Teddy Durand-Pradere, 17. Lois Guerois-Galisson, 18. Nicolas Corato, 19. Leone Nakarawa, 20. Baptiste Cope, 21. Gauthier Doubrere, 22. Enzo Herve, 23. Vuate Karawalevu.

Edinburgh Rugby: 15. Jack Brown; 14. Ross McCann, 13. Matt Currie, 12. Piers O'Conor, 11. Lewis Wells; 10. Cammy Scott, 9. Ben Vellacott (c); 1. Boan Venter, 2. Harri Morris, 3. Ollie Blyth-Lafferty, 4. Callum Hunter-Hill, 5. Glen Young, 6. Liam McConnell, 7. Freddy Douglas, 8. Tom Dodd. Replacements: 16. Ewan Ashman, 17. Mikey Jones, 18. Paul Hill, 19. Connor Boyle, 20. Hamish Watson, 21. Charlie Shiel, 22. James Lang, 23. Wes Goosen.

Referee: Andrea Piardi (Italy)