You could forgive Nic White for a split second of panic when he was pushed into the centre of the Canberra Stadium change rooms.
Subscribe now for unlimited access.
$0/
(min cost $0)
or signup to continue reading
What if he couldn't remember the words? After all, it had been five years since the ACT scrumhalf had professed he was proud to be Australian with a Brumby on his chest in a victory song.
The 30-year-old laughs he needn't have worried, because the pure adrenaline of a demolition of the NSW Waratahs made him feel like he'd never left, and rarely has a win felt quite so sweet.
"Bloody oath. I did think about it this week, like geez, if I get in the middle and I don't know the words ... I backed myself and had it covered," White said.
"It's a little bit hard to put into words to be honest, a little bit surreal. When I left here, I always dreamed of being able to come back. For a lot of people who leave the shores, it's not a reality.
MORE BRUMBIES NEWS
"To be able to be given an opportunity to come back was pretty special. To actually put the jersey back on during a Tah week and to get the result back here at home, it's a pretty nice feeling."
Yet quickly the attention turns to a chance to secure a home final when the Brumbies host the winless Western Force at Canberra Stadium on Friday night.
White looked anything but a man who hadn't played in six months during an impressive shift off the bench behind young gun Ryan Lonergan, while Joe Powell is waiting in the wings after being rotated out of the match day squad.
Three doesn't go into two, leaving Brumbies coach Dan McKellar poised to again reshuffle his squad this week after making nine changes to the starting XV for the Waratahs clash.
"It's what you want, it's a good headache for Dan to have," White said.
"That's what we want across the whole board. We want depth and we want guys competing for positions every day of the week, and that's just going to make us better and better.
"She's going to be a tight tussle there, but we hope it's like that across the whole squad. That will push us to be better, and that's what we want to do.
"We want to make sure over the next few weeks we evolve. [Saturday night] was good, we enjoyed it, but we can be better than that. The competition for positions is only going to push that."
To say the Brumbies still have plenty of room for improvement is perhaps an ominous warning for the Force, who enter the clash off the back of a 52-point defeat to Queensland.
So too the fact the home side has a chance to lock in a home ground advantage for the Australian competition's decider on September 19.
"It's certainly a carrot there. You don't want to look too far ahead, but that's the reward isn't it? We've put ourselves in a position to be able to get that but it's hard," White said.
"You don't want to get too wrapped up in looking ahead to where we get to, it's the process that we do to be able to get there.
"We need to review this game, perform against the Force, and if we do that and it happens, that's great. We certainly can't be thinking about that too much.
"Yes, it's a great reward for us, but we need to knuckle down. What gets us that reward is us doing our jobs, doing them well and performing as a team.
"We'll enjoy this because you have to, Tah week, when you beat the Tahs down here you have to enjoy it. At the same time we've got a short turnaround, and we have to move onto the Force.
"The Force are a good side, they've had a couple of tough losses but they are certainly a team that are able to bounce back and perform."
SUPER RUGBY AU ROUND NINE
Friday: ACT Brumbies v Western Force at Canberra Stadium, 7.05pm.