The 2005-06 Heineken Cup campaign will not linger long in the Cardiff Blues annals for performance alone. In a pool featuring Perpignan, Leeds Tykes and Calvisano, they collected three wins from six and finished third. But it was their match on Dec. 10, 2005, when at the Centro San Michele in front of 4,500 folk they unleashed Jonah Lomu on lowly Calvisano.

He only made 10 appearances for the Blues and scored one try but the seven-month contract paid dividends in different strands of the region. His sole score came against the Newport Gwent Dragons at the Arms Park on Dec. 27. It was trademark Lomu: a floating pass from tight-head Martin Jones found the bulldozing Kiwi on the left flank and he brushed aside Gareth Chapman to cross in the corner. The grin was the same, the stride exact but he never quite re-found the form that saw him emerge as the game's first global superstar 10 years previously.

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In 1995 Lomu burst onto the scene with his eight tries in the World Cup but unbeknownst at the time, he was struggling with nephrotic syndrome -- an illness diagnosed in 1996 -- and by 2002 he had to step aside from Test duties and underwent a kidney transplant in 2004. But rugby was in his DNA and there was an unquenchable thirst for success as then Cardiff Blues boss Dai Young remembers.

"I had the honour of working with Jonah when we signed him for the Blues. He was determined to get back to where he was," Young, now director of rugby at Wasps, told ESPN. "His work ethic was very commendable and he didn't talk about the struggles he'd been through but of course we knew about it. We'd all watched it and seen how far he'd come back but that was inspiring in itself. When he was with us, he was determined to pull on the black jersey again.

"He had suffered from injury and his illness but really wanted to come back. He had a couple of quiet games by his standards but he filled the Arms Park three or four times so he did the job commercially but then he hit form. He showed the pace and power we knew he was capable of and just when he was getting back to being the great Jonah Lomu, he went over on his ankle and dislocated it."

Though he never quite recaptured his 1995 best, he left a lasting legacy at the Blues. For the experienced players, they enjoyed chewing the fat with one of the game's greats. Tom Shanklin had already accrued 33 Wales caps by that point and missed much of Lomu's time at the Arms Park through injury but he has fond memories of the All Black's spell there.

"I was injured when he was with us but we brushed shoulders a fair bit," Shanklin told ESPN. "Rushy [Xavier Rush] and I went round to his flat for dinner. It was a lovely evening. He said to me we should swap an old playing shirt. I never followed that up; it's my biggest regret.

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"There was also a time when I asked him to come to a local insurance company to do a quick talk with me. They paid me £500 for a previous chat and they wondered if I'd bring Jonah along to do the same. I asked him in front of the boys and he was all coy and didn't know how to answer.

"I said they'd pay him £500 which for someone like me was top dollar. Jonah told me quietly that he wasn't sure how it really worked but the previous gig he did he got paid 20 times that but quickly said he'd happily come along as a favour for me. I of course told him not to worry and we never spoke of that again but he was someone who had time for everybody and was just keen to help wherever he could. We loved having him around."

That was Lomu's effect on one of the more senior players and he left a lasting impression on the younger generation at the Blues too. "You always saw him in the canteen spending time with the younger guys," Young remembers. "A lot of the younger guys were on small contracts, academy contracts and a couple of them had boots which had seen better days so he asked them what their sizes were and sorted them out with new ones. He didn't want any taps on the back but if he could help them, he would. He was always looking to help and it definitely wasn't just for show."

When he left after injuring his ankle, the players arrived at their training base to find he had paid for a new sound system to be installed in the team room. It was a mark of the man: utterly selfless.

Before their match against Harlequins on Thursday evening, they will hold a minutes silence to remember the time the global superstar came to the Blues. It will be a time for celebration of a wonderful man but also one of reflection of a life brutally cut short.

"When you meet a genuine legend of the game they sometimes don't live up to expectations but he exceeded everything you want in a person," said Young. "I was blown away by his humility, the way he handled himself and what a gentleman he was. He had time for everybody."