Jonah Lomu has revealed how close he came to dying soon after playing a leading role at the opening of the 2011 Rugby World Cup.
The former All Blacks winger, who underwent a kidney transplant in 2004, was admitted to hospital during the tournament when it began to fail.
In his updated autobiography, Jonah: My Story, AAP reports Lomu, 38, discloses he began feeling unwell hours after stepping onto Eden Park to launch the tournament.
"It started out as a wonderful evening, but as the night wore on I started to feel unwell. By the time I got home I was in a bad way.
"Over the next few hours I got worse. I couldn't keep anything down," he writes.
Days later, his condition deteriorated and Lomu was taken by ambulance to hospital where doctors told him he was very sick.
"My bloodstream was septic and the doctors were starting to think the worst: that my kidney had failed and my body was in total meltdown."
His doctor, John Mayhew, said things got dicey: "For a while there Jonah was an extremely sick man. There was a distinct possibility he could have died as a result of serious renal failure."
AAP reports Lomu is now undergoing dialysis as he waits for a second transplant. He was diagnosed with nephrotic syndrome in 1995.
He played 63 Tests in an international career which stretched from 1994-2002, scoring 37 tries.