<
>

England wing Jonny May declines 'scary' invite to visit North Korea

England wing Jonny May says he has declined an official invitation to visit North Korea. David Rogers/Getty Images

Jonny May has revealed he received an official invitation to visit North Korea after the England winger spoke of his fascination with the Asian country.

May began watching documentaries on North Korea with teammate Ben Te'o during the Six Nations earlier this year, and joked he could "fix the situation there."

But what started out as a bit of a laugh has now turned serious, which has worried Leicester's prolific try scorer.

"I got back to Gloucester and there was this letter waiting for me with a wax stamp on it, the full works, saying 'private, confidential'," May told the Daily Mail.

"It was a letter from the North Korean embassy. I swear on my life.

"It said, 'Hi Jonny. We've seen that you and Ben Te'o are interested in our country and we'd love to arrange a trip up to the embassy for you, to meet all our president's dignitaries, then we can organise a VIP tour to North Korea'.

"I sent the picture to Ben saying, 'What the hell is going on? Is this a wind-up?'. He said, 'No, I've had one too, they're watching us!'. That's what's scary, they do watch out like that, they have a Google alert. When anyone is talking about North Korea, it will pop up.

"I haven't been to the embassy. I'm actually worried about it. I didn't write back. I asked Eddie Jones about it, but we haven't responded to them. It is probably quite a big honour to be invited, but I'm not going to North Korea!"

May is known to be an interesting character in the England set-up, with George Ford revealing he had to 'evict' the wing from his flat three weeks after he moved from Gloucester to Leicester.

May is in line to return from injury this weekend when England face Australia.