Have England’s Rugby Players caught THE FEAR from the Footballers?

First of all, let me say I’m no rugby expert. I played inside centre at my secondary school and that’s about as far as it got – I only did that because my testosterone-fueled T-Rex of a PE teacher insisted I play for the oval-ball team, if I wanted to play in the football side.

But any mug watching England’s latest mauling could see something’s badly wrong with the team. The 32-6 defeat to the rampaging All Blacks was characterized by nervous, tentative, fearful play by Jonno’s jokers. Every time – well, the few times we attacked – the player in possession looked terrified beyond belief, just desperate to get rid of the ball. I think it was Ugo Monye, the petrified winger who first half tried the bamboozling tactic of firing an up-and-under straight up in the air and then dropping the ball on its descent to Earth. The tactic didn’t work, shockingly.

So-called specialist ball handlers like Rickey Flutey and Danny Care in the backs looked incapable of catching and throwing – surely the foundation of any year five PE lesson and certainly skills you’d expect to be mastered by England representatives at Twickers. As for leadership, well Steve Borthwick seemed to have lost the power of speech when talking to the ref. Warned about the indiscipline of England’s increasingly desperate players in the first half, Borthwick mumbled incoherently in response, presumably destined to assure the guy he would get his players to calm down. With four sin bins all game the bloody-nosed beast failed in that regard, which wasn’t surprising given his apparent lack of communication skills.

So, well-paid England stars appearing like startled fawns in the spotlight, incapable of performing basic tasks… does that ring any bells? Well, blow me down with a corner flag if they’re lilly-livered fear-ridden performances don’t evoke stomach-churning memories of the England football team, pre Fabio Cappello. You remember those games, when the likes of Steven Gerrard and David Beckham, pass masters at club level, couldn’t string a couple of five-yard combinations together?

Of course, under the Italian master, Lampard and Co have finally started looking like professional footballers, roaring to the top of their world cup qualifying group and even stringing a couple of passes together… saucy stuff. So, what does this mean for England’s struggling rugby boys? Well, Fabio’s top secrets we’re led to believe are his ability to discipline the millionaires at his disposal and his ability to instil a sense of belief in their fractured shells. So, could it be that Giant Jonno – for all his leadership qualities in his playing days – hasn’t convinced the likes of Borthwick and Mears that they deserve to mix it with the studly southern hemisphere chaps? Surely, somehow he needs to bolster their belief levels.

To elaborate on the passing similarity between England’s fearful footballers of yesteryear and the jittery rugger lads of today, isn’t passing the key problem? New Zealand tossed the ball around with a smile on their faces like they were in the back garden with their doting fathers. They found holes, they switched the angle of attack and they ran like the wind. England players stuttered and hovered indecisively before throwing wayward bombs to their angst-ridden team mates who looked as if they were trying to catch big blocks of concrete. Bereft of attacking options or movement the most popular choice for the English players on show was just to burrow their heads into the bosom of an opposing Kiwi with the desperate hope of retaining possession. I’m no expert, but this didn’t seem to work. So, does English rugby from school boy level onwards not encourage flair rugby? Certainly, at my university the Rugby lads seemed more worried about how big their guns were rather than the slickness of their ball skills?

So, given that the bruising ‘run straight into them and set up the second wave’ approach is failing hopelessly can England not at least start chucking the ball around a bit? Give us some entertainment? Can we get the youngsters doing, rather than focusing on their lat pulldowns and bench presses?

A guy I know remarked to me recently that rugby isn’t really a sport. He said it’s just big blokes who have big muscles and can run fast. The electric display that New Zealand turned on Saturday suggests that’s a load of rubbish. Rugby can be a highly-skilled, artful exhibition, albeit one fuelled by pace and power.

As I keep saying I don’t know a whole lot about rugby, but maybe a whole lot of us in England would want to learn a whole lot more if our national team took a leaf out of New Zealand’s book. Start tossing the ball around with flair and fun and maybe the interest in the sport will grow. One thing’s for sure, they’ve got to ditch the fear – just ask Steve Mcclaren what happens when that gets ahold of a sports team.

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