More brain, less brawn
FRANK KEATING
The basso thump of Six Nations’ rugby begins this weekend — today Wales are at Twickenham and Italy in Dublin, and tomorrow the French collide with the Scots at Murrayfield. The reverberating crash-bang-wallop continues till the Ides of March. Turn the BBC’s sound down; rugby is now as gruntingly noisy as women’s tennis. Oh for our old springheeled game of evasion, dodging and darting. Lately, it has become one unending wince as one man-mountain simply charges pell-mell at another: Pow! Pam! Ugh! and pot luck on murder or suicide.
England and France annually start as favourites; well, they each have by far the biggest supply of the biggest heavyweights. Nicely, however, it is Wales who come to Twickenham today as the champions. They won last year, not by much but with a mix of quickness, cheek, nerve and conviction. This time, I fancy they lack that middle quality, for they have spent much of their preparation getting in their excuses about injury and suspension. Truth is, they never enjoy London; always suburban Twickenham has daunted them or, at least, since Barry and Gareth and Gerald stopped playing. Red-bloodedly vengeful and cockily in the trim Wales might feel crossing the Severn Bridge with their hymns and bravado, but they have only to pass Reading for the fatal Celtic insecurities to begin kicking in. Mind you, it would be hugely instructive today if Wales could stay one move ahead and flit about, fast and loose, to keep England’s heavy-footed infantry on the hop. Which might force a change in the home side’s timeless tactic of muscle-over-mind powerplay, an outdated philosophy which I doubt will get England very far in defence of its World Cup next year in France. The 15-man all-court game, inventive power at a lick and as much brain as brawn, are the necessary new ingredients.
Which France have in abundance. France could select three different XVs each as brilliant as the other; zut alors the ruddy difficulty is choosing the one which is, exactement l’exemplaire, the very very best; the meld is all, and that has regularly been France’s dilemma and downfall. Scotland could do everyone a favour (including the French selectors) if they gave France’s first pick a rattling good run for its money tomor row in Edinburgh. You might say the same about Italy in Dublin, because it suddenly seems possible that the bounce and vitality in the progress of Ireland this winter have been dramatic. Into the new year, I had presumed a hearty, once promising but generally unfulfilled bunch had, sadly, grown old and jaded together. Then, out of the blue (you might say), the greens became vivid indeed when in the last of Europe’s Heineken Cup qualifiers, first Munster, with a pile of callow boyos new to me, hoorayingly ran ragged English Premiership strutters Sale; next day, Bath’s fortress was outrageously stormed by Brian O’Driscoll’s Leinster lot — both sides playing the aforesaid 15-man all-court running game — talk about Riverdance! — and on neither occasion was one clodhopping second-row forward gormlessly allowed to clog up the athletes’ midfield.
Traditionally, history’s fabled rugby matches (in fiction and in fact) were turned by lustrous, lavish, centre-three-quarter play. If the peerless O’Driscoll, the nearly as remarkable Frenchman Jauzion and, say, a couple of other audacious spirits in red, white or blue can joyously tear open and free up the midfield airwaves this next five weeks, then European rugby could be in for a renewal of grandeur. With not a grunt to be heard.
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