WALES ONLINE is a website to be approached with caution. You have to wade through some pretty smelly bullshit about how great (or poor) Welsh rugby is to find the occasional diamond in the dross.
On Thursday morning, I chanced upon such a diamond. It was a piece by former Cardiff and Wales player Mark Ring, in which he bemoaned the road professional rugby has embarked upon. He even admitted he had switched off the final 20 minutes of the Third Test between the Springboks and the Lions, since he had by then reached his boredom threshold.
You see, that's the thing about professional sport – particularly professional team sport -in this 21st century. We are in the age of “The Coach as God.” Top coaches today are rarely interested in entertaining their audience, or even necessarily in winning. It's all about not losing and keeping the coach in his highly-paid job.
The fact is, if every coach of every team did his job properly – got his or her team correctly prepared, motivated and rehearsed – every match, in every sport would finish 0-0. Nobody would slip-up or make a mistake, every move by the one team would be effectively countered by the opposition. The purists might enjoy the chess match that unfolded, the general public would soon lose interest and depart from that game.
Spectators don't come to see bloopers and unforced errors, but, these are the incidents which make sport. If no player slipped-up, there wouldn't be goals or tries. However, conversely, since it takes away from the excitement, it's the coach's job to prevent this.
Perhaps the most-exciting time to be a Scottish rugby fan was when Gregor Townsend was coaching Glasgow Warriors. He had a disciple at ten, in the developing Finn Russell. He also had a couple of “X-Factor” Fijians, in Niko Matawalu and Leone Nakarawa. Sure, Toony had a game plan for each match, but, Finn had licence to go off-script when necessary, and the Weegie Fijians were similarly free to improvise when the chance came up.
When every other lock forward in the PRO12 (as it was then) carried over the gain line – expectation was, he would go to ground and the ball would be recycled. When Nakarawa carried, it was up to the other Warriors to get up alongside him, ready for the outrageous off-load which would wrong-foot the opposition and keep the attack flowing. Likewise, Russell and Matawalu were free to make it up as they went along, which often led to glorious flowing passages of attacking rugby and the occasional, wonderful, coast-to-coast try – and every now and again had the Warrior Nation gobsmacked and asking: “What did they think they were doing there?”.
These days, however, while Townsend remains arguably the most-inventive coach in the northern hemisphere, his coaching peers are increasingly going down the road of being predominantly defensive. Stop attacks at source, shut down space, take no risks – play for position and territory. This makes for the bore-festival which is professional rugby at the highest level.
The hope for the future is that the Townsend method, and in England the Harlequins way will overcome in the battle for the soul of the game – otherwise, we are all doomed.
In his Wales Online piece, Mark Ring also pointed-out one or two wee side issues, which the fans in the stands might not be aware of. I particularly liked his point about how the All Blacks have perfected the art of “running interference,” whereby, chasers following-up a kick for position find they are having to take the long way round, through a thicket of black jerseys to contest the kick, leaving the kick receiver with plenty of time in which to gather the kick and assess his options.
But, for me the main point to emerge from reading the Ring piece was yet another statement of the obvious. We are in a period in the game where the forces of expediency are beating the forces of excitement and entertainment. The top coaches, other than Townsend perhaps, are putting results ahead of entertainment. Fair enough, since professional sport is a results-driven business.
However, if getting the right result means we don't get entertained; the fans will drift away, there will be less money going round, and the game has a problem. Better to tackle this problem now, before it becomes even-more serious.
That would mean World Rugby looking seriously at the state of the game, where it is going and how to ensure it moves in the right direction. Does anyone have confidence in the current World Rugby leadership, under Sir Bill Beaumont, and with time-servers like oor ain John Jeffrey and TCD involved doing the necessary? I certainly don't.
I commend the Ring piece to the readers, however, he makes some great points.
THIS IS a big weekend for the FOSROC Super6 competition. Week Five, the mid-point of the regular season, but, more importantly, the last week in which they have the rugby landscape to themselves. The club season kicks off next weekend, so, the S6 clubs have to put on a show to try to hold onto any new converts they have captured.
They've got a cracker to kick things off, with tonight's televised top of the table clash between Watsonians and Southern Knights, under the Myreside lights. There's a lot at stake for both teams, and a few questions to be answered:
How will the five-day turnaround affect the table-topping Knights?
Can the home team bounce back from Saturday's Edinburgh Derby loss to Heriot?
Was that a one-off, or the first sign of decline for Watsonians?
The game certainly promises much. I will be watching on TV and I just hope BBC Scotland has their act together better and it is available from the start on the iplayer. Better to watch on a 40 inch-plus TV screen, rather than even my trusty Apple desktop.
I will be at Millbrae on Saturday for Ayrshire Bulls v Heriot's. In recent years, whether in the Premiership or S6, this has always been a match-up to savour. I expect nothing less tomorrow.
After narrow back-to-back losses at The Greenyards and Bridgehaugh, Bulls return to Millbrae, knowing this is one they cannot afford to lose – while Heriot's, gradually finding their feet after a slow start, will be keen to maintain momentum. We even have Scotland's top referee – Mike Adamson, on the whistle. This one is tasty.
The same may be said for Sunday's Meggetland meeting of Boroughmuir Bears and Stirling County. That last-gasp bonus-point win over the Bulls last Friday has given County some much-needed momentum; and with Archie Russell on-fire at the moment and looking forward to facing his old team, this one excites.
Bears have not been getting the results their play probably merits, and, with home advantage, will be keen to get back to winning ways. Much will perhaps depend on how injured players on both sides recover, but, hopefully we will continue to see exciting rugby from two teams who like to play an expansive game.
Sunday's game is live on Free Sports (Freeview Channel 64), from 1.15pm.
I think we are watching different games AA.
ReplyDeleteThere is an adage that the best coaches adapt themselves to the players they have rather than the other way round. Townsend was exciting because of the firepower he had. He deployed a game plan to exploit those talents.
In the Scotland job he’s been found wanting IMO. The chatter about the 31-31 England game was that the players ignored his instructions in the 2nd half.
Whether he is the most exciting/innovative coach around, he still needs Ws in the credit column or he will be looking for new opportunities. Hardly surprising that coaches become conservative when their whole livelihood rests on not losing.