Challenging Times

DECADES BACK - Ally MacLeod was under a bit of pressure at Ayr United. The team wasn't clicking, the wins were not coming and, with Ally's nemesis – Enclosure George Reid sniping from his position behind the home dug out and the Somerset Road End singing the descant, the great man was toiling.

From memory, the Honest Men dragged themselves to a draw and post-match, in that tiny manager's office at Somerset Park, one of our number addressed the elephant in the room, asking him about dealing with criticism from the terraces.

Ally didn't duck the issue, coming up with a nugget of insight which I have quoted before, do so again today and will surely use again in the future.

He said: “For as long as unhappy fans are having a go at the Manager, that Manager is fairly secure; but, the minute the fans start having a go at the Board of Directors, the Manager is toast”.

What – you ask, has that wee tale got to do with Scottish Rugby? Well, just this. No matter who has had a top coaching job in Scottish Rugby, he or she has to thole the Scottish default position, at best - a grudging: “Him! Ah kent his faither”; at worst: “He's a bawbag, get rid”.

So, the body of the kirk has a long history of being unimpressed by the men running the teams. Some not-so-good coaches haven't lasted very long, while some good men were perhaps not fully appreciated by the fans.

Sione Fukofuka didn't hang around long enough to have the Rugby Union Divisions of The Tartan Army quoting the first syllable of his surname at him, and, to be fair, his departure was not greatly mourned around the nation. However, the news that he has been appointed Head Coach of the Australian Women's team has rather tarnished his escutcheon.

His going is the latest in a pattern. To put it bluntly, whoever does the hiring at Murrayfield has got into a bit of a pattern – of hiring the wrong people. Of late, that women's team has had, if we take the Coach as the guy holding the wheel: “More Captains than Cunard”.

OK, having carnival knowledge of a secretary across his desk was an own goal, but, the short-lived and now disgraced last CEO was, in truth, never a great appointment. We have seen other appointments within Murrayfield turn out to be less than epic, with one or two chocolate fire-guards somehow surviving for years – so, to get back to that Ally MacLeod story – maybe it's about time we started asking tougher questions of the SRU's Board of Directors.

OLD MA'A NONU caused a wee bit of a stir on Tuesday, when he stepped out of the Sharks' ranks and answered the All Blacks Haka with one of his own. That was one spine-tingling moment.

However, it wasn't exactly a unique moment. Guided by some of the social media comments around the incident, I discovered, on You Tube, a clip of the five Kiwis in a Munster team, entertaining the ABs at Thomond Park, stepping forward and doing their own Haka. Look it up, it's worth watching.

The abiding lesson for me, however, is, for all the ABs have, of late, tried to turn the Haka into something of a production number – a group of men in black uniforms performing a choreographed routine: sport's version of Springtime For Hitler. Nothing beats the simplicity of Kamate Kamate. It is still for me, the real Haka.

I also found, via Google, an online page: Inherit South Africa, written by a guy named Michael Chorton, who told the story of the long-abandoned South African “Haka” - the Zulu Indlamu – apparently last performed by the Springboks in 1937. The Afrikaner Broederbond then put a stop to this nonsense – might it now be time, with this present Greatest Rivalry Tour to bring back the Indlamu?

From a Scottish perspective: we have the world's greatest March-On spectacle – the Scottish Football Tartan Army, behind a pipe band, marching towards a stadium, assuring the world: “When you hear the noise of the Tartan Army boys – we'll be comin' doon the road”.

We also have the greatest March-Off spectacle – proudly shown in Edinburgh, every evening, at the conclusion of the Tattoo – nothing stirs a Scotsman's blood like the massed pipes and drums giving it laldy with Scotland the Brave and The Black Bear.

Surely we could come-up with a pre-match challenge to rival the Haka or Indlamu.