Meanwhile down at the Red Cow
Down to the Red Cow in Richmond to watch the rugby union World Cup final. The pub was heaving. One thing I thought odd was that people behaved just as they would if they were actually at the match, applauding good passages of play and cat calling the referee when there was disagreement with a decision. Who's going to hear them?
The outcome of the match hinged on one very tight decision over whether or not Mark Cueto's foot touched the line as he went over to ground the ball in the corner after a dazzling run by Mathew Tait.
The match official with the video monitor certainly spent time scrutinising the play before ruling out a try. So we couldn't complain even though it looked good from the angles I saw. And that's one of the things that makes rugby such a great game - so much better than football. The players didn't complain or whinge about the decision after the match; none of the "we wuzz robbed" remarks you get in soccer, simply an acknowledgement that South Africa deserved their win.
But I wouldn't go so far as to say they were the better side on the day. England didn't suffer a beating, they simply didn't get the rub of the green this time. Decisions can make so much difference, as New Zealand found when they lost out to a French try scored from what looked like a clear forward pass.
Consistent rugby
Over the whole tournament, however, South Africa played the most consistent rugby and did so by concentrating on their defence, punishing other sides when they made errors as they did against Argentina in the semi-final.
England succeeded because they went back to basics - to the things they do well - scrummaging, fighting for the ball and protecting it when they get it. In the final they made two costly errors. Jonny Wilkinson should not have passed out to Tait that led to a slip in front of the posts, then a penalty for holding on to the ball. Lewis Moody should not have tripped a South African player that led to another successful penalty.
Big commitment
They also lost the ball in one or two situations when they had South Africa under real pressure. On the other hand they defended well themselves. The great thing about the final, as a rugby fan, is that, as you watched the match you felt that every player on the field was giving their absolute maximum commitment.
So we left the pub disappointed with the result but not by England's performance. I'm happy for the South Africans if the win lifts their country. Their team will be going in to transition in the next few years due to political pressures to field more black players. This may lead to a weaker side in the short term but hopefully will produce long term benefits in building rugby excellence within South Africa's black population.
The danger is that the political ramifications create so much upheaval that it damages the South African game and its administration. Sometimes political correctness can go too far. Talk of removing the Springbok emblem because of a perceived association with apartheid in some quarters seems silly.
Laissez fair management
As for England, there will be transition there too. Some great players are retiring but there is enough experience in this side to be optimistic about the changes. One thing that may need to be addressed is the laissez fair management style of England's head coach Brian Ashton. Was it justified by the results? I'm not so sure. But that shouldn't mean talk of dissmisal. It just needs sorting out.
Another issue for the game's administrators is the success of defensive rugby and territory-grabbing kicking in this World Cup. It didn't make for many great passages of running play in the tighter games. There was plenty of excitement in the tenseness of it all but it meant that we didn't see much flowing rugby in those matches. Overall, however, it was a great tournament, made so, in many ways, by the lesser sides that are improving all the time. It leaves plenty to build on.
The outcome of the match hinged on one very tight decision over whether or not Mark Cueto's foot touched the line as he went over to ground the ball in the corner after a dazzling run by Mathew Tait.
The match official with the video monitor certainly spent time scrutinising the play before ruling out a try. So we couldn't complain even though it looked good from the angles I saw. And that's one of the things that makes rugby such a great game - so much better than football. The players didn't complain or whinge about the decision after the match; none of the "we wuzz robbed" remarks you get in soccer, simply an acknowledgement that South Africa deserved their win.
But I wouldn't go so far as to say they were the better side on the day. England didn't suffer a beating, they simply didn't get the rub of the green this time. Decisions can make so much difference, as New Zealand found when they lost out to a French try scored from what looked like a clear forward pass.
Consistent rugby
Over the whole tournament, however, South Africa played the most consistent rugby and did so by concentrating on their defence, punishing other sides when they made errors as they did against Argentina in the semi-final.
England succeeded because they went back to basics - to the things they do well - scrummaging, fighting for the ball and protecting it when they get it. In the final they made two costly errors. Jonny Wilkinson should not have passed out to Tait that led to a slip in front of the posts, then a penalty for holding on to the ball. Lewis Moody should not have tripped a South African player that led to another successful penalty.
Big commitment
They also lost the ball in one or two situations when they had South Africa under real pressure. On the other hand they defended well themselves. The great thing about the final, as a rugby fan, is that, as you watched the match you felt that every player on the field was giving their absolute maximum commitment.
So we left the pub disappointed with the result but not by England's performance. I'm happy for the South Africans if the win lifts their country. Their team will be going in to transition in the next few years due to political pressures to field more black players. This may lead to a weaker side in the short term but hopefully will produce long term benefits in building rugby excellence within South Africa's black population.
The danger is that the political ramifications create so much upheaval that it damages the South African game and its administration. Sometimes political correctness can go too far. Talk of removing the Springbok emblem because of a perceived association with apartheid in some quarters seems silly.
Laissez fair management
As for England, there will be transition there too. Some great players are retiring but there is enough experience in this side to be optimistic about the changes. One thing that may need to be addressed is the laissez fair management style of England's head coach Brian Ashton. Was it justified by the results? I'm not so sure. But that shouldn't mean talk of dissmisal. It just needs sorting out.
Another issue for the game's administrators is the success of defensive rugby and territory-grabbing kicking in this World Cup. It didn't make for many great passages of running play in the tighter games. There was plenty of excitement in the tenseness of it all but it meant that we didn't see much flowing rugby in those matches. Overall, however, it was a great tournament, made so, in many ways, by the lesser sides that are improving all the time. It leaves plenty to build on.
Labels: apartheid, Brian Ashton, Jonny Wilkinson, Mark Cueto, Mathew Tait, Red Cow, Richmond, Rugby union world cup, South Africa, Springbok
posted by Richard Donkin at
9:51 AM
3 Comments:
I would take issue with your view that Rugby is a 'much better' game than football.
Undoubtedly the players have far more respect for the referee and there isn't the associated croud trouble or hooliganism as most rugby fans are better educated. ]
However as for the actual game itself there is no comparison. In essence rugby is a bunch of big brutes throwing a ball around and trying to flatten each other. Whilst there is skill involved, the skill levels and techniques in rugby are far easier than the skills required in football. Any fit, big bloke, who isn't afraid to get hurt and has decent eye-hand co-ordination could easily be turned into a half decent Rugby player. The same isn't true of football. The skills are harder to acquire and perfect.
I have played both games to a reasonably high regional level, so speak from first hand experience.
Football at its very best is the beautiful game, poetry in motion. Pele, Cruyff, Best, Maradonna, Platini, Zidane, Ronaldinho - what these men could or can do with a football is so much harder than what Campese or Lomu or JPR Williams ever did with a Rugby Ball.
I guess it's subjective and a matter of opinion, it just happens that your opinion is wrong!
I don't deny that football is a skillful game. As someone who stood on the terraces watching Don Revie's great team at Leeds United in the 1970s how could I?
But it's not a beautiful game. Any poetry in motion is destroyed by the on and off field antics of players and the behaviour of a significant minority of so-called football fans.
At rugby games opposing fans sit together and exchange banter. At football games they trade blows and goad each other with obscenities. For that reason I don't watch Leeds United any more.
As for the players: Best, Maradonna, Paul Gascoigne all blighted their lives with drink or drugs and Zidane set a wonderful example to young people with his head butt on Materazzi in the last world cup.
Yes, Rugby crowds are better behaved than football crowds, historically because Rugby is played and watched by the middle-upper classes, whereas football is a working class game.
Best and Maradonna and Gasgoine did indeed ruin their lives with booze and drugs, but I would rather remember Best for his 6 goal comeback game, Maradonna for his 2nd goal against England and Gasgoine for his audacious flick over Colin Hendry at Euro 96. I'm not sure that their falability as human beings is relevant to their sporting genius.
I'm sure that there are some alcoholic and drug abusing present or past Rugby Players, it just doesn't get highlighted as much as they generally aren't as high profile figures as the world's leading footballers.
Referring to Zidane's headbutt is a bit of a case of double standards. On field violence in football if seen gets punished and is reasonably rare these days. In a rugby match there is often unnecessary stamping, high and dangerous tackles and a hell of a lot of punches thrown. Yet all this seems acceptable to the Rugby fraternity. Witness the 3rd place play off between Argentina and France where there was an early free for all. How often do you see that in football these days?
The levels of crowd violence and trouble have dropped dramatically since the 80's, and with high ticket prices at a number of leading premiership clubs, the demographic of the fan on the terraces is changing. There are now far more middle class football fans as the working class man is priced out of the stadium. This means that the foul-mouthed, racist bigots that were once common are becoming far fewer and more isolated.
I'm not so sure I want my sportsmen to be well-behaved social role models anyway. Give me a Zidaneor McEnroe over Shearer or a Sampras any day. I want my sports heroes to be agressive, determined, to have fire in their belly, to have a feiry personality. Sport has too many squeaky clean cardboard cutouts as it is. For every Coe we need an Ovett.
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