Losing ugly

Autumn blues

There has been a lot of negative press about the autumn international for England, but overall, it probably isn't as bad as everyone says. Yes, there were some disappointing results, but these were against the best two teams in the world. And even with these results, the team were probably not performing at their best - largely due to a misfiring 10, 12 channel, which was swiftly rectified with George Ford entering the fray, and Twelvetrees returning to the inside centre role. But the most important news is that, even when slightly off colour, the team almost managed to scrape out a win - they are only four points of improvement away from that most valuable of skill...winning ugly. For the moment, we'll just have to be satisfied with (just) losing ugly - but it shoes that with a few senior players returning and a bit more movement along the learning curve and this England team can really be something special. How long this takes is a different question - Clive Woodward took two attempts at the World Cup to develop the hard edge necessary to win the world cup. Plus, New Zealand are probably still within their 8 year winning cycle (as seen by international teams such as France and Spain in football) - so on balance of probabilities, its likely that we'll have to wait until 2019 for an England world cup win, which is why the RFU's decision to offer long-term contracts to the coaching team was such a good one. That's not to say we shouldn't hope for an England world cup win next year (it's certainly possible), but we should also be realistic and not overreact if there isn't the win that everyone is hoping for...

Tackle technique

The modern game has changed tackling technique from when I was younger. The idea of keeping your head out of the way to protect it from damage has been jettisoned with the need to stop the opposition at all costs. But perhaps this will change with the concussion rules, which are being admirably used (the only concern is what it has been like for the last 10 years or so). More and more players are being lost from games and kept out of matches to protect them from concussion damage - so coaches may start telling players to be more careful in the tackle in order to keep them in games for longer. I hope this will be the case - because looking after players' mental health really is more important than winning games.

Thick of it or bird's eye view

Coaching and managing top professional sports teams is an unforgiving business. Staff turnover is massively high in this cut throat world, and the very best performers are always looking for that something extra which can give them the edge over their rivals. And yet, there seems to be a large role to be played by tradition - this can be the only explanation for the strange difference of approaches between rugby coaches, who tend to sit up high in the stands, and football managers who prefer to be down on the touchline (except when they're banned by the fourth official, of course). Intuitively, this seems like the wrong way round - the world of rugby is such a physical and high intensity sport, where being up close to players would seem to be the best option. Here you can gee up players to ensure they're playing at maximum intensity, get a good feeling of stamina and energy levels, and make your opinion clear to the referees (although it would have to be done politely, given rugby's strict rules and traditions about respecting referees). Whereas football, with its greater degree of tactical variety focusing on the use of space, would seem to benefit from a bird's eye view - enabling managers to manipulate their teams, as a general would move his forces. There probably isn't one approach which is decidedly better than the other, with the different approaches most likely to suit different people - but it would be nice to see managers from both sports experimenting with other approach...

The nicknames of yore

The six nations is nearly upon us and your blogger is incredibly excited. The sporting competition which defines this part of the year is about to give us our weekend entertainment fix. The build up, the analysis, the matches themselves. And, of course, the nostalgia - reliving the great tries and teams of yesteryear. Misty eyed old codgers (your blogger included) will dream of the romanticism and innocence (well, sort of= of the amateur era. If only the modern pros would try to emulate their predecessors a bit more. And with Stuart Lancaster trying to instill this sense of history and pride into his team, perhaps he should consider getting his forwards to start coming up with nicknames like they used to in the old days - Mick 'the munch' Skinner, 'Iron' Mike Teague and Brian 'Pitbull' Moore spring to mind. It would certainly add a bit more colour than the Woodsey, Robbo and Lawsey that are probably being used currently, and would keep us old codgers happy too...

International selection and availability top of the agenda

It doesn't seem to matter what the sport is - there are selection controversies affecting national coaches across the country. So let's try to break it down into manageable chunks:

Rugby

This most surprising of all twists and turns of the past week comes from Rugby Union, where former England coach Andy Farrell has resigned from Saracens. Having earlier turned down a permanent coaching post with England in order to remain with Saracens, there seems to have been a change of heart and he will now serve out the rest of his time with Saracens. With the era of intrigue at the RFU seemingly, hopefully, at an end (although it appears Martyn Thomas is continually trying to drag the RFU back to the bad old days as he is considering issuing a writ against his former employees), there has also been no suggestion that Andy Farrell has been recently courted by the England camp to review his decision. Only time will tell if his intention is to return to the international fold (did the end of this season with Saracens fail to live up to the excitement of being involved with the England team?) - but he would certainly make an impressive appointment to join England as defensive coach (and Stuart Lancaster has indicated he'd be happy to have Farrell join his team), freeing up Mike Catt to take on a specialist attacking role.

Football

Meanwhile, the England football team's preparation ahead of Euro 2012 has ignited the nation's press into action - moving swiftly from mild disinterest in a team with modest ambitions to full scale scandal alert following Roy Hodgson's failure to invite Rio Ferdinand and Micah Richards up to the national squad following the injury which sidelined Gary Cahill. The Rio Ferdinand situation is a real can of worms and the only surprise is that it took this long for it to blow up into a full media frenzy. It appears that Hodgson decided that he could only take one of them to Krakow for the tournament as the alternative would be to have a divided camp which would make a successful tournament nigh on impossible. He then made the decision to pick Terry as the player in better form and, having made this decision, is unable now to select Ferdinand barring an injury to Terry himself. The explanation given that his non-selection was therefore a half-truth, as he would have been selected if he had been judged to be playing better than Terry. And for all the rights and wrongs of this course of action, at least it has the advantage of limiting the number of senior players travelling to the tournament and allowing a few younger players to get some experience of losing playing on the international stage. However, the final comment should go to Rio himself - he can certainly be applauded for (eventually) backing the team despite his omission.

The Micah Richards plot line is also a complicated one. Having first apparently turned down the opportunity to join the standby list in a fit of pique, it was then reported that he asked not to be included because he was so devastated at having been left out. It seems a strange reaction to say the least (particularly given the likelihood of injuries giving the standby list players a fairly strong chance of getting into the squad) and one hopes that in the future players take heed from this episode and always keep themselves open for national selection - short of injury concerns, surely any opportunity to join the national squad should be accepted regardless of perceived snubs or disappointments?

Cricket

And finally to cricket - the England squad has suffered a mixture of players disappointed at being rested by management against their wishes and another choosing to rest himself against the wishes of management. While the decision to rest Jimmy Anderson and possibly Stuart Broad seems a wise one given the amount of cricket that is stacked up ahead of them, it is also encouraging to see how hungry both players are to get caps and wickets for England. However, it's likely that this disappointment will pass once they're (almost certainly) reinstated to the team for the South Africa tests. And although some fans may be disappointed not to see the best available team for England play at Edgbaston, at least they will be hardly short changed with some superb replacements available and, in the very worse case, a lower standard performance should, all other things being equal, make for a closer match.

Meanwhile, Kevin Pietersen has retired from all short forms of cricket at international level, citing the need to preserve his fitness to compete in the Test side. Now while he has had a number of injuries affect his career, he appears to be in good shape and doesn't suffer the pressures on the body experienced by fast bowlers to require such caution at the age of 31. However, it would be unfair to label it as being purely financially motivated to enable him to be free to play in the IPL, rather, I would imagine, it is a decision based on the desire to perform more regularly on what is perceived as the biggest, most prestigious, stages - that is Test cricket for England and international Twenty20 tournaments such as the IPL.

It seems that the most obvious conclusion from these developments is that the one day format is under increasing pressure - if there was a focus purely on Twenty20 and Test cricket, this would lower the demands put on players in terms of volume of cricket and allow players to concentrate on the most popular (and, admittedly, lucrative) forms of the game.