Loose Pass: Southern renaissance as ‘power drains’ from north, a lightning HIA and breakaway league ‘unwelcome’
The southern hemisphere has been on top thus far in the Autumn Nations Series.
This week we will mostly be concerning ourselves with the southern renaissance, HIA issues and the breakaway league…
It’s a Southern World again
It was not all that long ago – a couple of years – that we were talking about the great levelling up of the rugby world. Ireland made New Zealand look human at home, and did the same to an extent in South Africa. England won a Test series in Australia. France was high among the favourites for the World Cup after beating South Africa in Paris. Wales beat Argentina, who had just beaten England, although England did beat Australia, who beat Wales – the Wallabies’ second win of a five-match tour that included a loss to Italy. The longstanding hemisphere divide was being closed at last.
Ya think? A year later, the only northern hemisphere team in the World Cup semi-finals was England, who had to hang on to beat Fiji. Neither Ireland nor France were able to deliver when it mattered. It was an all-southern hemisphere final. A year after that, here we are again: Ireland and France the only teams to have recorded wins against sides from the south of the equator and both of them rather fortunate, or at least hardly secure. England look unfit, Wales face a long and lonely rebuild, Scotland looks powerless and Ireland looks stale. Italy scraped past Georgia. France is the only northern hemisphere team that doesn’t look hungover from the World Cup, directionless or in a transition and they face Argentina next, frequently a bogey side.
So what changed? It’s possible that this is merely a long hangover from many a player not getting much of a rest following the World Cup in the north, while down south there was a good two-month recovery period. But that’s not quite right, as South African sides were playing in Europe too (the international players were held back for longer though). Coaching changes are perhaps a factor, giving New Zealand and Australia new direction, yet South Africa is still up there, as is France. The new coach bounce is conspicuously absent from England.
Cycles and generations come and go, but it does seem that the power that was draining up towards the north from the south is beginning to drain right back down again.
The lightning HIA
James Botham’s tackle of a rampaging Rob Valetini was as courageous a head-on tackle as you would wish to see on a rugby pitch. Valetini, all 113kg of him, had a 15 metre run-up at full pace. Botham did exactly what all the doctors insist is far more responsible for head injuries than Samu Kerevi’s collision with Jac Morgan earlier in the game: he stooped low, put his shoulder square and attempted to bring Valetini down.
At first glance, Botham did clearly kill the ball in the tackle. It only became apparent as the ball was finally released and played on that Botham was still in the same position. Referee James Doleman was fully justified in calling the game to a halt quickly, even more justified in telling Australia that no, it was not actually a penalty, Botham was clearly stunned and so it would be a scrum instead, and that Botham would go for an HIA.
This is where it went wrong. Several players asked the referee for clarification, medics ran onto the field, players took water, the TMO had a brief word about any possible illegality in the tackle. Mr. Doleman, generally excellent in the game, responded calmly to them all, which took a good 90 seconds. By the end of which he ordered the scrum and the HIA. Then he reacted with a “he’s already had it?” And then he allowed Botham to play on.
This cannot be right. Other players head for the sheds for thorough HIAs after collisions far less violent than Valetini on Botham. Who on earth felt able to give Botham a suitable HIA in that narrow time frame and in that location? Who sanctioned it? Where was the independent medical reviewer; surely the explicit commands of Mr. Doleman could not have gone unheard?
But most of all: how are we censuring Kerevi for mis-timed acts in a highly dynamic environment for being dangerous, then not taking the most dangerous moments seriously enough?
Be careful what you wish for
Both press machines in England and Wales are whirring away with rumours of THE SACK, and/or QUITTING and/or CHANGE FOR GOOD, with many a fan following suit.
But who would you get instead? Steve Borthwick’s England side may not be eking out the wins the fans and observers want it to, but lest we forget how rudderless it looked under the previous tracksuit-wearer. Warren Gatland’s young and largely green Welsh side does not look like it is not developing, even if the steps are baby ones.
There are few candidates out there to take on England, even fewer to take on Wales right now. Patience is required right now. And possibly, a conditioning coach or two, for it is fitness and mental durability that seems to be the greatest shortcoming in both teams.
Breakaway will do nobody any good
Goodness knows where the rumours of the IPL-style breakaway league backed by some anonymous fat wallets in the USA and Middle East came from. But they are unwelcome.
It’s not done cricket much good, nor F1, nor golf, all sports in which the protagonists earn more, but in which the nature of the sport has been eroded to the point of unrecognizability, exclusive of fans, exploitative of all involved. Please, Dr. Brett Robinson, do your new job so well that it can never happen.
READ MORE: What if Wales sack Warren Gatland? 16 possible options to replace legendary head coach