Why rugby falls behind football

For those who are not fans, Rugby is a fast, brutal, bodily-contact game played by fifteen a side, mostly huge men. Some describe it as the last form of gladatorial combat. Its main support came from English public schools where it was considered character building and ideal game for the middle-classes of a martial nation. But it was a dying sport until about ten years ago when its administrators overhauled it from top to bottom with the aim of giving it new spectator appeal. One example: the referee is wired for sound and spectators hear a running commentary from him as he instructs the players while they are in action how to avoid breaking the rules.

The overhaul worked and the game won many new fans. It is, of course, nowhere near as popular as football, leading sports writers to comment on the differences between the two sports and the fans that follow them. One wrote, “The Rugby boys seem a decent bunch of sportsmen and are more representative of the England I admire than any football team. Maybe its Rugby’s lingering connection to amateurism. I don’t know. But the players come across as real people whereas footballers don’t.”

How come? Well, England, the title holders after beating Australia in Sydney four years ago, collapsed to South Africa early on. When they pulled off a fairy-tale victory over their ancient rivals, France, the British Press was rightly full of it: “What a day! What a game! What a victory!” So great was the thrill that everyone, including the French, would have forgiven them if they had celebrated boisterously on the field, gone off and got drunk and sang a few verses of that old anti-French football song, “If it wasn’t for the British you’d be Krauts.”

Instead, what did we see on our TV screens at home and in just about every pub around the land? The mildest of celebrations on the field, some dignified hand-shaking between fellow team members and, England players putting a consoling hand on the giant shoulders of weeping French forwards as the loudspeakers around the ground rang with Edith Piaf singing, “Non, je ne regrette rien.” It was much the same on the French streets. TV crews found it hard to find a group of English fans bigger than five or six. They were delighted, they were celebrating, and they gave V for victory signs.

But they were not gloating and not rioting and throwing chairs and there wasn’t a policeman in sight.

Full time came and went with no sign of the referee’s whistle so asked another spectator what was going on. “Oh,” he said, as if it were obvious.

Then there has to be the major lesson of all team sports, one which football seems to have forgotten: no player is bigger than the team.

The support a team functioning as one can provide its players makes it possible to overcome the setbacks that all sports throw up. This England team overcame injury, temporary poor form, age, derision and despair. The other lessons from team sports carry over into life itself.

The British recognise them but with typical reticence are reluctant to talk about them.

The England coach, Brian Asthton, dinned them into his team after that early disastrous game. Have the mind set that nothing’s impossible. Tough it out. Don’t complain. Be patient. And never, ever give up.

Phillip Knightley is a veteran British journalist and commentator