By Chris Gleadell
September 29 2006

Just when we thought all was well with the season, reality came and gave us more than one sharp kick up the backside. It’s hard to know what to make of Saturdays defeat down at Kingsholm. For the second week running we put in a strong first half performance, even stealing one against the head from the much vaunted Gloucester scrum, something I’m sure that only happens every other millennia.

Then a run of injuries including what looks like a couple of long term absences not only knocked our rhythm but also most of our shape and sharpness and by game end we were hanging on with little or no ball or territory.

I am sure there will be a collective scratching of heads and some long hard pondering this week at the Gardens trying to pick out just where and how we went wrong so quickly and what can be done to remedy the problem. The two games against Worcester and the Dragons in the Anglo-Welsh EDF trophy at least give the team a bit of breathing space for the next two weekends before the big guns of Leicester and Biarritz in the Guinness Premiership and Heineken Cup respectively loom up on the horizon.

By the Tigers game we may have some of the walking wounded ready for battle but the sick list continues to rise and at time of writing we still await news on Tom Smith’s and Pat Barnard’s injuries whilst Steve Thompson is already out for around six weeks and Bruce Reihana until the new year, the pair already joining the likes of broken ankle victim Jon Clarke in the physio’s room.

Despite claims elsewhere that this can be laid at the door of player burnout and the players are playing too much rugby surely with only four weeks of the season gone this cannot be anything more than a run of bad luck on the injury front for the Saints, luck that will hopefully change for the better in the coming weeks. A speedy recovery to all.

WORLD CUP WOES

Poor old Andy Robinson, he’s already on a hiding to nothing with England ’s World Cup defence if you are to believe what the media are saying. The old nutmeg about player burnout reared its head again this week as was mentioned earlier but if you don’t quite buy that one so early in the season then there are another whole host of reasons in the press why England will not retain the RWC.

Nigel Melville suggested in last weeks Guardian that relegation from the Guinness Premiership weighs so heavy on GP coaches minds that they dare not try the expansive game that will secure England the spoils in France07. Am I missing something here, what English expansive game? Now with all due respect to Wally, Ben and Grase the team that won the RWC in Australia in 2003 was not exactly renowned for running them in from all over the place, more a solid forward platform and a reliable Wilkinson boot when push came to shove.

In fact a look at the stats tells you that the ever expansive All Blacks scored 16 (yes sixteen) more tries than England during the tournament without even getting a sniff of the cup. Yes of course we would all want to see the national side playing a high gain brand of rugby but to suggest that relegation haunted coaches are to blame already for England’s supposed demise is stretching it a bit surely? To use it as an excuse for ringfencing the GP is just plain daft.

The other recurring problem England has, or the Daily Mail will believe you they have, is that some clubs are playing far too many ‘foreigners’ in their ranks. Peter Jackson, the papers head rugby writer targeted Saints as the worse offenders suggesting we play New Zealanders by the dozen under the Kolpak agreement and we are very central to undermining England’s World Cup campaign. Had Jackson checked his facts he would not only have found out that Kolpak only covers workers from South Africa, Tonga, Fiji and Samoa but that most of our NZ players qualify through parentage or marriage as EU residents. But at the end of the day does it really matter as long as there is a sensible balance.

I’ve said it before in this column, the top English players do get game time in a hard, competitive league. Why soften it with lesser players who lets face it will never get a sniff of an England cap? Players will learn more playing against and alongside the like of Carlos, Califano and Chabal than they ever would against someone promoted to the ranks from a Div1 club just to make up the numbers purely because they were English born. Jackson bemoans the fact that only 60% of the players playing in the GP are English, looks shocking doesn’t it until some simple mathematics tells you that’s around 160 English qualified players playing in the top division. And England need a squad of how many?

In the following days paper the Mail gave Keith Barwell the right to reply and talking slightly tongue in cheek our chairman, whilst putting the argument from the clubs point of view, suggested that post RWC07 you will see even more South African, Australian and New Zealand players over here and don’t be too surprised when Dan Carter rolls up at the Gardens. Now of course we have as much chance of seeing Daniel O'Donnell on the Karaoke at the Bus Club than we have of Daniel Carter weaving his way magic on the Gardens turf (he would only be on the bench anyway) but his opposite number and those alongside him would long term be better players for it.

BBC DAWS

There’s no getting away from Matt Dawson on the box nowadays is there? I did think when Daws headed off to Wycombe Wasps to concentrate on his media opportunities we would be seeing him in sporting roles such as a rugby analyst but it seems Matt is turning his hand to everything at the Beeb.

Last Friday he almost took over the schedules. Before his usual sparring with Ally McCoist on Question of Sport there was Matt cooking up pan-fried sea bass with cucumber salsa on Celebrity Masterchef on his way to making the final this week. Then in October we will see him tripping the light fantastic in Strictly Come Dancing.

What’s next for our former scrumhalf is anyone’s guess but what a shame they’ve already cast Maria. ;-)