Behind the Rose E-Book

Stephen Jones

• Herausgeber: Polaris
• Kategorie: Lebensstil
• Serie: Behind the Jersey
• Sprache: Englisch
• Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2014

Seitenzahl: 1028

Beschreibung

This is a complete history of the England rugby union team - told by the players themselves. Based on a combination of painstaking research into the early years of the England team through exclusive interviews with a vast array of Test match stars from before the Second World War to the present day, world-renowned rugby writers Stephen Jones and Nick Cain delve to the very heart of the English international rugby union experience, painting a unique and utterly compelling picture of the game in the only words that can truly do so: the players' own. This is the definitive story of English Test match rugby - a story etched in blood, sweat and tears; a story of great joy and heart-breaking sorrow; a story of sacrifice, agony, endeavour and triumph. Behind the Rose lifts the lid on what it is to play for England - the trials and tribulations behind the scenes, the glory, the drama and the honour on the field, and the heart-warming tales of friendship and humour off it. Absorbing and illuminating, this is a must-have for all supporters who have ever dreamed of walking the hallowed corridors of Twickenham as a Test match player, preparing themselves for battle in the changing rooms and then marching out to that field of dreams with the deafening roar of the crowd in their ears and the red rose emblazoned on their chest.

Leseprobe

‘a historical treasure trove’

THE GUARDIAN

RUGBY WORLD

‘a superb book’

ESPN SCRUM

‘a riot of anecdote, inside track and genuine insights’

THE RUGBY PAPER

‘delves to the very heart of what it means to play for England . . . a must-have’

PLANET RUGBY

BEHIND THE

ROSE

PLAYING RUGBY FORENGLAND

STEPHEN JONESNICK CAIN

This edition published in 2021 by

POLARIS PUBLISHING LTDc/o Aberdein Considine2nd Floor, Elder HouseMultrees WalkEdinburghEH1 3DX

www.polarispublishing.com

Text copyright © Stephen Jones and Nick Cain, 2014 and 2021

ISBN: 9781913538217eBook ISBN: 9780857908162

First edition published 2014

The right of Stephen Jones and Nick Cain to be identified as the authors of this work has been asserted by them in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored or transmitted in any form, or by any means electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the express written permission of the publisher.

Interviews have been edited and condensed for clarity.

The views expressed in this book do not necessarily reflect the views, opinions or policies of Polaris Publishing Ltd (Company No. SC401508) (Polaris), nor those of any persons, organisations or commercial partners connected with the same (Connected Persons). Any opinions, advice, statements, services, offers, or other information or content expressed by third parties are not those of Polaris or any Connected Persons but those of the third parties. For the avoidance of doubt, neither Polaris nor any Connected Persons assume any responsibility or duty of care whether contractual, delictual or on any other basis towards any person in respect of any such matter and accept no liability for any loss or damage caused by any such matter in this book.

Every effort has been made to trace copyright holders and obtain their permission for the use of copyright material. The publisher apologises for any errors or omissions and would be grateful if notified of any corrections that should be incorporated in future reprints or editions of this book.

British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication DataA catalogue record for this book is available on request from the British Library.

Designed and typeset by Polaris Publishing, EdinburghPrinted in Great Britain by MBM Print, East Kilbride

ABOUT THE AUTHORS

Stephen Jones is the award-winning rugby correspondent of The Sunday Times and a former UK sports journalist of the year. He is the author of several books on the sport, including Lion Man: The Autobiography of Ian McGeechan, Midnight Rugby: Triumph and Shambles in the Professional Era, and Endless Winter: The Inside Story of the Rugby Revolution, which was the winner of the prestigious William Hill Sports Book of the Year award. He is also co-author of and Behind the Lions: Playing Rugby for the British & Irish Lions.

Nick Cain is the chief writer for The Rugby Paper. He edited Rugby World magazine for nine years, was a columnist for The Sunday Times for fifteen years and is the co-author of The Lions Diary with Jeremy Guscott, Rugby Union for Dummies and Behind the Lions: Playing Rugby for the British & Irish Lions.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

WE WOULD LIKE to pay tribute to a number of colleagues for their work in the preparation of this book.

John Griffiths, one of rugby’s foremost historians and the sport’s most trusted statistical source, played a leading role in creating the outline for this book, researching the memoirs of and articles by some of the great English rugby men from previous eras, and monitoring all other aspects for accuracy. This book could not have been produced without him.

Brendan Gallagher contributed in monumental fashion to some of the key chapters and also, through his galaxy of contacts, to the earlier chapters. Gallagher is one of the powerhouse sports journalists of his generation across a range of sports and his journalist craft and enthusiasm cannot fail to improve any project. This one is no exception.

We would also like to thank two more outstanding journalists, friends and colleagues in Adam Hathaway, of The People, and Rob Wildman, formerly of the Daily Telegraph and Daily Mail, for their input.

Nick Greenstock, assistant secretary of The England Rugby Internationals Club (ERIC), was extremely helpful in putting us in touch with former internationals. ERIC is the honorary association of all England and ex-England players (www.eric-rfu.org.uk).

Thanks must also go to Peter Burns at Polaris Publishing for his drive and enthusiasm throughout the whole process. And especially, we would like to thank all the wonderful England players of all eras who so readily shared with us their memories of their times in the England jersey. It is hard to believe that in any sport, the jersey of a national team has been in such good hands for so long.

Stephen Jones and Nick Cain

CONTENTS

INTRODUCTION: GENERATIONS OF ONE JERSEY

1: 1871-1892: THE FIRST RUGBY NATION

2: 1893-1896: SCHISM AND SLUMP

3: 1897-1909: EARLY EVOLUTIONS

4: 1910-1914: THE FIRST GOLDEN ERA

5: 1914-1918: THE GREAT WAR

6: 1920-1924: IN THE SHADOW OF THE WAR

7: 1925-1933: STUTTERING FORTUNES

8: 1934-1939: BACK IN THE GROOVE

9: 1939-1945: THE SECOND WORLD WAR

10: 1945-1951: POST-WAR RECOVERY

11: 1952-1960: A FORMIDABLE FORCE

12: 1961-1969: NOT SO SWINGING SIXTIES

13: 1970-1975: WE MIGHT NOT BE ANY GOOD . . .

14: 1975-1979: GATHERING MOMENTUM

15: 1980-1981: OASIS IN THE DESERT

16: 1982-1986: THE SLEEPING GIANT

17: 1987: THE FIRST RUGBY WORLD CUP

18: 1988-1996: THE CARLING YEARS

19: 1997-2003: THE MAKING OF CHAMPIONS

20: 2003: SWEETEST CHARIOT

21: 2004-2007: DECLINE

22: 2007: LONG RUN FROM THE BACK

23: 2008-2011: THE FALL

24: 2012-2014: THE HOUSE OF LANCASTER

25: 2014-2015: WORLD CUP CALAMITY

26: 2016-2017: ‘FAST EDDIE’ OFF TO A FLYER

27: 2017-2018: BOOM TO BUST – AND BACK AGAIN

28: 2018-2019: LOOKING FOR LIFT-OFF

29: 2019: BIG IN JAPAN – BUT TITLE GOES SOUTH

30: 2020-2021: A TITLE AMID THE PANDEMIC

BIBLIOGRAPHY AND SOURCES

INTRODUCTION

GENERATIONS OF ONE JERSEY

THE FIRST ENGLAND national rugby jersey was a garment of pristine white, save for a motif based on the rose. For those early games at the time of the advent of international rugby, the marvellous men who blazed the path had to bring their own jersey to wear and at a time when selection could be capricious, perhaps it was only ever needed once. The missive informing players of their selection gave details of the tailor from where kit could be bought – the tailor also had the England cap itself for sale.

These days, the jersey retains the Red Rose, but it is a hi-tech garment intended not just to be a uniform for play, but to actually enhance performance. Yet the important aspect is that the pioneers instituted the international rugby game, nurtured it and passed in on for future generations. There is an unbreakable link between the two kinds of jersey, and the men who wore it, now and then and in every match in between. Generations of men almost bursting out of their jersey with pride.

Everything else has changed profoundly, not just the kit. In the leap across the chasm of the years, the players have become paid to play whereas for the first 124 years of England’s international rugby history, they could not be, and this was a tenet of the sport pursued avidly by every Rugby Football Union president and committee as a matter of principle. These days, the modern RFU is streamlined and professional and at the forefront of the new sports business era, while retaining the strongest links with the amateur game by proudly reinvesting all its profits back into the sport.

Yet in the following pages we hear the testimony of the player who claimed one penny too much for a train fare, rounding up the amount of his claim, and the RFU, having checked the real fare, docked him the penny. Next time, he added to his claim one penny for the use of the toilet, and was paid.

Nowadays, the elite segment of players wield a commercial appeal to industry that is often lucrative for the game and themselves but significantly, you come across very few rugby followers who begrudge them a penny, for their ferocious dedication, commitment, power and skill, and their bearing in a different and far more severe age.

Between the extremes of the eras, however the players trained, however much they were paid (or not), how successful they were (or not) and whatever they wore when they took the field, some aspects have been unchanging for those 144 years – the essential goodness, demeanour, vividness, honesty, humour and the pride of the wonderful men who have played rugby for England. A generalisation? All history, and the words of those men inside this book, suggests not.

To wear the jersey for the first time, accordingly to the testimony of the newly-capped, is to cross a narrow but somehow cavernous border. It is as if the difference between having no caps and having one, is far wider than it is between having one cap and 100. It is a step into history. Every jersey is on loan to the proud wearer, to be augmented, and then passed on.

Heaven knows, England have not always been successful in international rugby. There have been grim, lingering flat periods, punctuated with some golden eras. The peak of the whole 150 years – the gargantuan, world-dominating World Cup triumph of 2003, was the culmination of years of red rose authority over both hemispheres when Sir Clive Woodward and Martin Johnson ruled the roost.

Yet perhaps the glory tasted sweeter when it was a little delayed, and England have produced soaring Grand Slams and Triple Crowns, and courage and bloody-mindedness against the odds.

Social inclusiveness is said not to have been a feature of the years. It is true that RFU and occasionally the England team – especially in the years following the breakaway of the Northern League, later Rugby League, in 1895 but even after – were drawn largely from the middle classes, almost always from the Public Schools, and often from the military services and Oxbridge.

Perhaps some selections were based on non-rugby connections. And on being what was perceived as the right sort of character. Yet the picture is flawed. Sometimes the social historians have been too earnest. Hundreds of England players have come from working-class regions or regions where rugby was deemed as a class-less gathering.

The generalisations have been too easy to make. England’s new breed, such as the powerful Manu Tuilagi of Samoan extraction, are no less part of the history than the old greats, such as Lord Wakefield of Kendal, the heroic yeoman figure of Bill Beaumont and the illustrious Will Carling and the others. They are all part, as Jason Leonard says in his foreword to this book, of one brotherhood.

Ronnie Poulton-Palmer, one of the earlier heroes, a wonderful, unpredictable player and vivid character, once wrote powerfully to the Press demanding that the RFU take no action against some players allegedly accepting payment for broken-time, as it made it too difficult for working-class players to turn out for England if they lost money, and that rugby was for all. It still is.

There is another generalisation that can be made with more confidence. The evidence of history and of our own eyes and ears, suggests that the fraternity of England players has contained some of the finest, most-balanced, least vindictive sportsmen that sport has ever seen; these are behavioural traits not peculiar to rugby but especially prevalent within its ranks. And not least among its top players. In truth, there are enough marvellous characters in the ranks to have worn the jersey to fill a hundred books.

As Jonny Wilkinson, probably the most famous of all the brotherhood, has proved, it is possible, even these days, to touch greatness and retain humanity and humility. It is also relevant to point out that in 150 years, only four England players have been sent off in an international, and it was over 100 years since the first international when the first, the colourful Michael Burton, was despatched – and none have tested positive for performance-enhancing drugs.

You would dearly love to be able to gather together round a table, England rugby players of all the eras. What would they drink? Beer, or isotonic drinks? The former, of course. The old convivialities would be preserved.

The modern players could listen in wonder at the heroics, privations and customs of every era, the old greats could shake their heads in wonder at the advances, on and off the field.

Then they could scratch their heads as the current crew explain to the pioneers the little pocket in the back of their jersey, and the workings of the global positioning system inserted therein.

The pathfinders, in turn, could expand on their roles in establishing international rugby, something sure to remain for as long as sport exists, as one of the finest traditions in sport, and one of the arenas of which England as a country can be most proud. Possibly, representatives of some eras could give vent to their frustration that results were never as good as they should have been.

Of course, many experiences would chime down the ages. The first-ever international saw a major refereeing controversy. Players of all eras would have seen the same. Tomfoolery of various kinds was not restricted to the older days when socialising was so vital a part of the game – it is true that England players were arrested for after-hour activities after a game in Edinburgh in the 19th century.

But also that in the 1980s, a player from each side was seen to be using the Calcutta Cup itself as a plaything on the streets of Edinburgh, long after it had been presented at the end of the match. Damage was so extensive that bystanders called it ‘The Calcutta plate’. It was soon restored. Among the pranks of the amateur era, we hear the story of the giant prop that drank after-shave at the post-match banquet, surviving to carry on scrummaging magnificently for his country.

We hear in these pages of the players whose idea of tapering off for the game was to eat ‘undercooked meat and beer’, and to stop smoking for a day or two as the game approached. One letter advising players of selection referred to the match ‘on Monday next’ and continued, ‘we require you to get yourself as fit as possible by that day’.

Our gathered heroes would be able to talk about shared experiences, but also about so many staggering differences, in their lives and their sporting careers. Yet the jersey they all have in common would give them a profound sense of brotherhood and sense of togetherness infinitely more significant than anything that divided them.

This book is the next best thing to that celestial but impossible gathering. It is the story of what they made of it all themselves, the camaraderie, the victories and defeats, the Grand Slams, the World Cup, the fallow years.

And above all, the passion to play for England, then to play well for England. This is the story of the creation and nurturing and maintaining of a magnificent sporting history, told by the men who wore the jersey.

Stephen Jones and Nick Cain, 2021

ONE

THE FIRST RUGBY NATION

1871-1896

IT ALL BEGAN, perhaps rather prosaically, with a soccer match. In 1870, the Football Association arranged a London fixture between teams labelled England and Scotland, rather paternalistically selecting both teams for a game which England won 1–0.

The staging of the game caused a stir north of the Border. The players representing Scotland had but tenuous links with the country, one player’s connection being an annual visit to his country estate, while the claims of another were said to be due to liking for Scotch whisky. The Scots claimed that the rugby code was their game and after the soccer defeat they challenged England’s rugby fraternity to accept a return match under rugby rules.

Blackheath, the oldest open rugby club in England, acknowledged the challenge and a committee dominated by old boys of Rugby School (Old Rugbeians, or ORs) was formed to select a team. The chosen side comprised ten ORs, including John Clayton, a Liverpool businessman largely responsible for popularising rugby in the North-West, and Frederick Stokes (captain) and Arthur Guillemard, committee members of the Rugby Football Union (RFU) formed in London in January 1871. England’s uniform was Rugby School colours: white jersey with brown socks.

The early internationals took place on Mondays, with 20 players on each side. Teams comprised 13 forwards, three halves, a single threequarter and three fullbacks. This was the shoving age. Forwards converged around held players who were ordered by the umpires to ‘down’ the ball – place it on the ground – whereupon packs formed primitive scrummages, leaning or shoving against one another. Heads were held upright, forwards barging or kicking theball through. Halves acted as a first line of defence, with the sole threequarter and back-three in support to catch punts ahead, land field goals or claim marks to kick for territory.

Until the late 1880s, matches could only be decided by the kicking of goals. Tries were worthless unless converted. Scotland won the first match by converting a try that was hotly disputed by the English team. Reg Birkett crossed for England’s first-ever try in international rugby soon after, but Fred Stokes was unable to convert from wide out. So, long before scoring by points was introduced, Scotland ran out victors by a goal and a try to a try.

England gained revenge at The Oval in 1872 through a magnificent dropped goal kicked by Harold Freeman, but their next visits to Scotland were mired in controversy. England suspected sabotage in 1873 when their boots were mysteriously lost by a local cobbler and, two years later, two Englishmen got so drunk after the match that they were arrested for assaulting an Edinburgh policeman.

Oxford and Cambridge Universities, meanwhile, were in the vanguard of change, experimenting in 1875 by reducing numbers on each side in their games from 20 to 15. International teams followed suit two years later. Reduced numbers made it easier for emerging clubs to field teams. Backs, moreover, had more scope to display skills.

Lennard Stokes, the Blackheath fullback-cum-threequarter, was the outstanding drop-kicker in the land in the second half of the 1870s. Younger brother of England’s first captain, he made his Test debut when Ireland entered the international arena in 1875 and the extent to which Stokes relished the transition to 15-a-side can be measured from the fact that he kicked 19 goals in his 12 cap matches.

The first decade of international rugby saw the game evolve from the shoving age. Mauls and ‘scrimmages’ became less protracted with fewer players in the packs. Blackheath and Oxford University exploited the possibilities. Oxford had a particularly successful side in the early 1880s and the influence of their captain, Henry (‘Harry’) Vassall proved significant.

Vassall won five caps for England between 1881 and 1883 and became known as the father of the passing game. This began as ‘short’ passing, an innovation made by Arthur ‘Jimmy’ Budd [England 1878-1881] at Blackheath in the late 1870s. Vassall, one of the club’s forwards, was persuaded by Budd to experiment at Oxford. Short passing evolved to long passing which required more cover among the backs, where typically two threequarters had become the norm, with nine forwards, two halves and two fullbacks.

Vassall moved another fullback into the threequarter line, bringing aboutthe one fullback, three threequarters and two half-backs formation which prevailed until the Welsh adoption of a four threequarter system.

Vassall’s ideas permeated England sides in the 1880s. His international call-up was for the first game played against Wales (in 1881), and he was soon cementing his place by scoring three tries in an overwhelming win. So abject were Wales that the fixture was dropped the next season.

Passing benefited back play, releasing the outside men from their hitherto primary duties as defenders, turning them into attackers who focussed on scoring. In 1882-83, England’s wings Wilfred Bolton and Australia-born Gregory Wade shared seven of England’s 12 tries when, for the first time, all three of the other Home Unions were met and beaten.

England therefore become the first nation to win the Triple Crown. One of rugby’s grand oddities is that the Triple Crown was strongly coveted as an honour, but it didn’t exist as an actual trophy until 2006.

John Clayton (England 1871, 1 cap): I trained hard for a month before the [first International] match, running four miles or so with a large Newfoundland dog to make the pace, every morning in the dark before breakfast.

I then rode four miles on horseback to my Liverpool office, where I was at my desk from 8am to 8pm, when I rode home again.

As was the custom, I adhered to a strict diet of underdone beef and beer, and lived a frugal and strenuous life otherwise. As a result, I increased my weight and achieved what was regarded as a superb state of fitness for the match.

Arthur Guillemard (England 1871-1872, 2 caps; RFU Secretary 1872-1876): The first International match between England and Scotland was played at the Academy Ground in Raeburn Place, Edinburgh, on 27 March, 1871. An attendance of 4,000 spectators showed that rugby football had already attained considerable popularity north of the Tweed. The ground measured some 120 yards by 55 [and] it was arranged that the match be played for two periods of fifty minutes each.

The match was evenly contested until half-time, after which the combination of the Scotsmen began to tell a tale, and just outside the English goal-line the umpires ordered the ball to be put down in a scrummage five yards outside the line. The Scottish forwards drove the entire scrummage into goal, and then grounded the ball and claimed a try. This, though illegal according to English laws, was allowed by the umpires, and a goal was kicked.

Hely Hutchinson Almond (Scottish Umpire: Scotland v England 1871): Let me make a personal confession. I was umpire, and I do not know to this day whether the decision which gave Scotland the try from which the winning goal was kicked was correct in fact. The ball had certainly been scrummaged over the line by Scotland, and touched down first by a Scotchman. The try was, however, vociferously disputed by the English team, but upon what ground I was then unable to discover. I must say, however, that when an umpire is in doubt, I think he is justified in deciding against the side which makes the most noise. They are probably in the wrong.

Arthur Guillemard: England then penned their opponents for some time, and ultimately R H Birkett ran in close to touch, but the captain’s place-kick, a long and difficult one across the wind, failed.

F Stokes was a most excellent and popular captain, combining a thorough knowledge of the game with admirable tact and good temper, and being gifted with power of infusing spirit and enthusiasm into his team. As a player, he was one of the very best examples of a heavy forward, always on the ball, and first-rate either in the thick of a scrummage or in a loose rally, a good dribbler, very successful in getting the ball when thrown out of touch, a very long drop [kicker] and a particularly safe tackle.

R H Birkett was very useful both forward and behind the scrummage and had plenty of pace.

Harry Vassall (England 1881-1883, 5 caps): We need not pause long to discuss the much-abused shoving matches of the days when twenty-a-side were played. They have gone, never to return, regretted by none.

Arthur Budd (England 1878-1881, 5 caps): The art of scrummaging consisted in straightforward propulsion. One of those in the front rank was expected to get the ball between his legs, and hold it there tight, while his forwards pushed on him might and main. The packs frequently lasted two or three minutes.

Harry Vassall: Men like J A Bush of Clifton and F I Currey were the typical forwards; the best half-backs were of the build of W H Milton and S Morse; the best threequarter back was H Freeman.

In our early schoolboy days [at Marlborough] we well remember gazing with awe on these heroes of the past in their international caps, which were then a novelty, when they came down to play against the school.

Arthur Guillemard: When the English twenty arrived in Glasgow [for the 1873 match] they found the country under snow, but this quickly thawed under a hot sun, and was followed by a downpour. The turf was consequently spongy and slippery at the top.

The greasy nature of the ground caused the English captain [Frederick Stokes] to direct his men to have bars of leather affixed to the soles of their boots. Freeman and Boyle, who with Finney were considered the most dangerous men on the side, reported, when the cobbler had done his work, that they were each minus a boot. Several of the team proceeded to ransack the cobbler’s shop, but without success, and it was not until after the match – in which Boyle played with a dress boot on his left foot – that the canny tradesman produced the missing articles.

Arthur Budd: H Freeman, a great goal-dropper and a powerful runner, was the most celebrated threequarter of his time. The most distinguished halves were S Finney and W H Milton. The most famous forwards were Frederick Stokes, C W Crosse and F H Lee.

The first step towards a faster game was the diminution in the number of players from twenty to fifteen. Lennard Stokes was the greatest threequarter of his day. In the opinion of many [he] has never had an equal before or since, was certainly the greatest drop-kicker the world has ever seen. His kicking combined the great length with the most wonderful accuracy, and an ability to kick in an extraordinarily small compass.

Charles Marriott (England 1884-1887, 7 caps): In 1882, following on a magazine article by Arthur Budd advocating the advantage to be gained by passing, H Vassall, the capable captain of the Oxford team, took up the idea, and developed a system of passing in his team with wonderful results.

Arthur Budd: The elaboration of passing was unquestionably the work of the Blackheath team.

Harry Vassall: It was the development of the passing game which was keynote to the success of the [Oxford] team. Short passing amongst the forwards had been adopted by other clubs before this date; but long passing, right across the ground if necessary, was a thing hitherto unknown. The team soon grasped the idea that passing, to be successful, must be to the open, and they learnt very quickly to back up in the open, and only to call for passes when they were in a better position than the man in possession. In this way they used to sweep the ball from end to end of the ground time after time, passing any length with such deadly accuracy that very often the whole team handled the ball in less than two minutes, and their opponents were completely nonplussed.

Arthur Budd: Bolton, a splendidly proportioned man with great pace, ran straight and handed off. Wade had the power of levering opponents off his hips. The English team [of 1883] was largely composed of new men and in every instance laid the foundation of special fame as International players. H B Tristram, as back, demonstrated that he was the best man who had ever officiated in that position. W N Bolton, A M Evanson and G C Wade were the [England] threequarters, and a finer trio never wore the English jersey. Alan Rotherham [became] the half-back of the decade.

The English team played a distinctive style, the Oxford passing, inaugurated by H Vassall, was understood by the whole team, and they worked together in perfect unison. [They won] for the first time on Scottish soil [where], by their unfailing energy, [Scotland] considerably interfered with the ‘passing’ game; but when the Englishmen did get a chance they illustrated the efficacy of the system. Bolton scored for England, [his winning] try being the result of a brilliant run.

As Vassall and Budd passed from the scene in 1883, another Oxford innovator, Alan Rotherham, put his imprint on the game, developing the idea of passing from the half-backs. Rotherham was credited with being the first to view the half-back role as a ‘link’ – a feed between forwards and threequarters – and what Rotherham did for half-back play, Bradford’s Rawson Robertshaw did for the threequarters.

English rugby enjoyed a glorious run as the other Home Unions adjusted to their innovations. After losing to Scotland in Manchester in 1882, England lost only once more before the decade ended. The period included a purple patch of ten successive victories – a record that stood until Sir Clive Woodward’s reign as England manager in the 21st century.

Household names in a decade that brought refinements to scrummaging were Charles and Temple Gurdon, experts at the ploy of wheeling scrums and breaking off them to lead foot rushes. Charles Gurdon was credited with introducing ‘scraping’ – heeling or hooking the ball back. Old-timers disapproved of these developments, believing forwards were primarily shovers. Packs, they feared, would become subservient to the backs.

Among the threequarters, the great Andrew ‘Drewy’ Stoddart and Dicky Lockwood, a Yorkshireman destined to become the first working-class player to captain England, were stars. Lockwood was among the earliest backs toexploit the crosskick while, behind them, Henry Tristram emerged as the outstanding fullback.

Arthur Guillemard: E T Gurdon’s record of sixteen matches evidences his sterling worth. In every respect he was one of the best forwards that ever represented England. He was very muscular, and used his weight and strength to the best advantage, and was usually to be found in the very heart of the scrummage. His use of his feet amidst a crowd of forwards was admirable, but better still was his dribbling when he had got the ball before him in the open, and many a time has the ring been wrought up to a pitch of frenzy watching the two Gurdons steering the ball past half-backs and threequarter backs straight for the enemy’s quarters. A grand example was that set by the brothers of resolutely keeping the ball on the ground when they had taken it through a scrummage, knowing how much more difficult it is for a half-back to stop a combined rush of two or three good dribblers than a single man with the ball under his arm. An excellent knowledge of the game and thorough unselfishness helped to make [Temple Gurdon] a popular captain.

C Gurdon, built on a larger scale than his brother, with enormous strength in his thighs and shoulders, was one of the most massive and muscular forwards that ever stripped. In his day a scrummage was worthy of its name. A very zealous worker in the scrummage, [Charles] devoted all his attention to the ball, and was very careful not to overrun it whilst steering it through the ranks of his opponents. When he had got it free he dribbled fast and with unusual skill and success. Halves and threequarters dreaded his rush more than that of any other player.

Arthur Budd: Lockwood, a pocket Hercules, was an exceptionally clever player, and though he was a fine runner, his great forte was his judgment kicking, and he was the first man to start the example of kicking obliquely across the field and running on himself at full speed, so as to put his forwards who were at the spot where the ball pitched onside.

Stoddart was certainly one of the most graceful players who ever donned a jersey. His dodging was simply marvellous. Sometimes he would go right through the thick of a team without a hand being laid upon him, and he was able to field a ball off the ground when running at full speed.

If a ballot [for the world’s best fullback] were taken Tristram would probably come top of the poll.

For all their success on the field, the RFU encountered immense difficultiesoff it. A fight to maintain their position as law-makers to the sport saw them shunned by the other Home Unions.

The 1884 England/Scotland game was the showdown of the season with England seeking back-to-back Triple Crowns. Internationals now took place on Saturdays and a record crowd approaching 10,000 gathered at Blackheath to see them win by a conversion. The visitors, however, disputed the try from which Wilfred Bolton kicked England’s winning goal.

A Scot had ‘knocked back’ in the move leading to England’s try – an infringement under Scottish rules. England supported the referee, a respected former Irish international, saying his decision was final. Besides, why should Scotland profit from their mistake? The Scots wanted settlement by an independent adjudicator and a lengthy correspondence ensued, resulting in cancellation of the 1885 Calcutta Cup match.

The Irish Union intervened suggesting a meeting to consider forming an International Board to resolve disputes. The concept of a Board crystallised in Dublin in February 1886, Scotland later conceding the 1884 match to England on condition that the RFU join a Board comprising an equal number of members from each of the Four Nations. Sensing the Board would become the game’s sole law-makers, the RFU rejected Scotland’s ultimatum.

And so England were pariahs in 1888 and 1889, before the RFU offered to accept independent arbitration. This gesture of goodwill saw them reinstated to the International Championship in 1890 and when arbitration concluded in April, the RFU lost its law making powers – but held half the seats on the Board.

During the dispute, England played a Test against the first touring side from overseas. The New Zealand Native team, known as the Maoris, undertook a gruelling tour of Britain and Ireland in the winter of 1888-89, often playing three matches a week. It was an epic undertaking, and remains the most heroic sports tour in history.

It was now that the amateur creed of the RFU began to cause serious disagreements, something which was to continue for a century and more. The news that expenses were paid to the Maori tourists vexed the true-blue amateurs of the RFU, while the international itself was a fractious affair. Under Fred Bonsor – the first Yorkshireman to skipper the national side – England fielded 12 new caps but maintained their long unbeaten international record. Disputes marred a match refereed by the RFU secretary, Rowland Hill and some of the visitors withdrew from the field in protest when he awarded England a contentious try.

Charles Marriott: In 1884 a misunderstanding arose with Scotland over the referee’s decision, and this led to no match taking place the following season. In 1886 the matter was adjusted, and the Scottish match again took place, but, unfortunately, differences arose between England and the other Home Unions, and for two seasons England played no International matches with the other Home Unions.

Then fissures began to appear. The intense club rivalries in Yorkshire and Lancashire Cup competitions brought those counties into sharp focus while England were in the international wilderness. When the RFU launched the County Championship, partly to compensate for the lack of international competition, Yorkshire dominated its early years.

Their packs invariably comprised working men with a reputation for hard, uncompromising scrummaging – the so-called ‘northern forward’. They had become integral components of England’s recent packs and carried the national side through its next heyday in the early 1890s.

English rugby came of age in 1892 marking the occasion with a Triple Crown without conceding a single score – the perfect season. Significantly, most of the players were from Lancashire and Yorkshire, no fewer than 13 northerners taking the field against Scotland.

All told, in its first 21 years the RFU placed 45 teams in the field, winning 30 losing six, and drawing nine. The game’s first rugby nation justifiably dominated. But storm clouds were gathering, destined to tear the northern heart out of the game, sending England’s rugby stock into a decline that would take 18 years to overcome, giving birth to what was to become a new code of rugby and creating divisions which lasted way into the future. England were already a great rugby nation, but not every player came from the same culture, or social grouping.

Arthur Budd: The only International in which England engaged this season [1887/88] was against the Maoris, who during their visit to this country displayed a remarkable aptitude for disputing the decisions of the officials. The English umpire and referee were anathematised and threatened, and at one period of the game five of the Maori team left the field, but were induced to return by their manager. The English team was an exceedingly strong one, and it was a great pity that they had no opportunity of showing their prowess to the other countries.

Charles Marriott: The game had now obtained for some years a high state of perfection in the north, especially in Yorkshire, where it was most enthusiastically followed. Unfortunately the numerous matches made such a demand upon the players’ time that in many instances it meant loss of wages, which they could ill afford. To make this up to them all sorts of surreptitious payments were made, which went under the name of ‘veiled professionalism’. To still keep in the Rugby Union fold an endeavour was made by various Northern Clubs to legalise the payment for broken time. The Rugby Union, while wishful that their game should not be a class one, and that anyone might take part in it, provided he conformed to their rules, rightly divined that recompense for broken time was only the thin of the wedge of full-blown professionalism.

TWO

SCHISM AND SLUMP

1893-1896

ENGLAND HAD NO sooner emerged as the pioneer rugby union nation – and the pre-eminent one in international competition – when its triumphal march was stopped in its tracks by a tumultuous dispute which was to cause reverberating problems throughout the sport and which many people deduced was an outbreak of class warfare. The social divisions in Victorian Britain wreaked havoc with the newly established sport, resulting in a near-brutal rift which became known as the Great Schism.

The traditional view is that working class players and their overwhelmingly Northern-based clubs advocated financial compensation, known as ‘broken-time’ payment, for any loss of earnings incurred by their participation, their middle class counterparts, especially those in London and the south, were having none of it. Recently, historians have concluded that the class-based battle lines were slightly exaggerated. But to the majority of southern players, earning a living from the professions or business, rugby union was a recreational sport, and their view was that any move to pay players was against the best interests of the game, and its amateur spirit.

A large contingent of northern clubs were diametrically opposed to this outlook, mindful of the need to reimburse the miners and factory workers for any loss of wages, or jeopardise the progress that the sport had made. They knew also that rugby union in the north had rapidly become a popular spectator sport capable of paying broken-time compensation.

The ‘pay or not to pay’ argument came to a head at the RFU’s London AGM in September 1893. Yorkshire, home of the most competitive county cup competition in the land, and also the country’s champion county andsource of England’s most rugged forwards, forced the issue by proposing ‘broken time’ payment.

By that time some northern clubs were enticing star players with job offers, and transfer stories were rife. This promoted grave suspicions about northern practices in the amateur south, and the stances hardened. Yorkshire’s proposal, which they insisted was drawn up to stave off full professionalism, was defeated in a vigorous debate.

Before the landmark meeting, Yorkshire’s committee approached their Lancashire counterparts seeking support. Lancashire’s president was Albert Hornby, Harrovian, establishment figure, and the first man to captain England at both rugby and cricket. He was notorious for having once declined to play rugby against Scotland because it interfered with his shooting, which was going ‘particularly well’. After considering the arguments, Hornby (and his county) declared support, though his former England colleague John Payne, a Manchester solicitor and the county’s secretary/treasurer, sternly opposed.

Payne, thinly disguised as ‘half-back’, wrote to the Manchester press censuring his county. Meanwhile, the bastions of the Rugby Union, President William Cail and Rowland Hill, its ‘amateur of amateurs’ secretary, mobilised members and arranged proxies for their AGM at London’s Westminster Palace Hotel.

Advocating Yorkshire’s proposal, the county president recalled that the England team in Dublin seven months earlier had included working men from the northern counties. They had set out Friday morning, played on Saturday and returned on Monday. The working men had their railway fare and hotel bills refunded but lost three days’ wages. He asked the assembled members if they called that playing on ‘level terms’.

Cail and Rowland Hill responded, tabling an amendment declining to sanction the proposal. Hill, defending amateurism, was backed by the Yorkshire clergyman/schoolmaster, Rev Frank Marshall, rugby’s first historian and upholder of amateurism. Marshall set the cat among the northern pigeons, vigorously opposing his own county. He said one Yorkshire club had seven licensees – it was an open secret that many players were in receipt of ‘funds’. Fierce debate followed.

Herbert Fallas, the Wakefield Trinity international, was enraged by Marshall’s comments. Harry Garnett, another Yorkshire ex-international and a past president of the RFU, expressed his ‘reluctant’ support for his county more temperately. Broken time might offer a stay of execution from full-blown professionalism, he argued. Among the Lancashire contingent Roger Walker, the England forward of the 1870s, spoke at length, wondering if broken time payments were practicable.

Despite the northerners turning up at the AGM in numbers on two specially chartered trains they lost the vote by more than two-to-one, 282 votes to 136. The amendment was carried, broken-time rejected. The status quo effectively taxed players from working-class backgrounds and, two years later, in August 1895, the Great Schism began when 20 leading Yorkshire/Lancashire clubs seceded, forming the Northern Union. This was to become the founder body of a new and separate code, rugby league.

Players remained remarkably loyal to their clubs. A case in point was Billy Nicholl from Brighouse Rangers, one of England’s 1892 Triple Crown pack. When he started playing as a teenager, Brighouse couldn’t afford to pay travel expenses. He became a publican and when the club was among the 1895 breakaways, he felt honour-bound to remain a Brighouse player. The detrimental effect of the schism on the national side was not immediate, even though after 1896 it was profound.

Wales carried off their first Triple Crown in 1893, their success being ascribed to the four threequarter system they had pioneered with mixed results over the previous seven seasons. The upshot was that England embraced the system in 1894, beating them 24–3 at Birkenhead. They won again in 1895 and sent the Welsh packing from Blackheath with a 25–0 drubbing in 1896.

The RFU exercised an even hand about the amateur game in the north. Three of their five home internationals between 1893 and 1896 were staged there. Heckmondwike’s Dicky Lockwood, first capped in 1887, was England’s skipper in 1894 before falling out with the RFU after they suspended him before a Yorkshire Cup-tie. That precipitated his conversion to the Northern Union, whereupon Billy Taylor, a working man from the impeccably amateur Rockcliff club in Northumberland assumed the England captaincy.

Taylor shared that responsibility for three seasons with the outstanding southern forward of the day, S M J ‘Sammy’ Woods, a dual Test cricketer for his native Australia and adoptive England. Woods was poles apart on the social scale from Lockwood and Taylor. A strapping Cambridge Blue of private means and bluff character, he was the classic gentleman player right down to the obligatory set of three initials – ‘good ole Sarah Mary Jane’ they called him in Yorkshire.

Yorkshire talent was still available. Two of their finest forwards, Bramley’s bull-necked Harry Bradshaw and Bingley’s aptly-named Tom Broadley, were at the heart of the 1894 win against Wales. However, with the upcoming generation of working-class players gravitating to Northern Union clubs, Yorkshire’s dominance of amateur rugby waned with fewer selected for England. After extending their County Championship run to seven titles in eight seasons in 1896, another 32 years passed before their next title.

Billy Nicholl (England 1892, 2 caps): We had our own expenses to pay in those days. We couldn’t afford railway fares. Many a time we [Brighouse players] trudged to the other side of Huddersfield, played a tough game, and trudged home again. Occasionally we came across a kindly disposed lorryman, or a coal cart, and got a lift on our way in that manner. Despite all these little difficulties, it was the greatest ambition to play. We would have given up anything rather than miss a match.

Tom Broadley (England 1893-1896, 6 caps): On Saturdays I used to work in the mornings and play football in the afternoons. It was hard going. For the England v Scotland International in March 1893 I and three other Yorkshire players selected for the match received the total sum of seven shillings – less than two shillings [ten pence in today’s money] each!

Leonard Tosswill (England 1902, 3 caps): During the nineties the game suffered a shock which shook it to its foundations and threatened its very existence. This was the great cleavage which split the Union over the question of payments to players for ‘broken time.’ In Yorkshire and Lancashire, at that time the most powerful strongholds of the game, many of what are called the ‘working classes’ were playing rugby, and it was alleged that they could not afford to play unless they were given compensation for loss of working time.

Charles Marriott: The game had now obtained for some years a high state of perfection in the north, especially in Yorkshire.. Unfortunately the numerous matches made such a demand upon the players’ time that in many instances it meant loss of wages, which they could ill afford. To make this up to them all sorts of surreptitious payments were made, which went under the name of ‘veiled professionalism’. To still keep in the rugby union fold an endeavour was made by various Northern Clubs to legalise the payment for broken time. The Rugby Union, while wishful that their game should not be a class one, and that anyone might take part in it, provided he conformed to their rules, rightly divined that recompense for broken time was only the thin of the wedge of full-blown professionalism. They therefore refused to recognise any system of payment in whatever shape or form.

John Payne (England 1882-1885, 7 caps): I am clean against the [Yorkshire] proposal [for payment for broken time] as it would in future be a source of infinite misery to the working man footballer.

Albert Hornby (England 1877-1882, 9 caps): To sum up, there is no danger in the proposal. It is possible to differentiate between the professional pure and simple and the amateur without any difficulty.

Leonard Tosswill: The Rugby Union set its face resolutely against this [broken time] principle, foreseeing that it was merely the prelude to actual professionalism. Thanks to the courage and firmness of the Rev. Frank Marshall, Rowland Hill and other stout-hearted supporters of amateur football, the game was saved for future generations.

Harry Garnett (England 1877, 1 cap): No one can live long in Yorkshire without being convinced of the necessity for some such payment as proposed. Passing the resolution will not prevent professionalism, but it will delay it for perhaps three years, perhaps more, perhaps less, and it is in this spirit that I have come to support my county.

Charles Marriott: After a very spirited and, at times, heated debate, the amendment was carried by 282 votes to 136. As a corollary a large number of north country clubs seceded from the Rugby Union, and formed the Northern Union to allow payment for loss of time. As had been anticipated, the Northern Union [subsequently] adopted full professionalism for its players.

Leonard Tosswill: Many of the Yorkshire and Lancashire clubs left the Union in consequence, and it was not long before they had formed the Northern Union on definite professional lines. It is only within comparatively recent times that the game has recovered fully from this blow and the number of clubs affiliated to the Rugby Union has risen above the number which constituted it before the secession of the northern clubs.

Dicky Lockwood (England 1887-1894, 14 caps): We had real good fun in the old days. Football isn’t what it used to be. It was a real pleasure to play, and we considered the enjoyment of a game sufficient recompense. Some people blame the Northern Union, but I think it was a good move. The Rugby Union is right enough, although they could never hide the spite they had against Yorkshire. Personally, I don’t love them much. I cannot see why I was debarred from playing with Heckmondwike in the first round of the Cup tie, when Taylor, of Rockcliff in Northumberland, under exactly the same circumstances, was allowed to do so. Since then I have never played under any but Northern Union rules [for Wakefield].

THREE

EARLY EVOLUTIONS

1897-1909

THE GREAT SCHISM cast long shadows. In 1893 there were 481 clubs in membership of the RFU, but three years later there were 383. By 1904 the number had dwindled to just 244. Decline was evident in results too. After the 1892 perfect Triple Crown, 18 years passed before England’s next Championship title. Between 1897 and 1910 England beat Wales only once, and half the successful 1892 team were with Northern Union clubs by 1896. It was English rugby’s Dark Age.

Wales, meanwhile, made rapid progress. Forward play there involved physical forwards heeling the ball out for fast, imaginative backs to exploit openings and create overlaps for wings to score tries. Specialisation at half-back began there. Llewellyn Lloyd at Newport and Dai and Evan James, Swansea’s famous brothers, were early pioneers of specific stand-off and scrum-half roles.

That practice slowly spread to the West Country through their close ties with leading Welsh clubs. Elsewhere, though, development was stunted. The loss of northern working men hugely weakened English packs. Their game barely moved tactically. The international tide first turned in 1897 at Newport where Billy Taylor, still their captain, put an 11–0 defeat at Rodney Parade down to an awful pitch. But by 1899, Arthur Rotherham, as England skipper, had no excuses when Wales won 26–3, scoring six tries to one.

England hit rock bottom that year, losing all three internationals for the first time, and failing to register a score against Ireland and Scotland. Seven new caps took the field against Wales. Only two – John Daniell among the forwards and the legendary Devonport fullback Herbert Gamlin – would win more than half-a-dozen more caps. Gamlin alone would reach double figures,though Daniell, who became captain in 1900 at the tender age of 21 and went on to lead England six times, would have commanded a place in any international pack.

Daniell was at the helm inspiring England to win two of their three matches in 1902. Only the tricks of Wales’ artful scrum-half, Dicky Owen, in luring his opposite number offside with a dummy at a scrum, allowed them to squeak home 9–8 through the ensuing penalty. (Clive Woodward would be similarly hoodwinked in Cardiff 79 years later.)

With Harry Alexander up front, and John Raphael and JT ‘Long John’ Taylor at centre showing promise, the season brought a rare shaft of light to the gloom that otherwise shrouded the England careers of Gamlin and Daniell. Taylor had begun playing with Castleford before they defected to the Northern Union, whereupon he transferred to amateur West Hartlepool. But he was definitely in the minority by actively dissociating himself from a ‘broken-time’ outfit.

There was no more acute observer of this period than Dai Gent. Although he grew up in South Wales, Gent moved to Gloucestershire and played for England in the 1900s before swapping ball for pen as rugby correspondent for the Sunday Times. His England debut was against New Zealand in 1905.

The All Blacks had swept through the land. Their focus was on constant backing-up of the player, and they had evolved specialist positions for half-backs and forwards (including the detested wing-forward or ‘rover’). England went down 15–0 – five tries to nil – in miserable conditions at the Crystal Palace. The site had been temporarily hired by the homeless RFU to accommodate the vast crowds the tourists attracted. England were overwhelmed. Only the wet conditions and the plucky display of the new Cornish fullback, John Jackett, kept the score down. The press was unanimous – England were lucky to get nil! Wales later halted the New Zealanders’ progress, but the visitors left a happy legacy. Change was in the English air.

The catalyst was a Harlequins half-back called Adrian Stoop, first capped in 1905 partnering Walter Butcher for the final game of another Championship whitewash. At the time England still played the naive ‘left-and-right’ half-back game – halves alternating between fly-half and scrum-half depending on which side of the field the scrum was positioned.

Change took time. Stoop wasn’t even an England regular. He returned against the First Springboks in 1906, controversially selected in preference to Devon’s James Peters, a black half-back who, it was said, the South Africans objected to playing against. An admin error also saw the wrong forward invited to play that day – Arnold Alcock, an unknown Guy’s medic getting called ahead of Liverpool’s Lancelot Slocock. Whatever next? England drew 3–3, beatFrance, who were playing their first away Test, before Stoop was dropped again after losing 22–0 in Wales.

Undeterred, Stoop set about raising his club’s profile – in the process making English rugby interesting again. He decided ‘stand-off’ was the tactical key, and installed himself as the fly-half specialist. Basic skills were paramount. Quick passing, with players running on to the ball at speed, was the mantra.

Harlequins became drivers of English club rugby’s revival between 1907 and 1909. Stoop was a magnet to players seeking enjoyment with success, and ’Quins gathered a talented team that played ‘total rugby’ long before the expression entered rugby’s lexicon. A century later, he could have been a coaching blend of John Dawes, Carwyn James and Clive Woodward.

Dai Gent (England 1905-1910, 5 caps): I watched [Welsh rugby] first between 1897 and 1903, [when] I became a player myself. In the scrummage every man got down into the first position he could find, there were definitely no set positions. Every man got into the pack and was expected to fit himself in as tightly as he could, and push. If his side got the ball, he had to help in heeling it out quickly and gently, pushing his hardest all the time, even after the ball had gone! If his side did not get the ball, he pushed harder than ever, for he fully expected that the extra attention he could give to his pushing, having no ball to think about, would enable his pack to push the other men off the ball.

The backs were the ‘passers’, not the forwards [who] were strongly discouraged from interfering with the job of the men behind. What effect had that on the game? Very much, for you did see the seven backs on each side have ample room in which to manoeuvre without the interference of forwards straying about. It made a beautiful game to watch, and I consider it still the most perfect form of rugby I have ever seen. An intensive close game among the forwards, with the open game almost entirely left to the seven backs on each side. No interference from ‘roving’ [wing] forwards.

Edward Baker (England 1895-1897, 7 caps): The English forwards were badly beaten. We backs never had the ball passed out to us at all.

Dai Gent: My very vivid recollection of half-back play in my pre-playing days was of Wales beating England in 1899. It was the play of the Welsh half-backs that really paved the way for a smashing defeat, for the English half-backs were powerless against them. In Wales, then, the separate functions of the two half-backs had become quite stabilised, but in England generally this was not the case.

Arthur Rotherham (England 1898-1899, 5 caps plus 3 caps for the Lions): The Welshmen were most deserving of their victory. There is not the least doubt of it that the best team won. From start to finish the game was played in the most friendly spirit.

Arthur Budd: The brothers James simply waltzed round Livesay and Rotherham.

John Raphael (England 1902-1906, 9 caps): To play against Wales in Wales with any prospect of success, it is no good settling down to a steady ‘dogged as does it’. The team that tries that has usually very decisively settled itself ere the first lap has been completed. It is at a very extended sprint that a game at Cardiff or at Swansea must be played. The grounds are quite different to any one meets elsewhere. Cardiff more particularly can be a real terror. I have played there when not a member of the English team and seemed unable to get a foothold of any sort; and yet the Welshmen were frolicking – well, that’s hardly the right word – they were raiding our goal-line with an insatiable and a disgusting greediness that even a hard ground and dry ball would not have justified.

Leonard Tosswill: John Daniell was the greatest forward the game has ever known. I played with and against him in every kind of game. He was not only a magnificent forward but a most inspiring captain. He could get the last ounce out of his men, and was at his best in an emergency. Physically he was the ideal build for a forward, not too tall, with very powerful shoulders, fast and clever in the loose, and a tremendously hard worker in the scrummages. I believe Daniell would hold his own in any company of forwards, from any country and of any time.

Dai Gent: The octopus-like Gamlin. Six feet odd in height, with exceptionally long arms and legs, his face always grimly set, and slightly bow-legged, I can see him now. Here was the greatest tackler I have ever seen. No man passed the ball after Gamlin had laid hands on him: he went headlong, ball and all, with Gamlin’s tentacles all round him. Gamlin’s genius lay in arranging – yes arranging – when the man in possession should be tackled. It is practically useless to tackle a player just after he has passed the ball. It is the man with the ball you want. Gamlin would watch the movement coming up to him, taking in at a glance its probable development, and then he would, by perfect positioning, force the movement to go in a certain direction, induce a player or two to pass, and then crash into the man on the spot where he [Gamlin] had decided the movement should stop. In his days Welsh football was at its very best, and the greatness of their midfield players used to enable the Welsh backs to burst through the middle of the field quite often, and run up to Gamlin, often three to his single self. Then it was that his deferred tackle came into play.

Sammy Woods