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  Robert Kitson: Gatland's jibe will galvanise English |
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 | Reported by guardian.co.uk
on Wednesday, 28 October 2009
(3 weeks ago) |
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The Wales head coach may come to regret his criticism of the Guinness PremiershipYou have to hand it to Warren Gatland.
Is there a more gymnastic orator in rugby? One minute he is encouraging an all-for-one cross-border team ethos with the Lions, the next he is slagging off standards on the English side of the Severn Bridge.
There is always an ulterior motive for his verbal hand grenades but, on this occasion, his artful lob would appear to have landed slightly too close to home.The beauty of Gatland, of course, is that he loves to stir whichever pot happens to be bubbling in front of him.
By criticising the Guinness Premiership as "the weakest I have ever known" and not good enough for wannabe Welsh Test players, he is clearly hoping to lure back the likes of Eifion Roberts, the Sale prop who would appear to most neutrals to be a genuine international prospect.
Welsh regional rugby gets stronger and the Premiership gets further diluted, potentially weakening the English national team.
Job done, get the beers in.Except that the situation is not quite that simple.
It is true that this year's Premiership has not been mind-blowingly good to date.
The ebbing tide of multi-national talent to the Top 14 - not just the English - and decreasing squad sizes have had a draining effect on clubs like Sale and Gloucester, both of whom are enduring tough seasons.
Wasps, Saracens and Newcastle are rebuilding, Leicester are injury-plagued and only London Irish and Northampton have been playing with any real freedom.Yet Gatland is forgetting a couple of things.
For a start, he is in effect criticising two proud Welshmen - the former national coach Mike Ruddock at Worcester and Sale's head coach Kingsley Jones - who will now be fully entitled to brandish two fingers the next time the Kiwi asks them for a favour.
His trusty assistant coach Shaun Edwards may also have a word.
Is Gatland saying that Edwards, still the beating heart of London Wasps, is now less effective at motivating players than he was in the days when Lawrence Dallaglio was captain? And what about the unsettling effect on people such as Roberts, Dwayne Peel, Gareth Delve, Ceri Jones and Warren Fury whose career choice he is basically criticising?On top of that, he has all but written England's team-talk for them prior to next year's Six Nations game against Wales.
This particular English side respond best to having their backs against the wall and Welsh wins at Twickenham have not been frequent enough during the professional era to make too many claims on behalf of the inbuilt superiority of Welsh club rugby.Of course results such as the Scarlets' away victory over London Irish in the Heineken Cup raise quizzical eyebrows.
But Europe is a contrasting type of competition to the Premiership, demanding a completely different mindset.
Is Gatland seriously suggesting the Scarlets would be top of the English league after six rounds if they were suddenly to be granted access? Ditto the Newport Gwent Dragons? Surely not.In fact, the more you think about it, the more Gatland may ultimately regret going public with an opinion that will galvanise every single club in the Premiership and make the English as a whole desperate to prove him wrong, possibly to the detriment of Wales in the long run.
Where he is on more solid ground is in his implicit criticism of Premier Rugby officials, whose refusal to make an exception to allow someone like Peel to face the All Blacks does them few favours and comes across as petty and self-serving.
Gatland's disdain, on that front, is entirely justified.
Bagging everyone living east of Chepstow, however, is not so clever.Calendar boysHandbags, or rather man-bags, at dawn.
The sacked Stade Français coach Ewen McKenzie, has accused his former employer, Max Guazzini, of recruiting players based on their looks in an attempt to boost sales of the club's beefcake calendar.
"I had certain players forced on me who, for me, shouldn't have been in a team targeting the Top 14 title," McKenzie told L'Equipe.
The Australian's views have gone down poorly in Paris.
"It is imperative for him to justify the reasons why Stade Français, which is a well known club in Australia, sacked him and all he comes up with are derogatory remarks," retorted Guazzini.
"From A to Z, everything he said was rubbish." Okay, but which players could Max possibly have recruited for their beauty rather than their beastliness? Take a look at the Stade team photo and make up your own minds.Turning JapaneseThere is as much worldwide interest in the venue as the outcome of this Saturday's Bledisloe Cup clash between New Zealand and Australia in Tokyo.
If the locals respond to the so-called "Rumble in the Rice Bowl" it will underline the potential growth opportunities for the sport in Asia between now and the 2019 Rugby World Cup in Japan.
Given the anticipated financial losses for the 2011 tournament in New Zealand are currently estimated at NZ$39.3m (£18m), there is plenty at stake.
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