England 26 New Zealand 12: World Rugby champions, did you say?

Forget the All  Blacks, England are the best rugby team in the world. Don't laugh, the evidence could well be indisputable in a couple of weeks time. I am, of course talking about the other code of the game. The one they started up in Huddersfield many years ago ''t'get some dosh for t'players.''

I guess many the Hooray Henry losers who watched New Zealand beat Australia in Saturday's RWC Final still have hangovers after their six-week oval ball of non-qualifying celebration. But earlier this evening I watched a team of white-shirted Englishmen hammer world champions New Zealand in front of a euphoric crowd at Hull's KC Stadium. And there was not a single chariot around, sweet or low.

The occasion was the first of three Test matches between England and New Zealand, who have pinched the mantle of world's best from their Antipodean cousins in recent years. And surprise, surprise, the men in white 'rose' to the occasion as only an English team can (as opposed to 'do').

Oddly enough, the clinching try was scored by Wigan Warriors captain Sean O'Loughlin, whose name sounds more in keeping with a jolly green giant on the Irish after-dinner circuit.  The reality is that O'Loughlin is Wigan born and bred and it's hard enough trying to decipher his accent  in St Helens, let alone in the lah-di-dah corridors of rugger power. Not that he is ever likely to follow Sam Burgess on his international Twick or Tweet merry-go-round. He'd need an interpreter and as far as I know there's nobody on earth who is fluent in both English and High Wiganese.

Sean O'Loughlin...scored  England's clinching try

Now I have to confess that as a true Welsh patriot, I am a rugby union person. I don't have the divided interests of former players like Jonathan Davies, who seems able to switch codes in the commentary box almost at will not you, Carling). Jiffy also seems to rather confused about his nationality at present. A Welsh-speaking Welshman, he was heard this evening to utter the unutterable over a microphone as England celebrated victory against the Kiwis. He called them 'we'.
Shame on you, Jonathan. Next thing you'll be telling me that the late Bill McLaren was from Trimsaran.

At first I thought I was imagining the whole unlikely scenario of England beating the All Blacks.  I was doing my usual early-evening channel-hop and there it was. BBC2, live rugby action with England battering the hell out of a bunch of burly black-shirted Kiwis.

My senile brain gradually absorbed the fact that in recent years England have become pretty much the best in the business when it comes to the 13-man game. My recollection is that Australia ruled the rugby league show for almost as long as the All Blacks have been the most remarkable sports team on earth. Apart from a couple of momentary blips when they crashed to No.2 in the rankings, they have been the best in the business for as long as I can remember.

The first nation to win three World Cups, first to win back-to back-crowns and in Richie McCaw led by a unique warrior who has won 131 of his world-record 148 Test matches. I was in junior school last time Wales beat the All Blacks. We've lost to them perhaps a dozen times since then, and even in the golden era of Gareth Edwards and Barry John, only once come close to repeating the feat.

Now you can bet that the McCaw birds of Kiwi-land will be ruling the roost until the next Worldwide Webb-Ellis is invented.

The big question is whether England are on the verge of putting the rugby league world to whites. 

Scrum off it: TEN hilarious rugby gems for World Cup Final day

During  more than three decades in Fleet Street, I heard more offbeat tales about sports celebrities than I care to remember – many of them first-hand from colleagues who witnessed the event. These 10 anecdotes are just a few  of the funnies I picked up from rugby players and journalists  (both union and league). Whilst I suspect one or two of the anecdotes  may be apocryphal, does it really matter as long as they tickle the laughter buds?

Charlie Faulkner...lines crossed

DON’T CALL US: During their 1978 tour of Australia, the great Welsh team of that era tried all sorts of devious methods to get freebie phone calls through to their wives and loved ones back home. The players resorted to tricks like asking restaurant proprietors if they could use the phone – and then calling the other side of the world when the proprietor thought they were ringing a local number. Prop forward Charlie Faulkner – a not-so-bright member of the legendary Pontypool front row – opted for a different tactic at the reception that followed the first Test match in Brisbane. He picked up the house phone, got through to the hotel switchboard and barked out his home number in

Newport. ‘’To whom do I charge the call?’’ asked the operator. ‘’Err…Mr Dawes. John Dawes,’’ mumbled Charlie, figuring he could get the tour coach to pick up the tab. ‘’Please remain by the phone for a moment, Mr Dawes, and I’ll call you back,’’ came the reply. Charlie replaced the receiver and got back to the business of drowning his sorrows after a rare defeat. By the time the call came through a few minutes later, he was in another world. ‘’Ullo,’’ said Charlie. ‘’I have a call to South Wales for Mr John Dawes,’’ confirmed the operator. Charlie took a quick look around. ‘’He’s not here,’’ he barked – and hung up.

GUMMETH THE HOUR: Cliff Morgan, the rugby maestro who later became a commentator and eventually head of BBC TV sport, vividly recalls his first broadcasting experience. Wales had just beaten Ireland 14-3 in Dublin on their way to the Triple Crown and Grand Slam when BBC radio commentator Sammy Walker asked the great man what he remembered about the match. ‘’My father losing his teeth,’’ said Cliff. ‘’When Ken Jones scored our second try, dad was so excited that his dentures flew out of his mouth into the crowd and he hasn’t seen them since.’’ Some years later, Morgan was recounting the tale to Tony O’Reilly, who played 29 times for his country before becoming a mega-rich international businessman and head of the Heinz empire. O’Reilly, who was renowned for his great wit, feigned surprise at the news. ‘’Your father’s, were they?’’ he said. ‘’That’s amazing. I know the guy in Cork who’s still wearing them.’’ On another occasion, O’Reilly had to make a brief trip to a Dublin hospital after being involved in a minor traffic accident. With medical treatment in Ireland charged on a sliding scale according to income, the nurse who was filling in the details on his behalf asked: ‘’Mr O’Reilly, do you earn more than 10,000 punts (pounds)?’’ Quipped Tony: ‘’Now that depends on whether you are talking about the hour or the day.’’

HEADS WE WIN: Wales coach Clive Rowlands was giving his customary pre-match talk before an all-important international at Cardiff Arms Park. As usual, the players were locked into Room 338 at the nearby Angel Hotel – and the emotive Rowlands was pounding them with reasons why they had to grind the opposition into the dust. By the time he had finished working on their emotions, the wound-up stars were ready to die for their country – literally. ‘’What are you going to do?’’ Rowlands bellowed as the electric atmosphere reached fever pitch. ‘’WIN!’’ yelled the players. ‘’What are we going to do?’’ echoed Clive. ‘’Win, win …WIN!’’ It was all too much for second-row forward Geoff Wheel. The big man from Swansea worked himself into a frenzy and, screaming ‘’Kill, KILL!‘’, he charged at the door to Room 338 – and butted a hole clean through it.

A FATE WORSE THAN BREATH: After four years in the England team, veteran prop Paul Rendall had seen it all. So it was only natural he should want to put new boy Paul Ackford’s mind at ease as they prepared to face Australia at Twickenham. ’’Don’t worry,’’ Rendall assured police inspector Ackford in the changing room before the match. ’’The game will fly by. You’ll find the first half seems like three minutes and the second half four minutes.’’ England went on to produce a dazzling performance and were within five minutes of a memorable victory when Ackford staggered up to Rendall during an injury stoppage. ‘’You’re a f***ing liar!’’ gasped the 6ft 6in second row. ‘’I’ve been out here for four-and-a-half hours and the game’s still not over.‘’

LATE MOMENTS IN SPORT: The British Lions were given a fearful runaround by the Orange Free State outside half during a particularly traumatic 1980 tour match. In the end, Lions centre Ray Gravell could stand no more. As the South African danger man made yet another break, the Welsh tough guy hit him with a fearful tackle long after he had parted with the ball. The referee angrily called the Llanelli star over and proceeded to dish out the severest of reprimands. ‘’That was the latest tackle I’ve ever seen!’’ he stormed. Replied wisecracking Gravell: ‘’Sorry ref, I got there as quickly as I could.’’

STICKY WAGER: It certainly wasn’t the weather that took York Rugby League coach Bill Reilly and Aussie scout Arthur Clues to Batley. The Mount Pleasant ground was anything but pleasant as the wind howled, the rain sheeted down – and the teams made a forlorn attempt to play rugby in a mudbath. With scarcely a minute left to play, neither side had scored a single point. Then Batley, playing up the hill and into the gale, won a penalty way out on the touchline. As their fullback lined up an ambitious pot at goal, Yorkshireman Reilly turned to Clues and wagered: ‘’I bet you a dollar he kicks it.’’ ‘’You’re on,’’ replied Clues. The kicker squelched through his run-up, only to slip in the quagmire at the moment of contact – and the ball trickled just a few inches forward as he plunged onto his back in the mud. ‘’I told you he’d kick it,’’ said Reilly, holding out his hand for his winnings.

ARMS AND THE MAN: There was no question of injured Tommy Martin making his own way off the field. The Leigh and Great Britain second row needed a stretcher after taking a bad knock on his ankle – but the one and only St John Ambulance stretcher was already occupied by another player. As Martin lay writhing on the ground and the fans bayed for the action to restart, desperate officials grabbed an office chair from the clubhouse and dashed on to the pitch with it. Martin was lifted gingerly into the seat, and with one embarrassed committee man either side, the chair was hoisted into the air by its arms. With the crowd roaring their approval, Martin was steered tentatively towards the dressing room . Five seconds later, there was a huge crack and the committee men were left holding a chair arm each as the seat and legs tipped Martin out – straight onto his damaged ankle.

GRIN AT THE DEEP END: To celebrate Leigh’s feat in avoiding relegation, coach Tom Grainey took his strugglers on holiday to Majorca. Some months later, his assistant Colin Clarke was reflecting on the break in the changing room at Hilton Park. ‘’Remember it, lads?’’ he mused. ‘’All that sun and San Miguel…and old Grainey up on the top diving board doing a double somersault with pike?’’ With that, prop forward Derek Pyke chirped up: ‘’Hey, it weren’t me. I were out on a training run.’’

WIGAN’S BIG ‘UN: The groupie girl outside Wigan’s Riverside Club eyed up the town’s new Rugby League hero – and liked what she saw. ‘’Hiya, big boy,’’ she said to burly South African Nick Du Toit, her eyes settling on the most personal part of the 6ft 3in forward’s anatomy. ‘’Tell me, are you built in proportion all over?’’ ‘’Listen, lady,’’ replied Du Toit in his clipped Afrikaans tones. ‘’If I was built in proportion, I’d be 12 foot ten!’’

AN ED FULL OF NOTHING: Tough-guy Eddie Szymala was in the wars again. And after the beefy but intellectually-challenged Barrow forward broke his jaw in a match against Oldham, coach Frank Foster was quick to pay tribute to the wounded hero. ‘’Eddie doesn’t know the meaning of the word fear,’’ Foster told the assembled press. ‘’Mind you, there are a million other words he doesn’t know the meaning of, either.’’

Why Rugby is a better game than American football

You guys across the Pond will be furious but here in the real world we have a ball game which leaves your so-called ''football'' for dead.

If you hadn't disappeared into the Bushes (by George, what a presidential play on words), you would realise that FOOTBALL is actually the global game — the one you refer to over there as ''soccer''. I mean, how can you call a game football when the only time anyone kicks the ball is to convert a try or land what you call a ''field goal''?

A try? Well, in the real world that’s the term we use for a touchdown. And by REAL world, I mean the entire planet, not the globe as visualised by folk in that admittedly quite large piece of land between California and New York.

The game I’m talking about, by the way, is called rugby. You may have heard of it. In fact you made a rather pathetic attempt to copy it when you nicked our oval-ball idea in order to invent your own grid-iron game way back when.

In fact, I’m told the intelligent guys among you still play rugby quite a lot at university. And I’m not talking about College Football. Why anyone should care so much about the kids’ version of grid-iron is another mystery to us Brits.

Rugby is just as tough as your game, if not tougher. Only our players don’t dress up as bouncy castles and plonk motorbike crash helmets on their heads. What’s all that about, for heaven’s sake? Apart from anything, it turns the hundreds of players in every team into faceless zombies.

I believe the original distortion of the rules of rugby in the United States was largely due to some guy called Walter Camp (who presumably was a lot more macho than his name). It’s so sad because had you stuck to the REAL game invented by William Webb Ellis at Rugby School in 1823, you guys could have been a real force at rugby.

Maybe even in the same class as the mighty New Zealand All Blacks, the most successful international team of all-time.

You talk about your quarterbacks. Stars like Brett Favre, Peyton Manning and Tom Brady. Well, we have guys called outside-halves, who are the ultimate playmakers and in Dan Carter, the Kiwis have as brilliant a player as the world has ever seen. He also kicks goals from 60-degree angles, rather more subtle than your field-goal experts who merely have to boot them over from in front of the posts.

Dan Carter: The ultimate playmaker

Anyway, you chose to create your own version of the game. Fair enough, even if you did bend every rule that existed to the point that you even allow the ball to be passed FORWARD. How ridiculous can you get?

OK, we did make a bit of a mess of things over here early last century when the political shambles over professionalism saw the game of rugby split into two codes. But they remain very similar—and these days players can switch between rugby league and rugby union with little problem.

To sum up, these are the reasons why American Football is to my mind subservient to rugby (either code).

1. Rugby is a worldwide game, while American Football is played seriously in only a handful of countries. Well, not even that - just the US and Canada, really. The International Rugby Board rankings list 94 nations (the USA is actually 16th, so there’s still hope for America if you come over to the real world). New Zealand is ranked No.1 at rugby union and, since you have a population 100 times as big as theirs, plus considerably fatter sheep, both human and woolly, the sky should be the limit. And the Aussies are traditionally best at rugby league, so you’ve got a chance to bring the cocky so-and-so’s down to earth. 

2. Rugby is all action for 80 minutes. American Football is all inaction for four hours—arguably the slowest game on earth. Jut try turning the TV on at random in the middle of a game. If there are not ads showing and something is actually happening, it’s a miracle. And if anyone says cricket is slower, I’ll let Geoffrey Boycott loose on them (in-joke for the Brits).

3. Rugby players lay into each other like real men, with just the flimsiest of body padding. Grid-iron players are unrecognisable as human beings with all that body armour.

4. Rugby is played by two teams of 15 players (13 in rugby league). Between them, they have expertise in both attack and defence (note correct spelling of defence). Grid-iron players aren’t good enough to attack AND defend, so a squad of immobile 300-pound elephants are programmed to come on and stop the attackers, who are the only guys who can really play the game.

5. Rugby does not need flimsily-dressed cheerleaders to give the male fans some real excitement. We also celebrate the scoring of tries with applause and back-slapping, not lots of ridiculous dancing and high fives.

6. Rugby is played in ALL conditions—on grass, not synthetic turf, as seemingly used by most NFL teams. That stuff is more dangerous than the opposition, for heaven’s sake. I’ve never seen a grid-iron game played in mud and pouring rain, though I am told it does happen on occasion. Now that would be worth watching even for a cynic like me!

7. Finally, and most important, this article is all a bit of fun and not to be taken seriously. I’m a woman who was reared on rugby union (I’m actually from Wales, where rugby is everything). The reality is that the best game is the one that appeals to YOU.

It’s all subjective so whatever your preferences, may the best game win! (Wales is the bit that sticks out to the left of England on the map, by the way).

Now let's get down to things that really matter. Which is better...rugby union or rugby league?