Postcards from the edge

Choosing the right location for a team base is fraught with difficulties. Declan Kidney’s choice for his charges has appeared to have been an inspired choice.

THE DEVIL, they say, is in the detail and if there’s one thing all coaches can agree on, putting your players in the right surroundings is half the battle won on the road to a successful tournament.

Choosing the right location for a team base is fraught with difficulties, as the England football manager Sven Goran Eriksson found out at the 2006 World Cup when he plumped for the spa town of Baden-Baden as the headquarters for his pampered players and their demanding WAGs. The place went into lock down as paparazzi besieged the town.