Lawes: 'If it wasn't Owen Farrell there wouldn't be as much uproar'

Courtney Lawes was at his teammate’s side with his insistence that there is no malice with Farrell who is ‘not trying to get it wrong or hurt people’, but is simply a ‘fierce competitor’ trying his best in an environment where things happen in splits of a second.

FIERCE COMPETITOR: Courtney Lawes was at his teammate’s side with his insistence that there is no malice with Farrell who is ‘not trying to get it wrong or hurt people’, but is simply a ‘fierce competitor’. Pic: Harry Murphy/Sportsfile

Give a controversy enough time and room to breathe and the one inevitability is that it will spread like a fire, engulfing everything and anything in its path. The furore surrounding Owen Farrell this last week sits before us today as Exhibit A.

England’s out-half has been stood down for today’s game at the Aviva Stadium because of the heat, debate and disciplinary toing and froing generated in the wake of his red-card tackle against Wales seven days ago and the disruption and intrusion it all caused.