Mick Cleary: Five things to fix at the RWC from anthems to stadium access
STADIUM ACCESS: Issues for supporters getting into the stadium in Marseille and also Bordeaux need to be fixed going forward. Pic: ©INPHO/James Crombie
Five Things To Put To Rights
Marseille could have been another Hillsborough. Images of the crush in and around the Stade Velodrome on Saturday night send shivers through those of us just glimpsing events on social media never mind actually being there. World Rugby has to crack heads over this matter. And quickly. Safety is the paramount concern.
But fun should also be a fundamental part of the experience. It was in Japan. And has been at every World Cup I’ve attended. Treat supporters as willing partners in the occasion and not as potential troublemakers. If that had been an England v Argentina football match there is no doubt that it would have been a more dangerous experience, potentially catastrophic.
World Rugby should not expect its patrons to get them out of a tight corner on this one, to be well-behaved and all will be right with the world. Confiscating water bottles for goodness sake – what’s that all about? It’s worse than going through an airport. Remember that France won the rights to stage this World Cup only through last gasp politicking by Bernard Laporte and his sidekicks.
For all the social and crime issues in South Africa (who lost out with their favoured bid), I’ve never known problems at grounds there. The fans in France have paid top dollar and deserve better.
Scenes outside the Stade de Marseille as hundreds of fans struggle to enter the stadium minutes before KO.#ENGvARG #RWC2023 pic.twitter.com/38u8zA4QpN
— The Good, The Bad & The Rugby (@GoodBadRugby) September 9, 2023
You can imagine how appealing the idea appeared when it was first floated at a committee table. Let’s do our bit for a very worthy charitable cause and get these kids’ choirs to perform the pre-match anthems.
It would be a noble initiative, it would be different and it would have the world in union and all that, wowed by the sweet spectacle. On paper, yes.
In practice, no, no and no again. Not only has it not worked, it has put a huge dampener on the build-up.
It is in danger of back-firing, too, on the charitable cause. It is time to be bold and to change tack. No-one would hold it against the organisers if they were to take such a remedy. The anthems are an integral part of the rugby experience.
Football does not have the same traditions and many colleagues have remarked on how much they envy rugby in having such a theatrical backdrop to the main event. It has never been hi-jacked by silly overly-nationalistic types. It is just a full-on expressive moment of togetherness and expectation. You don’t need any fancy off-field embellishment.
Give us ‘La Marseillaise’ back in all its rawness and richness.
I know. I know. It was a masterclass from George Ford on Saturday night. Three sweet swings of the boot and England were up off the canvas after the opening shock of losing Tom Curry to a red card.
The scoreboard ticked and ticked and ticked, three drop goals in nine minutes, England had gathered themselves together for the fight while Los Pumas became rattled and deflated.
Ford made it all look ridiculously easy. Of course it is anything but as perhaps the fact that he had only ever landed two drop goals in his previous 85 tests might indicate. It was revealing to hear him say afterwards that England had rehearsed that very scenario at their Le Touquet training base before flying down to Marseille, practising being a man down and trying to maximise their resources in order to manage their way through a tricky situation.
Ford had to manipulate the field to get in the right position as well as not to make his intentions obvious. But, here’s the stinger. For all his expertise and fine-edged execution should a drop goal really be worth the same as a penalty goal which is awarded when the opposition have illegally stopped an opposition attack, thwarted them from perhaps scoring a five-point try?
It seems imbalanced to me. Fair play to Ford and England. But it’s time to re-assess the value of a drop goal.
The TV experience is supposed to compensate for missing out on the vibe of actually being there in the stadium by providing a close-up sense of thud and thunder and twist and turn and shimmy and feint that you might miss at the ground itself, big screens notwithstanding.
So far, though, the replay of actual events and incidents has been massively underwhelming and sometimes out of sync with what has actually just happened out on the field of play. It’s not quite censorship of big moments but rather a subversion or sanitisation of them.
The director’s cut is not up to scratch, wherever the particular feed is coming from. There has been so much high-class sport across the summer – be it The Tour de France with its gripping head-to-head between Jonas Vingegaard and Tadej Pogacar, the Ashes’ nip-and-tuck contest and the women’s football World Cup – all thrillingly played out in multi-angled close-up, that it has been disappointing to be so disappointed with rugby’s output.
It is just not quite at the races. And this for a sport that needs to find new converts and certainly in the UK with its wall-to-wall terrestrial coverage on ITV, there is a danger that a great opportunity is being missed.
Ok, ok you might argue that England toppling Argentina in any circumstances might constitute that let alone doing to with 14 men. And, yes, likewise Wales’ victory over Fiji, a higher-ranked side and so without the capacity to provide the shock value as it did in 2007 when it resulted in the sacking of head coach, Gareth Jenkins.
Mind you, Wales needed the (enormous) rub of the green from English referee, Matt Carley, as well as a butter-fingered fumble from Semi Radradra in the last minute to get them home. Fiji are no-one’s pushovers and Samoa in England’s group as well as Ireland’s opponents on Saturday in Nantes, Tonga, ought to be able to hold their own. Here’s hoping.
There has been laudable investment in Pacific Island rugby over the last few years, a tweak in eligibility rulings as well, to get these natural athletes competing with the best. But more needs to be done. The World Cup schedulers front-loaded their fixture card to provide a big-bash opening weekend.
But even so Ireland put 82 points on Romania, Georgia didn’t really trouble Australia nor Namibia likewise against Italy. The football World Cup is wonderfully competitive right across the board. It is what makes it so engaging. Rugby is a long way from there yet.
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