England’s World Cup ante-post gamble is back in the running for 2007. Rugby league legend Andy Farrell took his first steps as a union player on Monday night. His 65 minutes for Saracens A against Harlequins A must have been a mighty relief to those who invested so many hopes in him. He could make a Premiership debut from the bench today.
The decision to spend so much money and faith in Farrell’s powers is one hell of a gamble. He spent more than a dozen dazzling years at the peak of his first sport for both club and country; that is some spell at the top level and the gathering injuries as a league player were a warning to those who would invest excessively on his reputation in one code. He has been terribly unlucky with injuries since the switch, but the writing was on the wall for those with opened eyes. A professional gambler would not have seen Farrell as a panacea for the tribulations of English union.
There were simply too many negatives factored into the equation. Apart from the toll of being so long at the top, there is the small matter of Farrell being as near as you come to a custom-built rugby league player. Does he have quite the size to make a dent in opponents from the pack or the speed to handle life in the back-line? It was the question being asked through the long months of his sidelined spell at Saracens. Few came up with a confident answer.
Great league player that he was, Farrell did not travel south with the obvious running talent of Jason Robinson. The ability to beat a man is the most common factor between the two codes. Anyone with acceleration has a chance of crossing the codes. Without it the odds are long against. Backs such as David Watkins and Jonathan Davies made it in league because their speed and elusiveness made them dangerous operators in any code. Fewer forwards have made the swap with any joy — either way.
There is, of course, a good reason. The two sports are further apart up front than people realise. A scrum is a strategic battle in union whereas it is a restart in league, and union has constant contact which makes the entire 80 minutes a decision-making process. League has six tackles.
Martin Johnson and John Eales are two of the great modern forwards of the union game. Johnson thundered around the park, hitting that contact zone and developing as a solid carrier and distributor fairly late in his career. He would have made a handy prop for an average league side but not much more. As for the telescopic Australian, it is hard to envisage him even making the professional league grade. This does not make league a superior sport, or dent the reputation of either lock.
It is just a reminder that the sports are more distant than first cousins. A chess and draughts board looks the same before the pieces come out of their boxes.
Farrell discovered the fact for himself in a reserves match. As if the odds against him succeeding are not long enough, he is being played in one of the two positions that do not exist in league. The headlines dealt with his well-taken try, but the reality was the difficulty of coming to terms with the minutiae of union forward technique as a blindside flanker.
Twice Harlequins scored from scrums with Farrell bound down on the blind side. Young Tom Guest was past him from the Harlequins No 8 position before Farrell looked up from his shove. In league you restart at the scrum. Farrell knows it is more influential in union. He kept his head down and pushed like the novice he is. Easy problem to eradicate? Think again. Flankers do not exist in league so it will not be a simple matter of changing the mindset.
Decision-making is not just what a player does with the ball in hand. Every ruck and every maul is a decision to be made. Farrell clattered into rucks, clearly aware that this is what union flankers do. But the best do not. For them, each contact situation is a moment requiring an instantaneous decision. To dive in when the ball cannot be won is to leave a defence one man down.
I remember talking to Peter Winterbottom, one of England’s best opensides, about the Springbok flanker Schalk Burger when he was making headlines around the world with his dynamic debut season of Test rugby. Headlined as one of the best back-row forwards on the planet, Winterbottom said: “He will be good when he works out when to hit a ruck and when not.” If Burger, a union player from the year dot, finds the intricacies of the contact zone a mental morass, what hope Farrell getting to grips with these labyrinthine difficulties, the likes of which he has never before encountered? The former Wallaby coach Eddie Jones, among others, talked — in his brief spell at Saracens — of redefining a union position through Farrell’s brilliance. And it is true, there are few forwards with his distribution skills and none with his kicking game. But to create some sort of hybrid position, halfway between a blindside flanker and an inside-centre, requires a side that is settled, with the room for some startling originality as a luxury item. In 2002 England was that side; New Zealand are it now, but this is not 2002 and Farrell is not a Kiwi.
Nobody doubts Farrell will throw his considerable mental and physical strengths at making himself a success at union. That is what champions do. I have not met a single rugby league player, former player or analyst who thinks otherwise. No doubting his commitment, but a few of them question whether he will make the successful transformation.
That’s the key word: transformation – not grade. If England’s finest rugby league player of the past 15 years does not reach the starting post in 2007, the focus should not be upon any shortcomings in Farrell. Rather Saracens and England fans will wonder whether such a professional- sized wager should have been struck with the wild optimism of the amateur punter. Jason Robinson, younger and quicker, was always a better bet, even if Farrell was the better league player. If Farrell makes the Premiership grade, he will have achieved a minor miracle. oSaracens v Newcastle, Vicarage Road, today, kick-off 3pm
