Time for England to get Sevens game in order
NICK CAIN
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There is no nation in the Rugby Union family that was not disrupted by Covid. However, while some, like Ireland, have bounced back with a vengeance, others, like England, have used it to excuse a decline in standards and ambition.
The contrasting fortunes of the Ireland and England Sevens teams tells the tale. On the England Rugby website this week Sevens got short shrift. The news section was blank – despite the team having competed in the 2022 Rugby World Cup Sevens tournament held in Cape Town last weekend, and the 2022 Commonwealth Games Sevens held at the end of July.
This lack of coverage for the biggest prizes in the abbreviated game, the Olympic Sevens apart, can be explained by there being nothing for England to shout about. England were relegated to the second tier competition in Cape Town after losing 17-5 to Ireland in the Round of 16 – and winning the plate final against Uruguay did not merit any attention.
The opposite was true for the unseeded Irish, who went on to win the bronze medal by outplaying Commonwealth gold medallists South Africa (24-14), and then beating Australia 19-14 in the third-place final.
Ireland were also only a few points away from making the final against eventual champions Fiji, after being edged out in the semifinals by New Zealand (17-10). Understandably, the Irish Sevens website was full of tournament news and upbeat photos of the team's welcome at Dublin airport on their return from South Africa.
The signs of England's stark decline as a force in Sevens had been flagged already in the Commonwealth Games, where they were pitched out before the quarterfinals, and also in the World Sevens Series. England finished the global circuit in 10th place, while relative newcomers, Ireland, finished fifth.
The Irish Sevens story in the pro era was non-existent until the re-admission of rugby in the Olympics, which in 2015 saw a group based on provincial squad players and academy hopefuls formed. However, it was not until 2019 that the IRFU awarded its first professional Sevens contracts. The progress since then has been jet-propelled, culminating in finisher Harry McNulty and playmaker Terry Kennedy spearheading their shock bronze medal triumph.
England's Sevens story has more depth. An early mark was made when an England team won the 1973 International Sevens Tournament hosted by the Scottish Rugby Union on its centenary, beating Ireland 22-18. England then went on to win the inaugural 1993 Rugby World Cup Sevens, which was again held in Edinburgh, before Fiji and New Zealand overtook them, and a gradual decline set in.
The crossover between the fifteens game and Sevens was much closer in the amateur era, not least because Sevens was a means of attaining high level fitness and providing a stage for backs, and back row forwards, to showcase their athleticism and skills.
This explains why the England team that became world Sevens champions for the first, and only, time in 1993 included such future international stars as Lawrence Dallaglio, Matt Dawson and Tim Rodber.
It also made us realise how England failed to exploit Andy Harriman's blistering speed and swerve to the full in fifteens, and it introduced us to Dave Scully, the never-say-die Wakefield firefighter. The scrum-half 's crunching trysaving tackle on the huge Fijian finisher, Mesake Rasari, in the semifinal is still etched in my memory of a marathon Murrayfield epic, which saw England win the final against an Australian side fielding David Campese and Michael Lynagh.
The link between Sevens and fifteens has become more frayed with fixture congestion demanding that they take separate paths, but even so the links have endured into the pro era. Such luminaries as Josh Lewsey, Phil Greening, Mathew Tait, Paul Sampson, Tom Varndell, Christian Wade and Danny Care have all graced the England Sevens stage.
Of the current wingers in the Premiership, it has also provided a springboard for London Irish flyer Ollie Hassell-Collins.
If anyone requires any further evidence that the two arms of rugby can still work incredibly well in tandem look no further than Gabin Villiere, the outstanding France winger. Villiere came through the French Sevens programme, as did the brilliant centre Virimi Vakatawa, who has been forced to retire prematurely this season due to a heart condition.
What is so perplexing about theRFU's organisation of English rugby at elite level is that so little appears to be joined up. The anecdotal evidence that young players in Premiership academies, and other leagues, are sitting on the sidelines or holding tackle bags rather than playing, is everywhere.
Why is it so difficult for the England Sevens programme to take a more vibrant route? Why not link with Premiership academies, as well as the universities and colleges in the BUCS league – not to mention the clubs in the Championship and National Divisions One and Two – to identify a pool of players who want to play Sevens for their country?
A combination of part-time contracts, generous expenses, free world travel, and five star accommodation, should be enough to attract an army of young hopefuls to the England Sevens banner.
The next RFU mission is to stop the brain-drain of England Sevens coaching talent. Former playmaker Ben Gollings has just coached Fiji to the World Cup Sevens title, while his mentor, Ben Ryan, who coached Fiji to Olympic Sevens gold in 2016, has crossed codes to join Brentford FC as director of elite performance.
Two more elite England Sevens coaches, Mike Friday and Phil Greening, are coaching the USA Sevens team, while former England Sevens captain and coach Simon Amor, has been appointed as Japan Sevens head coach after being axed as England backs coach by Eddie Jones.
The RFU also has to iron-out the Olympics-led concept of fielding a Great Britain team in the annual World Sevens Series. The best way forward is a compromise, which enables England, Scotland, and Wales to participate as individual nations three years in every four, and come together as GB in the year leading into the Olympics.
It is time the RFU revamped the England Sevens structure – and stopped looking for excuses.
