Columnists
Jeremy Guscott: Bath will need the big boys to shine
Bath have got a squad now which, when at full strength, and at home, can take on anyone, whether it’s in the Prem or in Europe,...
-
Latest News
/ 12 hours agoThis farce could rip the game to pieces
NICK CAIN READ HIS EXPERT OPINION EVERY WEEK Top dogs: Matas Jurevicius on the charge for Ealing who are flying at...
-
Chris Hewett
/ 12 hours agoGlad we were spared Gianni’s sycophancy
CHRIS HEWETT THINKING ALLOWED JUST for once, we must congratulate World Rugby on getting it right. Their staging of the pool...
-
Latest News
/ 12 hours agoThe Big Brekky feeding the soul as well as body
PETER JACKSON THE MAN TRULY IN THE KNOW ON THE filthiest of winter mornings last Tuesday when the squalls rattled everybody...
-
Brendan Gallagher
/ 12 hours agoI fear the worst in RWC mismatches
RUGBY MATTERS A weekly look at the game’s other talking points BRENDAN GALLAGHER RUGBY’S obsession with micro-management long ago became a...
-
Columnists
/ 1 week agoJeremy Guscott: England short of World XV starters
The 2027 Rugby World Cup draw held last week in Sydney produced a good result for England, mainly because Wales, their...
-
Columnists
/ 1 week agoNick Cain: Selection skills key to delivering big prizes for Steve Borthwick’s England
Where does England’s 4-0 Autumn Series success over southern hemisphere opposition leave them? The answer is having to take the next...
-
Columnists
/ 1 week agoNick Cain: Recruiting Benhard Janse van Rensburg sends out the wrong message
The decision by the RFU to petition World Rugby for Bristol’s South African-born-and-bred centre Benhard Janse van Rensburg to be granted...
-
Chris Hewett
/ 1 week agoChris Hewett: Eben Etzebeth top billing in Springboks rogues’ gallery
Clint Eastwood knows a thing or two about cinema, but if anyone is to make a sequel to his Springbok-inspired Invictus...
-
Columnists
/ 1 week agoPeter Jackson: When Dafydd James asked ref to end the misery
When the roof caved in on Wales and their predicament cried out for someone to put a humane end to the...
-
Features
/ 1 week agoPaul Rees: R360 threat can force change
Paul Rees on how the proposed breakaway league could revamp rugby amid increasing stresses on top players
-
Columnists
/ 2 weeks agoKyran Bracken: Grand Slam has to be expectation, not hope for England
This England team is the closest thing we’ve had to the 2003 World Cup-winning side – and they should set their...
-
Chris Hewett
/ 2 weeks agoChris Hewett: Key pieces might yet emerge for England chief Steve Borthwick
The World Cup is all that matters, right? Everything else is 50 shades of beige. If England’s second-string success in Argentina...
-
Columnists
/ 2 weeks agoPeter Jackson: Argentina left licking their wounds after double mugging
Tom Curry condemned Argentina to a gross injustice at Twickenham last weekend, one which subjected the victims to a grotesque double...
-
Columnists
/ 2 weeks agoPeter Jackson: Daan Human factor has made Springboks even deadlier
Forensic experts engaged on a week-long trawl through the ruins of the Irish pack would have found something more disturbing than...
-
Brendan Gallagher
/ 2 weeks agoBrendan Gallagher: Bravo referee Matt Carley for taking no nonsense
Of all the subjects that have irritated me in recent years – apart from the hardy annual of blatant forward passes...
-
Columnists
/ 3 weeks agoJeremy Guscott: It’s great to see England carving out a way to win
What impressed me most about England’s victory over New Zealand was the way that they stayed in it in the ebb-and-flow,...
-
Columnists
/ 3 weeks agoNick Cain: Don’t exaggerate the importance of bench too much
The eight-man bench is not an aspect of the pro game I support, and the lauding of England’s “Pom squad” as...
-
Chris Hewett
/ 3 weeks agoChris Hewett: These Flying Fijians deserve place in sun
Few historians of the ancient world put it quite this way, but the Peloponnesian War was won off the bench.
-
Brendan Gallagher
/ 3 weeks agoBrendan Gallagher: Awards season has its problems
It’s the awards season and time to issue my annual warning about the vaguely ridiculous nature of awards – remember that...
-
Columnists
/ 3 weeks agoPeter Jackson: And finally, George Ford puts his nemesis to the sword
During a rare moment of solitude since last weekend, George Ford might have found his mind drifting back to an ancient...
-
Columnists
/ 4 weeks agoJeremy Guscott: Time for Scotland to make big step
Scotland have had the players in the last six years to make a big impact on the world stage, but overall...
-
Columnists
/ 4 weeks agoNick Cain: England A team just not up to the job
The Rec was packed with 14,500 Red Rose fans last Saturday, England A were on home turf, and the second-string All...
-
Chris Hewett
/ 4 weeks agoChris Hewett: Without Jac Morgan, Wales will not be all right
The differences are obvious: he doesn’t have a shock of guitar-hero hair, or a nose so busted it resembles the last...
-
Columnists
/ 4 weeks agoPeter Jackson: Ray ‘Chico’ Hopkins still unhappy with place in history
Even now, more than 50 years after turning England inside out and upside down at Twickenham, Ray ‘Chico’ Hopkins still resents...
-
Brendan Gallagher
/ 4 weeks agoBrendan Gallagher: A bolt of brilliance in that Arctic winter
The old sporting, and indeed show business, maxim of leaving the punters wanting more has never rung truer than with Richard...
-
Columnists
/ 1 month agoJeremy Guscott: Look at that lineup and you have to say: ‘Wow!’
England’s performance against Australia in the first of their four home Autumn Series Tests was rusty, which was only to be...
-
Columnists
/ 1 month agoNick Cain: Fault-lines show cracks in the All Black armour
Jordie Barrett’s tour-ending ankle injury against Ireland in Chicago last weekend plays into the hands of an England team hunting their...
-
Columnists
/ 1 month agoDavid Norrie: 40 years on, and still stuck in the dark ages
The definition of insanity is to keep doing the same thing over and over again – and expect a different result.
-
Chris Hewett
/ 1 month agoChris Hewett: I’d stick with Ben Earl in the back row, Steve Borthwick
Welcome to the “Yeti Syndrome”, a vivid way of categorising the many things we seek in rugby but no longer expect...
-
Columnists
/ 1 month agoPeter Jackson: Fearless Fred Howard calls Henry Pollock to account
A retired referee of global renown called the other day to pose a rhetorical question about the legality of Henry Pollock’s...
-
Brendan Gallagher
/ 1 month agoBrendan Gallagher: When Pumas gave Wales a tough time
The record books tell us that Wales and today’s opponents, Argentina, have contested 22 Tests since their first official meeting in...
-
Columnists
/ 1 month agoJeremy Guscott: Time for France to put down a marker
France, champions of Europe, against South Africa, double World Cup winners and newly crowned Rugby Championship title holders, in Paris on...
-
Columnists
/ 1 month agoNick Cain: Avoid the circus and keep strategy simple
We are told the bench is now the ‘swingometer’ that dictates who wins at international and top club level.
-
Columnists
/ 1 month agoNick Cain: Believe it! All Blacks are there for the taking
New Zealand may not be the imperious double World Cup winners they were in 2015, but at the start of the...
-
Chris Hewett
/ 1 month agoChris Hewett: ‘Finishers’ need to be put in their place
Imagine you are peering across halfway at a pack of forwards so big, knotted with muscle and profoundly pug-ugly that the...
-
Chris Hewett
/ 1 month agoGalthie’s secret squirrel exercise
CHRIS HEWETT FACED with last week’s espionage bulletin from France, the owlish master spy George Smiley would have cleaned his spectacles...
-
Columnists
/ 1 month agoPeter Jackson: Welsh Rugby’s press charade does the game no favours
When the top brass at Twickenham interviewed Dudley Wood for the vacant position of RFU secretary, they raised a pressing matter...
-
Brendan Gallagher
/ 1 month agoBrendan Gallagher: We need a full-time eligibility supremo
This column grew hoarse a few years back, arguing for World Rugby to loosen their belts just a little and spend...
-
Columnists
/ 2 months agoJeremy Guscott: England are buzzing and ready to have a go
The reboot of the international season starts for England when they face Australia at Twickenham on Saturday, and they go into...
-
Columnists
/ 2 months agoNick Cain: Luke Cowan-Dickie’s reprieve smacks of inconsistency
Luke Cowan-Dickie’s exoneration by an RFU disciplinary panel on Tuesday for a potentially dangerous high tackle on Tom Willis in last...
-
Chris Hewett
/ 2 months agoChris Hewett: Too much talent can be a problem
We have heard much wailing and gnashing of teeth over Tom Willis, largely from those who assumed the France-bound Saracens forward...
-
Brendan Gallagher
/ 2 months agoBrendan Gallagher: Don’t hold Noah Caluori back – he’s too good
So a supernova named Noah Caluori, whose vapour trails lingered long in the sky over Hendon last Saturday night, is now...
-
Brendan Gallagher
/ 2 months agoBrendan Gallagher: Emily Scarratt has left a stellar legacy
We can, if we want, measure Emily Scarratt’s extraordinary career in bald facts.
-
Columnists
/ 2 months agoPeter Jackson: Wingers who fly high in their teens
Those teenagers who dare to wing it across the international stage belong to a galaxy of meteoroids once flown by England’s...
-
Columnists
/ 2 months agoPeter Jackson: Ospreys have good reason to spit blood
When the WRU delivered its damning verdict on the Ospreys and Scarlets, the judges ought to have been suitably dressed for...
-
Columnists
/ 2 months agoJeremy Guscott: Problem laws are just not ‘helpful’
When it comes to a commentary on the laws of the game, it’s important to acknowledge first that the referee has...
-
Columnists
/ 2 months agoNick Cain: Time for Maro Itoje & Co to take on the world
Maro Itoje scaled one of the most significant peaks in rugby union as a winning Lions captain this summer, but he...
-
Chris Hewett
/ 2 months agoChris Hewett: The two-team solution has worked for Scotland
On a bad road day – the sad truth is that most days turn bad the moment you sit behind the...
-
Columnists
/ 2 months agoPeter Jackson: Long march of players from distant lands
The All Blacks are heading this way via Chicago reinforced by another bountiful raft of converts from their treasured trawl of...
Latest News
Superb Sharks demolish Clermont
Latest News
Dowson: I’d love to keep Furbank at club
Features
OSCAR WILSON
BUCS Super Rugby
Cardiff Met’s Gus Patterson on becoming Bridgend’s next rugby star
The best betting sites
