Sunday, May 01, 2011
England A: Does Mike not talk to his team?
Are the England A management and team over in Spain not on speaking terms?
I just ask as, talking about his next opponents, Mike is quoted today as saying that Netherlands "are very much an unknown quantity for us".
Now, leaving aside the fact that The Netherlands is not exactly that far away, have been playing international rugby for longer than anyone else (including five years longer than England), and that finding out about Dutch women's rugby is really very, very easy (there was a pretty good article on Dutch rugby on ScrumQueens a couple of weeks ago) there is one overwhelming reason why Mike should have very good intelligence about his next opponents.
Only two weeks ago, as a warm-up for this tournament, Netherlands played against the British Army. And who plays for the British Army? Why, none other than England A flanker Jane Leonard.
Do the England management team do no research on their opponents at all? More seriously, has Mike fallen out with his team? Or maybe is Jane so miffed about only starting the game on the bench that she no longer on speaking terms with him? Perhaps we should be told...
[In fairness it is possible that Mike never said anything of the sort and the entire quote was made up by someone in the press office at Twickenham - after all, most quotes in most press notices are. Even so they should have known better too.]
I just ask as, talking about his next opponents, Mike is quoted today as saying that Netherlands "are very much an unknown quantity for us".
Now, leaving aside the fact that The Netherlands is not exactly that far away, have been playing international rugby for longer than anyone else (including five years longer than England), and that finding out about Dutch women's rugby is really very, very easy (there was a pretty good article on Dutch rugby on ScrumQueens a couple of weeks ago) there is one overwhelming reason why Mike should have very good intelligence about his next opponents.
Only two weeks ago, as a warm-up for this tournament, Netherlands played against the British Army. And who plays for the British Army? Why, none other than England A flanker Jane Leonard.
Do the England management team do no research on their opponents at all? More seriously, has Mike fallen out with his team? Or maybe is Jane so miffed about only starting the game on the bench that she no longer on speaking terms with him? Perhaps we should be told...
[In fairness it is possible that Mike never said anything of the sort and the entire quote was made up by someone in the press office at Twickenham - after all, most quotes in most press notices are. Even so they should have known better too.]
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