FA snub public to fail All Black test

So, having run out of football teams to copy, England have turned their attention to rugby. The All Blacks are the new model for the FA, who have recruited owen Eastwood, formerly with New Zealand Rugby. Famously, the All Blacks have what is termed a ‘no dickheads’ policy, which Eastwood helped shape. ‘A dickhead makes everything about them,’ mental skills coach Gilbert Enoka (right), explained. ‘They are people who think they’re entitled to things, expect the rules to be different for them or are unnecessarily loud about their work.’ This is interesting as whoever it was at the FA who decided to close the Hilton hotel at St George’s Park to the public during international breaks would certainly fall foul of the All Blacks charter. only the England players and staff and outsiders with prebooked teams using the site will be allowed there in future. Is this how the All Blacks behave? of course not. Their team base in Auckland when they play at Eden Park — and there’s an innovation, having your training camp in the same city as your ground, rather than two and a half hours up the M1 — is the Heritage hotel. It’s a nice hotel in the centre of town but nothing special. It doesn’t have pretty views across the water like the SofiteSofitel where France staystay, it isn’t high up, ovoverlooking the city, liwa like the Pullman where the British and Irish Lions mmade camp. AAnd it certainly isnisn’t closed to the pubpublic. Anyone can walk in, there is no heavyheavy-handedhan security and New Zealand’s rugby players can be regularly sighted in the public areas being unassuming and very normal. So the FA and England have failed their first All Black test: because if you’re so special the hotel has to be closed on your account, everyone pretty much knows what you are.