Lancaster was well meaning but gimmicks riled
One of Stuart Lancaster’s gimmicks was this old bell he had got from the Navy, which he set up at the training centre in Pennyhill. The management did not really know what to do with it, but finally decided that someone would ring it to signify the end of a game review, on the Monday after a Test match.
It sounded quite cute after a win, but after we lost to Wales at the 2015 World Cup the bell rang and someone shouted, “Iceberg ahead!” (When I say someone, of course I mean me.) The coaches were trying to be serious while the lads were p------ themselves, and Stuart was furious, looking around for the gagster. As it turned out, I was spot on – we lost our next game against Australia and sank like the Titanic, failing to progress from the group.
Don’t get me wrong, I think it is important for the England team to be connected to the fans, grassroots rugby and the history of the sport.
Without the fans, grass-roots teams and the England players that came before us, we would not exist. But the truth is, all the off-field things that went wrong at the 2011 World Cup had nothing to do with any of that stuff. It was just a bad team environment, our standards were not good enough and we kept getting stitched up.
While I understood what Stuart was trying to do, some of it was overkill and ended up being a bit annoying. It is nice to get a message from an old coach or a family member every now and again, but it was happening all the time under Stuart. And it did not always have the desired effect. When they asked my dad to record a video, he looked straight at the camera and said, “Your mother and I are very proud of you but try not to lose this weekend, James.”