>> Coach Johnno ‘would have won World Cup’
John Wells, Newcastle defence coach and former England forwards guru, offers NEALE HARVEY a typically candid assessment of the Falcons, his previous stint with the national team and the urgent issues currently facing the Red Rose boss Eddie Jones.
How do you reflect on last season and how proud were you of taking Falcons into the play-offs?
We all have different skill-sets and one of the beauties of what Dean Richards has done at Newcastle is put people together who rub-up against each other but get the best out of each other. I’ve had plenty of robust conversations with Dean since the days I started playing with him at Leicester, let alone working for him, and it’s same with all our coaches. But when coaches deliver what we delivered last season and the playing group respond as we did, it makes the achievement all the more worthwhile. Everybody at Newcastle had to squeeze the toothpaste to get the very best out of each other and that’s the aspect we should be most proud of. Ultimately, everything came together and the fact we won so many tight games showed the players were prepared to fight.
Be honest, how good did it feel to go to your old club Leicester on the penultimate weekend, win 25-23 and put them out of the play-offs?
It was one of those better moments you have in your career without actually winning a trophy. There’s obviously history there for Dean and myself and the way I finished was very different to his. I left there very amicably but it’s a business now and when you go back you want to win. It’s the first time I’d ever won at Leicester outside being a player or coach there, so knowing how tough it is to win at that place when the opposition is playing for the same prize made the result one of my best ever. We had Leicester and Wasps to play in our final two games and knew we needed a performance. We could have finished fourth or as low as eighth, so for the lads to come up with what they did to win at Tigers was a fantastic achievement.
Having made the play-offs, was the trip to Exeter just a step too far?
Brutally, yes. We got completely outplayed and make no bones about that. We gave Exeter a really good game at home but have always struggled at Sandy Park. Exeter brought their A1 game and the dam burst so no complaints over the 36-5 loss.
After improving from 11th to finish eighth and fourth in the last two years there’s expectation around Newcastle. Any danger of falling from your pedestal?
Of course, we could. There are 12 teams with different motivations for wanting to do well and there’s no doubt we want to replicate the season we had last year, but we also know that with two weeks left we could have finished eighth – fine margins. We did ride our luck at times last season, we’re not hiding from that, but we rode our luck on the fact we tried to play good rugby and had boys with character. We’re going to try to give ourselves an opportunity again.
Recruitment has included such as Logovi’i Mulipola, George McGuigan, Johnny Williams, Tom Arscott and Josh Basham. Satisfied with that?
It’s what we can afford, being brutal. We’ve tried to recognise where we’ve struggled a bit and within our limitations recruited accordingly. Three of those guys are capable of slipping into the first team straight away while others are good prospects who might take a month or a year depending on pre-season, but we’re not in a position to sort everything out with money and we’ve done a good job of developing what we have up here. We have guys who never give up, always keep going and sometimes that’s a more priceless talent than the millions you can spend on players.
Is there more growth in some of your shining lights like Will Welch, Calum Green and Mark Wilson?
There comes a cut-off point, either through age or injury, but all these guys are under 30 and can continue to improve. Calum Green came here in 2014 and has improved aspects of his game, not just a little bit but considerably. He’s never been left behind by other bigger name locks in the Premiership, he’s always been willing to work incredibly hard to try to keep up with, and even surpass, what’s around him both at the club and beyond. It’s the same with Will Welch and they are typical of the type of guys we have playing – full of heart, endeavour and brilliant club men who never give up. What they bring to the club in terms of organisation is priceless and there’ll be pressure on them now to be even better because that’s the culture we’re trying to produce up here. Mark Wilson’s just come off the back of a tour to South Africa and he still sees a huge opportunity to get himself to a World Cup next year. Those three guys still have plenty to play for and it will be a massive motivation for them.
Can Calum Green consider himself unlucky not to have had an England call?
Calum’s certainly got a good skill-set across the board, but the problem he’s got is the country is blessed with a number of high quality second rows. There are three at Saracens alone so for Calum to come out as last season’s top lineout stealer in the Premiership and be one of its top tacklers, I’d say he’s been incredibly unlucky.
Turning the clock back, how grateful were you that Newcastle rescued you in 2012 after losing your job with England in the aftermath of the 2011 World Cup?
They didn’t come to my rescue and personally I’d have been happy to put my feet up and do something else! But Mike Ford was up here and he asked me to help out for a couple of months – and I’m still here. Everything snowballed from there but what I’m grateful to Newcastle for is being loyal to me when things haven’t been going so well, and that’s the difference. It’s all right getting hired in the first place but we haven’t always done so well and after finishing 11th for three seasons on the spin there would have been a lot of people saying, ‘let’s get rid’. But with our owner, Semore Kurdi, being a stable person and Dean being an even more stable and loyal character, part of the reason this club has been successful is there haven’t been individuals above my pay grade jumping as soon as something hasn’t gone right. What happened last season was in no small part due to not boarding the managerial merry-go-round. Sometimes change is a good thing and my role has changed from forwards to defence, while Micky Ward is now forwards coach and Dave Walder came in, but the stability Dean and Semore have brought on and off the pitch has led us the right way. Stability, trust and loyalty are strong words that this club adheres to.
Do you still look back at that 2011 World Cup campaign with regret?
No. There was a lot of b ****** s written about it and a lot of things that were blown up out of proportion. I was obviously fortunate to spend a lot of time with Johnno (Martin Johnson) and when you hear stories about 2003, things weren’t a lot different. The dif-
ference was that ever since Jonny Wilkinson kicked the winning goal that year, it changed the way the media looked at rugby, for better or worse. We were maligned in 2011 but we’d won the Six Nations and got to the World Cup quarter-finals unbeaten, but for a bad 20 minutes against France, we could have won it. Let’s put things in perspective a bit: Gareth Southgate wins three games, draws one and loses three at a World Cup and they come back national heroes; we lost two competitive games in a year and got pilloried. People judged us on two or three overblown incidents off the pitch when the overall picture was much better.
Should Martin Johnson have offloaded you and the other coaches and stayed on?
100 per cent! Johnno asked for our thoughts and I said, ‘mate, it’s time for me to move on but you must stay’. He’d been through all the processes, good and bad, and, in my opinion, he’d have been a World Cup winner as a coach. But he felt let down by a number of things, made up his mind and that was that.
Find it hard watching England now?
Not at all. I haven’t been to Twickenham since but only because I can’t be arsed. Why sit in the stand and battle the trains and traffic when I can get a much better view on TV? People think coaching England is the bees-knees but whether it’s the national team or Old Dickonians down the road you only want to do your best, but you’ll always be judged by results and I do think the Press can have be a big factor in how you’re perceived. You can be a really good coach and get slammed, or you can be an average coach and be blown up out of all proportions. That’s just the way of life, but I don’t give a s**t about it. I know the job I do up here, I know how hard I work and what the other people here think of me. We wouldn’t have done what we did last year if we didn’t all have a high regard for each other and that’s what’s important to me.
What do you make of England right now?
It’s about whether they can bounce through this period right here and now. When they won their 18 games on the bounce they weren’t as good a side as some people made out, and they’re not a bad side now. There’s probably a middle ground there but they’ve still got many of the same problems that England have had over the last 8-10 years: they’ve still not sorted the 10-1213 combo and they’ve still got issues in the back row. In all positions they’ve got fantastic players but players with other countries like Ireland and Wales are probably just working together a bit better at the moment. I’ve got no doubt that if England could get these areas sorted by the time they come to the World Cup they could still be very successful. If Billy Vunipola can get to the level he’s capable of England are a far better team with him there, and some of the Lions lads are having a half-decent rest and pre-season now and should come back better. If they can get another good preseason before the World Cup England won’t be far away, but it will also be interesting to see what Eddie Jones does with the coaching set-up. In theory they need a backs coach and a defence coach and that will go a long way to determining whether they can make the best of the playing resources available.
How do you see the issue around England’s No.7 spot?
Tom Curry, right, has come on enormously as a No.7 but the jury is still out and he’s not getting all the positive vibes you need to know that you’re going to be the England incumbent for the next few matches. As soon as the season gets going there’ll be people talking about Gary Graham, Sam Underhill, Mark Wilson and others but it’s one of the key positions and we haven’t got it resolved because as a nation we’re not sure what we want.
Are England being hindered by the way the breakdown is being reffed in the Premiership?
Yes. I think it’s f***ing us completely. I think the Premiership referees are too good! They referee it by the letter of the law but when you get into international rugby or Europe the game is a little bit quicker and looser and people don’t want to see the amount of penalties that come from the breakdown. You can get away with it in international rugby and the fact that a lot of PRO14 teams – Scotland, Wales and Ireland – have all got significant numbers of what you’d call natural No.7s, you’re allowed to develop those skills and bring them into games, which they can then take into the international arena because the refereeing isn’t as sharp. They give you more opportunity to compete for the ball aggressively on the floor, whereas in the Premiership referees are on your case straight away. You then get coaches on the players’ backs and you end up not competing for the ball because you’ll get pinged off the park. If everyone refereed like Wayne Barnes I think you’d see an all-round improvement of English players at the breakdown because he gets the balance right. He encourages an aggressive contest but also hammers a guy who goes too far.
Back to Newcastle, how do you fancy a Champions Cup Pool with Toulon, Montpellier and Edinburgh?
You look at the quality of those teams and you know what we’re coming up against, so let’s just give it a crack. Let’s give ourselves an opportunity of beating these sides at Kingston Park and then if we can go away and nick a win or pick up a few bonus points, you never know. It’s a great challenge.
Huge year ahead for rugby in Newcastle with another big game at St James’ Park, the European finals and England playing a World Cup warm-up there?
I hope so. It’s always been a tough gig up here in the face of football but the 2015 World cup broke the mould and the event at St James’ Park last season was magnificent. With the brand of rugby Newcastle are trying to play people are taking notice and the whole atmosphere up here is different. We’re breaking the barriers down and putting rugby on the map thanks to a lot of very hard work from everyone. The club is going the right way and one day I’d love to help take us into a Premiership final at Twickenham.
“Everyone at Falcons had to squeeze the toothpaste to get the very best out of each other”