Hard-wired Farrell is too much of a risk as the captain
Nick Cain looks at problems England may cause themselves with leadership decision
THE ‘break-out-thebunting’ fanfare after Owen Farrell pronounced himself fit to face Ireland was understandable. The England fly-half is a proven match-winner and the confirmation at the Six Nations launch on Wednesday that, following successful surgery on a thumb tendon, he will be in the Red Rose line-up in Dublin on Saturday evening was a huge relief.
Farrell has a long track-record in his 69 Tests overall for England (65) and the Lions (four) for being the right man, right place, right time to get his team over the line with his telling kicking, passing, and turn-overs.
However, there is also a lingering fear from the Autumn series that his hard-wired tendency to tackle high also makes him a potential yellow and red card liability. This conundrum goes to the heart of whether Farrell, who has also shown signs of getting on the wrong side referees with over-aggressive questioning, should be England captain.
That he relishes playing the lead role is not in doubt. Although Farrell is not the most accurate goalkicker in the Six Nations – Leigh Halfpenny, Greig Laidlaw and Johnny Sexton were all ahead of him in terms of success percentage from 2016 to just before the 2018 Autumn series – it is more that he invariably kicks the ones that count.
The huge pressure kick to draw the third Test of the 2017 Lions tour in Auckland, levelling the series, was a case in point.
When it comes to being an ultra competitor Farrell is in the front rank. It is this quality that made Eddie Jones promote him to the England captaincy – first as a co-captain with Dylan Hartley, and now that the Northampton hooker is sidelined for the start of the Six Nations, out there on his own.
However, it is Farrell’s inability to keep his ultra-competitive instincts in check that make him both a key asset and a possible Achilles heel as England open their 2019 Six Nations account at the Aviva Stadium.
Farrell was lucky to escape yellow cards for two high-hit collisions in November, the first on South Africa’s bench centre Andre Esterhuizen in the last act of the first Autumn Test at Twickenham, and the second three weeks later on Australia lock Isack Rodda.
In the first instance the stakes were sky-high, because had Farrell conceded a penalty or been carded or cited for a dangerous tackle England would almost certainly have lost the opening game, and the fly-half might not have been available to play against New Zealand the following Saturday. Farrell’s no-arms collision with Rodda to thwart an Australian try just before half-time saw the visitors have to make do with a penalty to level the score, rather than a penalty try which would have given them a lead at the interval.
Both rulings smacked of ‘home-town’ refereeing decisions in which the local boy was given the benefit of considerable doubt over the legality of either tackle – and it is my belief that had they not been at Twickenham, Farrell would have been sin-binned for both, and possibly red-carded.
The furore that followed the incidents will only add to Farrell’s notoriety for pushing high tackle margins to the limit – and that could mean bad news for the fly-half, and for England, over the course of this tournament.
Springbok coach Rassie Erasmus said tongue-in-cheek that he would advise his players that it is legitimate to tackle with a high shoulder to the chest/face of opponents. A couple of weeks later his Wallaby counterpart Michael Cheika fumed that the referee’s refusal to award a penalty try and sin-bin Farrell for his shoulder charge altered the course of the match.
These controversies, and the complaints they prompted, will not have been lost on the World Rugby panel referees taking charge of England’s games over the next seven weeks in the Six Nations.
To put it bluntly, Farrell will be a marked man where match officials are concerned.
Jerome Garces, the Frenchman who will be in charge of the Ireland-England encounter, witnessed Farrell’s “hit” on Esterhuizen first-hand as an assistant referee in England’s slender win over South Africa, and is unlikely to offer him any leeway in Dublin.
The same applies to Jaco Peyper, the South African referee who was roundly criticised by media pundits for getting the Rodda decision wrong, and will be in control of proceedings when England face Wales in Cardiff.
If that is not enough reason for Farrell to tread carefully, the appointment of Nigel Owens – who is not the most controversy-shy referee – for England’s home match against France makes it imperative that the Saracens fly-half alters his tackle technique.
You sense that the only way Farrell will be safe from tangling with the referees between now and the end of the 2019 World Cup is if he drops the point of impact in the tackle to lower rib height or below.
My instinct is that Jones should have erred on the side of caution in this Six Nations, and kept Farrell out of the captaincy mix, in the same way that his Irish counterpart Joe Schmidt has done with Johnny Sexton.
Fly-halves like Farrell and Sexton are not just chief tacticians who execute the kicking strategy, call backline moves, and make sure the numbers are right in defence, they are also goto goal-kickers, and resp for restarts. That is enough for any to have on their plate wi the added responsibili captaincy. Yet, where gets to concentrate own game while R Best brings his e ence and nous t as Ireland’s ca Farrell is Eng head chef, bot washer, and ga extractor – and, ly, also has to rem change his tackling nique. The amount of respon that 10s carry without th taincy explains why ther been very few successful captains at test level. Phil Bennett in 1977 is fly-half to have captaine Lions team in the post-w while England have had short-term fly-half capta Richard Sharp (for five T the 1960s), and three tem stand-in skippers since t with Rob Andrew, Jonny son and George Ford eac
the job for two Tests.
Maro Itoje is an obvious captaincy candidate who, like Farrell, ticks the box of being one of the first names on the team sheet.
Itoje’s 26 England caps, and the kudos of being a 2017 Lions Test lock in New Zealand, means that the 24-year-old is no longer a new kid on the block. He also demonstrated leadership qualities earlier in his career, taking over as England U20 captain to win the 2014 Junior World Championship title in Auckland.
While Itoje’s competitive instincts mean that he is sometimes impulsive on the pitch, his ability to be disciplined and think rationally is underlined by the way he managed the dual demands of a pro rugby career with completing a degree in politics at the School of African and Oriental Studies so successfully.
Thus far Farrell has not demonstrated he has the diplomatic touch required to communicate well with referees, whereas Itoje’s study of politics will have impressed on him the significance of the art of persuasion.
Throughout the three years Jones has coached England the number of penalties they concede has been a thorny issue, and Itoje has the right attributes to do something about it.
During last season’s slump England were in double figures in almost every match at a time when most successful international coaches consider anything over six penalties to be a bad day at the office.
For the record, England’s penalty ledger in the last Six Nations was Wales ten conceded, Scotland 13, France 16, Ireland 11. The indiscipline continued when they lost the first two Tests of the South Africa tour, conceding 12 in Johannesburg and 13 in Bloemfontein.
When the fivematch losing streak was eventually halted with the win in Cape Town the tourists conceded a respectable six penalties – but it was back to bad habits with 11 leaked against South Africa in the Autumn opener, and another 12 against Japan. However, either side of that in England’s two best November performances they were back to single figures, with seven against New Zealand and five against Australia.
For England to win in Dublin they cannot afford to concede penalties in double figures. It is the surest way to shoot yourself in the foot against a side of Ireland’s quality. The same applies for the remainder of the Six Nations, and going forward into the World Cup.
Itoje has already grasped the nettle. He told The Rugby Paper before the South Africa tour that it was imperative for England to improve discipline in order to end their losing streak. Unfortunately, in the first two Tests his teammates did not heed the call – and nor did the Saracens lock follow his own advice.
Like all the best forwards Itoje has an edge to him, and after making a couple of uncharacteristic mistakes, he and others allowed Springbok sledging to get under their skins. In the Autumn he compounded the error by being given a yellow card against South Africa for killing the ball, having been penalised already for two maul infringements.
However, Itoje has demonstrated throughout his rapid rise to the top that he has the priceless ability to learn quickly from his mistakes, and the lower penalty counts against New Zealand and Australia indicated that he and his team-mates may have turned the corner.
There are no shortage of examples in Rugby Union that the best game-keepers have often been reformed poachers – England’s 2003 world champion captain Martin Johnson among them – and that, combined with Farrell’s full plate, is why Itoje should captain England.